toughest decision of my life, should I leave him?

Sad_lass2

I’ve never used one of these message boards before but am faced with making the toughest decision of my life and have already taken a lot of strength from what the generous responders have said to others in my situation...


My partner doesn’t think he wants children in the future and I do...


I have been with my OH for 6 years. We are both about to turn 30. I love him very deeply. When we met it was proper head-over-heels stuff. I had never really been in love before and was totally bowled over by the love and affection I received from him. I felt safe, cared for and respected in a way I never had before. Over the years our love has only deepened, we understand each other really well. We are perfect for each other in so many ways. As gushy as it sounds we make a good team enjoying life together. Our relationship had to be long distance for 2 years after an initial year together because of university but we then moved in together (his suggestion) and have happily lived together for the last 3 years including a year working in New Zealand. As happens our lives have been intertwined with increasingly mutual friendship groups.



I say all the above as explanation in a way. My growing dilemma for the last year or so has been his indifference to having children in the future.
I have always known I want to have a family. My fantasies include the full works: parents who love each other, a couple of kids who feel loved and supported, watching them grow together, experiencing lives shared as they grow up. Like many this has always been a part of what I imagined for the future. I have a job which I love and which I could balance with family life and I worked hard to get here.


I remember my OH saying something to me early in our relationship. He said that he thought men didn’t want children and just got pressured into it by women. I remember thinking this was strange and telling him this simply wasn’t true – there are heaps of men who actively want children themselves. Early on the question came up a few times and he always said he wasn’t sure about kids but wasn’t keen. I guess I stuck my head in the sand (I suppose love is blind) and also listened to friends who said “He’s young, guys are like that...wait til his friends start having children, he’ll probably come around.” I always hoped that was the case.



I’m sensible enough to know you cannot change anyone and shouldn’t want to. Over the last year or so as we approach 30, lots of friends are getting married and some are starting to have children I’ve been talking to him at reasonably regular intervals about how he feels about the whole kids question. He has been saying he is at 49% (he’s a numerical sort of person!) for about the last year in how much he wants to have kids but my growing fear is that he only says this to give me hope he will want to have kids in a few years. In our latest conversations he has said that he will have kids because he wants me to be happy but this doesn’t appear to be coming out of a personal wish to have a family.



We talk all around the reasons for having kids and not and I think our friends and family who know about the dilemma think we are struck by “analysis paralysis” – over thinking a decision which can’t always be reasoned out. I think this is true – despite the many reasons not to have kids I don’t seem to be able to talk myself out of it. I just want them and I’m lying to myself when I imagine being ok not trying for them.



His reasons for not wanting them are both straightforward and complex. The straightforward reasons he gives are probably masking the more complex personal ones. His father was not particularly present during his upbringing – at work all the time. He has fears that after childbirth relationships suffer and interestingly that mothers become less confident and unable to cope (his mother didn’t work and after being quite an adventurer in her youth is now quite shy and meek). He isn’t fond of small children – he has 2 nephews who admittedly live on the other side of the country but in whom he shows little interest. He is also somewhat uninspired by his current career. He is in a very good job but it requires a lot of extra work out of hours and a lot of jumping through hoops to remain in that career. At the moment I think he might be sticking with it partly because he thinks it provides a more secure future for me and any potential family. I think he would probably have kids with me to make me happy and in the hope that he’d enjoy family life once it came along. But I obviously have loud alarm bells going off in my head over “trapping” him into a life he wouldn’t have planned for himself.



I know I’m asking for the moon on a stick and I can guess what folk who’ve been kind enough to read some of this will say but I LOVE this guy so much. Do I need to cut my losses and recognise that to set him free will make us both happier in the long run or stick with it and help him to work through his reasons for not wanting kids???....
Thanks for any advice

I am a friend

I also think ye are overthinking and over talking all of this. Ask him 3 straight questions:

- do you want kids with me?
- when do you want to have them?
- if we have kids are you likely to feel trapped.

The first one has to be a yes or no answer and no more B/S % type answers. The second has to be a definitive timeline and the last one has to be a best guess.

He may love you alright but his lack of clarity around such an important issue will never make you happy. It suits him but he in reality is only wasting your time. There are other guys out there who want the same as you. If your current bf doesn't then you need to meet someone who does.

December2012

What you could do is go to a relationship counsellor to talk through this issue.

One or two sessions may help, or it may take more, but the counsellor can facilitate you both discussing this very emotive issue in a way that is safe and allows you both express yourselves and be listened to.

mood

You should read the thread below. Very similar situation.

The bottom line is he need to give you a yes or no answer. Then you need to decide if you will stay with him or leave him. He can't expect you to waste more years with him and still not know what he wants. I suspect he is reluctant to tell you the truth in case you leave.



http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056599037

Piliger

Hi OP. Such a painful and complex and difficult situation. I really sympathise.

I am 50, male, and have one son.
I had no interest whatsoever in kids until I was about 25. They didn't even appear on my radar. Then suddenly one day something clicked when I was with some small children and their parents, friends I think, and I flipped to the exact opposite. I ca't explain it except I was the baby of my house and it was a very unhappy house.

A few thoughts that come to mind after reading your post:
- Firstly I am very concerned that you might persuade him to have children and then be condemned to a life of conflict and unhappiness with a man who resents it and takes it out on you and the kid(s). Thus I would stop completely trying to persuade him or thinking about therapy of any kind.
- It sounds like he has been drip feeding you his opposition and just saying whatever makes you happy at the time..... 49% ... to make you happy ... etc.

My overall response to you is to say that if you are left with no children, the pain and unhappiness for you will be unbearable and you will have many many years to suffer it. Love is great. Love is what we are told we all need. But the truth is love is just not enough! I would suggest that you manoeuvre yourselves to spend some time, VERY casually, with friends who have small children a few times over the next 6 months. Make sure they are small and loveable and not badly behaved :rolleyes: Make NO effort to be encouraging! Let him feel what it's like to hold a small baby (especially where, ay, he is left on his own in a room for a few minutes with it). Let him feel what it's like to have a small beautiful little child sit on his knee and laugh.

The result may be nothing. But it will be a very useful indicator about him and your future together. You never know it may spark something inside him. I have seen it happen, not just with me.

In closing. If it doesn't work I truly and honestly suggest that you do the toughest thing. Walk away. It will be ghastly and painful. But you have a passion to have a child. You can't sacrifice that, in my personal opinion anyway.

Sad_lass2

mood wrote: »

You should read the thread below. Very similar situation.

The bottom line is he need to give you a yes or no answer. Then you need to decide if you will stay with him or leave him. He can't expect you to waste more years with him and still not know what he wants. I suspect he is reluctant to tell you the truth in case you leave.



http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056599037

Thanks very much for this and thank you to the other responders. I have read the above thread and found it really useful. It was from this post that I found this website. I think our situations are very similar but I suppose your own situation feels distinct to you which is why I posted. Unlike her partner, my bf has been quite willing to discuss things with me as recognises its importance to me and I think he is trying to force himself to come round to the idea of kids to keep us together. This doesn't feel like a good way to start a family.


That's why I find it useful to hear from others who've been in a similar situation. I had believed that it was quite a male thing to be slower to come round to the idea of having children and that he might change his mind. Now I'm starting to feel that he has had long enough to give me a yes/no to whether he wants them with me and as the other posters have said once he gives me this it is down to me to decide what to do. The difficulty is him saying yes but feeling that he's only doing it to keep us together.


I don't think he understands the yearning for a family at all. He said at one point "you want kids more than you want me." But it's more complex than that - I've wanted kids long before I met him. It's not an either/or choice... And if he genuinely did want kids I think we'd be married by now. That's what makes this so hard. I've been in tears on and off all day (he's out) knowing what I probably have to get the guts to do. It's so painful.

Sad_lass2

Piliger wrote: »

Hi OP. Such a painful and complex and difficult situation. I really sympathise.

I would suggest that you manoeuvre yourselves to spend some time, VERY casually, with friends who have small children a few times over the next 6 months. Make sure they are small and loveable and not badly behaved :rolleyes: Make NO effort to be encouraging! Let him feel what it's like to hold a small baby (especially where, ay, he is left on his own in a room for a few minutes with it). Let him feel what it's like to have a small beautiful little child sit on his knee and laugh.

The result may be nothing. But it will be a very useful indicator about him and your future together. You never know it may spark something inside him. I have seen it happen, not just with me.

In closing. If it doesn't work I truly and honestly suggest that you do the toughest thing. Walk away. It will be ghastly and painful. But you have a passion to have a child. You can't sacrifice that, in my personal opinion anyway.

Thank you so much for this heartfelt and warm reply, I really
appreciate it.

We have just spent the last week on and off with friends and family's small children which is one of the reasons things are coming to a head. He played with them a bit but could only find negative things to say about the experience along the lines of - they're exhausting, look how they have taken over their parents' lives etc... And I think it's partly this that led him to say another "I don't think we are missing anything - you and me" ie we don't need little people to complete us...we're enough as we are... The trouble being I don't feel the same way.

I am a friend

Op you have said it all - it's not enough for you. There is nothing wrong with not wanting kids but what he is doing wrong is not giving you a straight answer.

He doesn't appear to have the baby bug at all and truth be told it seems that no matter what he says now, his actions up to now I.e. Half heartedly saying he wants kids will mean you will never be comfortable having kids with him. He would have to move the world to convince you he is genuine I think. The question is can he, in all fairness to himself, do that? Can he do it quickly enough to not waste and more years of your time? I don't envy you.

Piliger

One thing that makes this kind of thing so difficult for a woman, I feel, is the feeling of being selfish and calculating. I can understand it completely. But sometimes life is like that !

The OP has some time. It's not a critical issue right now this week. However although she has time to have kids, she may not have time to end this relationship and find another partner ..... that is the time issue imho.

I want to give this young man a chance. I hate to see a love fail because of an issue like this. I truly feel that it is worth giving things a chance for another 6 months.

OP - keep with the program for a while .... another time or three with the kids (A small baby, and not toddlers running around driving everyone crackers :rolleyes: ) I still think it's possible. The ice may melt. His childhood experience, which may be a lot more traumatic than he is letting on, may also melt.

Keep is low low key and avoid the whole subject during this time imho.

Best of luck.

daisybelle2008

Like other posters I would agree to give your OH a chance. But I would seriously caution trying to make him spend time with other peoples small babies in an effort to make him 'melt'. It always has the opposite effect on me! The smaller they are the less I want to be around them. In fact I find it exhausting and a little distressing to be honest, just like your boyfriend. Also like your boyfriend with his nephews, I too don't really spend much time with mine and am not that interested (until they become teenagers or young adults). Remember that in the States they get teenage girls to spend time with real babies in an effort to put them off getting pregnant! He is only going to point out the winding, crying, dirty nappies, constant feeding, lack of sleep and attention required. .. I have been around 100's of babies and no 'melting' has or ever will occur. I would feel annoyed and manipulated if you were orchestrating baby situations with that agenda Everyone says it is different with your own and bonding with them is much more natural, so I don't think the comparison is ever going to be fair

Your boyfriend has said that he will have children with you, it does appear to me that he values the relationship more then his 51% uncertainty. I would really consider that this is a very good position.
I could see myself making that decision if I met someone I felt as strongly about as your boyfriend feels about you (and I would be exactly of your boyfriends thinking now). Relationships are about compromise and he is making that because of his love for you.

I would see it as a very positive thing that despite his lack of paternal instinct he is willing to have a family with you. He can be as good a parent as someone who desperately wanted children. In fact he possibly could be better as he is definitely not looking to fulfill himself through children. Please do not consider it 'trapping' him in a life he wouldn't have choosen. He very clearly has a choice. If he is choosing to stay with you and have children then that is his choice to make. Not everyone who has kids it 100% sure, one of my best friends is having children because her husband wants them, but she is happy to do that.

fungun

I think he would probably have kids with me to make me happy and in the hope that he’d enjoy family life once it came along. But I obviously have loud alarm bells going off in my head over “trapping” him into a life he wouldn’t have planned for himself.

If he decides he will have children with you because he wants to be with you and wants to make you happy, then that is not 'trapping' him. Its his choice based on what is important in his life (much the same type of choice as you are facing now). And if he makes that choice he should not resent you for it.
I think its time for a discussion where you say you think you might have to break up if he doesnt want kinds (not sure have you done this already). This means that if he says he is happy to have kids with you, it is not a vague yes but you saying something on the lines of you will come off the pill when your current batch runs out (if thats what you use). This at least forces him to think of the reality of his choice

Not too sure about the advice to spend time with other peoples kids. I still usually dislike spending time with other peoples kids, even though i love spending time with mine. If you are thinking of the 'influence him' path, Id be more inclined to have him talk to male friends who may have a child you is now >4 (preferably ~8), kids that age are a more positive experience for most men.

I am a friend

daisybelle2008 wrote: »

I would see it as a very positive thing that despite his lack of paternal instinct he is willing to have a family with you.

I strongly disagree with this viewpoint.. Why would you want to bring a child into the world who is not wanted by his / her father? Seriously

So what would the dynamic be? You look after the kid 100% cos he doesnt want any part other than be the sperm donor? What affect will this have on the child??? No one here is thinking about the child!!!! I think if you go ahead with this, as things stand, you will be winning the battle but losing the war.

Sad_lass2 wrote: »

him to say another "I don't think we are missing anything - you and me" ie we don't need little people to complete us...we're enough as we are... .

This does not sound like a man who wants kids....

Its really really hard having kids and you need both parties onboard 150% or else it is often too much for one person to take on. IMHO, the worst possible thing you can do for yourself and the child is have an unwilling and uninterested father who is only doing it to keep the peace.

curlzy

Hey OP,

I'm in the exact opposite situation. My fiancée definately wants kids, and I'm not so sure. However, I've told him that I will have them as he wants them but I'm staying in work and he can be a stay at home dad. Similarly 2 other friend don't want kids but their fellas do, so you can tell your BF that only women wanting them is BS:D If I were you I wouldn't pressure him, pressure to procreate is beyond stomach turning and deeply unsexy. Maybe have a little faith that he will want them down the road? At the end of the day he sounds like the love of your life and he's 49% sure he wants them, I wouldn't walk away if I were you.

Best of luck.

daisybelle2008

I am a friend wrote: »

I strongly disagree with this viewpoint.. Why would you want to bring a child into the world who is not wanted by his / her father? Seriously

So what would the dynamic be? You look after the kid 100% cos he doesnt want any part other than be the sperm donor? What affect will this have on the child??? No one here is thinking about the child!!!! I think if you go ahead with this, as things stand, you will be winning the battle but losing the war.



.

Where in the OP's post has she said he wants to be no more than a 'sperm donor'?? They seeem to have a very good relationship with each other and while not totally certain about having kids he is happy to compromise in this relationship. He seems willing to compromise. There is not indication that he won't step up to the plate. She also says he is probably staying in his career to provide for a family in the future.

Believe it or not a lot of people feel like that and still go on to be very good parents. They realise that the relationship is more important to them than remaining childless. Some people do not find a relationship that could convince them to change their position. It really is not black and white.

She said he has said that he will have kids because he wants her to be happy...that is a reason for a lot of people and they go onto make a very good family unit because they choose that path.

Jack B. Badd

Sad_lass2 wrote: »

He played with them a bit but could only find negative things to say about the experience along the lines of - they're exhausting, look how they have taken over their parents' lives etc... And I think it's partly this that led him to say another "I don't think we are missing anything - you and me" ie we don't need little people to complete us...we're enough as we are...

Those sentiments sound familiar, I hear them coming out of my own mouth on a regular basis. I don't hate children but I don't particularly like them and I certainly don't want my own - from the sounds of it, neither does your OH.

It sounds like he really loves you and he (foolishly imo) is willing to consider having children to please you but be aware that, for a lot of people who don't want children, part of our desire not to have them is because we don't want to lose or share our OHs. We don't want a third person in our relationship, we don't want to have to vie for our partner's attention when they have someone else who is 100% (or almost) dependent on them.

I'll "put up" with friends' children because that's what I have to do to keep my friends. I would never want to "put up" with my own children to keep my OH. It's not fair, OP, but I really think you should consider this a deal breaker, not 49% or 51% but 100% deal breaker...

I am a friend

Sad_lass2 wrote: »

he has said that he will have kids because he wants me to be happy but this doesn’t appear to be coming out of a personal wish to have a family.

daisybelle2008 wrote: »

Where in the OP's post has she said he wants to be no more than a 'sperm donor'??

He doesn't have a want for a family life.. where does this leave her and the kid? Who plays with the child, cleans their nappy and their nose. what happens if the OP wants more than one child??? He doesnt want kids.

daisybelle2008 wrote: »

They seeem to have a very good relationship with each other and while not totally certain about having kids he is happy to compromise in this relationship. He seems willing to compromise.

Compromise isnt good enough when another human life is involved.

leeroybrown

Piliger wrote: »

My overall response to you is to say that if you are left with no children, the pain and unhappiness for you will be unbearable and you will have many many years to suffer it. Love is great. Love is what we are told we all need. But the truth is love is just not enough! I would suggest that you manoeuvre yourselves to spend some time, VERY casually, with friends who have small children a few times over the next 6 months. Make sure they are small and loveable and not badly behaved :rolleyes: Make NO effort to be encouraging! Let him feel what it's like to hold a small baby (especially where, ay, he is left on his own in a room for a few minutes with it). Let him feel what it's like to have a small beautiful little child sit on his knee and laugh.

The result may be nothing. But it will be a very useful indicator about him and your future together. You never know it may spark something inside him. I have seen it happen, not just with me.

Piliger wrote: »

OP - keep with the program for a while .... another time or three with the kids (A small baby, and not toddlers running around driving everyone crackers :rolleyes: ) I still think it's possible. The ice may melt. His childhood experience, which may be a lot more traumatic than he is letting on, may also melt.

As a couple of other posters have pointed out this idea really is a double-edged sword. I'm not the biggest fan of kids so a tactic like this would probably leave me feeling that I'm glad to be childless. Worse still, I'm not a big fan of underhand tactics so if I figured out that my partner was marching me around the place to socialise me with kids it'd probably put me off the idea too.

I am a friend wrote: »

Compromise isnt good enough when another human life is involved.

Life's all about compromises. I'd say there are a huge number of happy well looked after children out there who were conceived earlier in a relationship, later in a relationship or just conceived full stop because one partner decided that their commitment to their other half was worth it. Some people might do it for completely the wrong reasons but a lot of the time it's just a perfectly normal thing that happens in a solid relationship.

I am a friend

And I would think there are a lot of messed up kids and adults who are messed up because their parents didnt want kids.

theg81der

Hi OP!

Same situation with myself and my hubby I`m now 7 weeks off having a baby. We went to counselling amd it helped. I didn`t put him under pressure or issue an ultimatum although he was aware that it wasn`t fair for us to stay together when I desperately wanted children. So I waited it out basically and he decided he wanted us to have a baby but mostly because he wanted me.
He is a great dad (I have a step daughter) so I know he will put everything into it, alot of the reason he didn`t want kids was the time and commitmnt that he considers it neccessary to put in. He is a naturally nervous person, resistant to change, and his family has "issues" around children and pregnancy so he was never going to jump happily into anything prefering probably for an accident - which I wasn`t going to allow because I believe it should be a decision. Even at the start of the pregnancy he wasn`t sure but now he`s 100% it just takes some people longer.
Look at your partners unconscious behaviour - is he metiulous about birth control? If yes he`s sending you a pretty loud signal if no he may be the same as my hubby. You know anyway in your heart of hearts, no one here can really tell you OP.

hoodwinked

op your relationship may be good now, but having a child can bring on a lot of stress,

if he's not 100% on board with the decision he may resent or even blame you, at times when you're sleep deprived and exhausted he just will end up letting it out as he'll be too tired to hide his true feelings,


from what you say he is very adamant he does not want children and im not sure is your leaving him a ploy in your head that makes you think it will change his mind, if he thinks he'll lose you, if it is, it probably will work but again months down the line you could be dealing with the above,

you cannot compromise with children, once they are here, everything changes for life! there is no "oh this isn't what i thought it would be, lets give them back"


my first thought from reading your posts is if this girl has children with this guy she'll end up a single mum, he's not ready or willing but is willing to put himself into the pressure cooker for her.

its very romantic, but practical is what you need to be for children.