My Boyfriend Is Wasting My Last Chance At Getting Pregnant

Q: What do you do if you've been dating someone for almost three years, and you live together, but they aren't proposing?

I'm almost 40, and this is likely my last shot at getting pregnant naturally. I only have one ovary left. In the first two years, my boyfriend and I were so in love and he was so effortful and engaged in courtship. Now that we live together, he has almost become dreadfully predictable and almost boring, and worse, sometimes he's disrespectful.

We went on a trip to Tahiti, and he had literally the most perfect opportunity to propose — a waterfall hike with no one else around — but still, no ring.

I'm starting to get that horrifying feeling in my gut that he is never going to propose and that he doesn't actually see me as his life partner. I'm afraid to end this because I want to become a mother, and I'm equally afraid to continue to move forward without deep, legitimate commitment. I feel like I’m screwed either way. If he proposes at this point, I’d almost question if it was legitimate because he’s been so resistant.

What is a woman supposed to do in this situation? How do I stop acting like a faux-wife and put limits on this without destroying the most successful relationship of my life?

A: I am so, so, so deeply sorry. This relationship is not for you. It has nothing you want in it. I do not think there is any metric in which this relationship is “successful” other than in your memory of its beginning.

I have so much I want to say to you. If you ever catch me out and about around half a bottle of wine, please introduce yourself so I can drop everything and tell you every thought I have about your situation for three hours and 47 minutes (coincidentally, the runtime of Lawrence of Arabia).

An engagement is supposed to be an expression of a deep, intentional love, not a rancorous capitulation to your partner. A ring is a symbol of commitment, not its stand-in. Marriage should not be a concession; having children should not be a favor. It should be abundantly clear with or without these events that a person wants to be with you.

That is not the case for your relationship, which is why a proposal has become so significant. You’re looking for a sign that your boyfriend cares about you, that he wants you, that he chooses you, that he wants to build a life with you.

And maybe he does in his own way! Maybe you two are simply on different timelines — maybe he would want what you want, but in seven years. Maybe his version of commitment doesn’t require a proposal. There are plenty of people who do not want marriage or kids at all, maybe he is one of them. I don’t know. Have you asked him? If not, trying to make sense of this is like looking down a storm drain in hopes of understanding calculus.

It’s one thing to drag your partner to a magical evening at Medieval Times but to drag someone through parenthood? That is my idea of a perfect hell.

You know a lot more about his specific hangups than I do, but what I do know is this: Parenting is the group project to end all group projects. You’re considering picking someone who doesn’t show up to class, didn’t buy the textbook, and doesn’t seem to fully respect you?

And I’m not certain he’s willing to raise children with you. I am genuinely unclear about if you believe you can somehow convince him to propose and start trying to have a baby. It’s one thing to drag your partner to a magical evening at Medieval Times but to drag someone through parenthood? That is my idea of a perfect hell.

The way someone has treated you in the past is often a great indicator of how they will treat you (and their children) in the future. I would be miserable and feel more alone raising a child with a man who was rude to me — or heaven forbid, our child. I would also not want for my child to have a man like that as their parent.

But I am not you. I’m not in your shoes. It’s easy for me to instruct you to give up the future you’ve yearned for, and much harder for me to offer you a wonderful alternative. (Unless you have like a really hot, desirable ex whom you still kind of have a thing for, who is waiting in the wings. If that’s the case, please go get him and start trying.)

For starters, know that your biological clock won’t necessarily run out on your next birthday. More people are now having kids in their 40s than in their teens. If you haven’t spoken to a fertility doctor yet, please do (or multiple, if you can afford to). Can you get your AMH levels tested? (The anti-müllerian hormone indicates a person’s ovarian reserve, which is linked to — but not a definitive picture of — the odds of conception.) Is freezing your eggs an option? Is there anything else you can do or ought to know in order to have the best chance of conceiving in the future?

Beyond that, you need to figure out what you will compromise on and what you will not. I do not think that this man is “your person” in the grand, poetic sense of that phrase. But he might be your partner. Is motherhood worth sacrificing true love for you? It does not matter what anyone else’s answer to that question is. It only matters what yours is. Many, many, many people across time have said “yes” to that question.

Even if it means losing out on a happier relationship, even if it means a partner who does less parenting work (which I think is likely with this guy’s demonstrated behaviors and lack of conscientiousness), even if it means dragging someone to show you affection or later foregoing it altogether, motherhood may be worth it to you.

But I want to whisper something in your ear just in case: You are also allowed to answer “no.”

You deserve to be loved by someone who cherishes you. You are allowed to mourn and grieve and wail on the bathroom floor about this all, and still come to the conclusion that you cannot have kids with this man simply because he might be your last shot.

Neither leaving nor staying will guarantee you a baby.

That doesn’t mean that the door to biological children is closed. The journey might be markedly harder. You might end up on a journey that you didn’t plan — IVF; using a sperm donor, egg donor, and/or surrogate; adoption or fostering; thriving as a childfree woman and finding joy in being an aunt. Those destinations might make you deliriously happy in a way you could not have foreseen. Still, leaving him is an irrefutable risk. Neither leaving nor staying will guarantee you a baby. Neither leaving nor staying will ruin your chances of having a baby.

Can you happily be a mother while unhappily married? Can you leave knowing it might make having a baby more difficult? Only you can tell me which is the worse tragedy to you.

If you decide you want a future with your boyfriend, you need to have a reckoning with him. Lay out what you want, when, and why. Be clear. Do not hint. Do not fudge your desired timeline. If you want to be engaged by the end of this month, and you would be disappointed if you weren’t, say that.

And then you need to ask something: “What do you want?” It’s very important listen to his answer carefully. Don’t just hear what you want to hear. Ask:

• Do you want to marry me?
• If so, what is holding you back from proposing?
• Do you want to have kids? If so, when do you want to start trying?
• What do you envision our life together looking like?

This is going to be the first of many discussions. I recommend going to a couples therapist together, because these conversations will likely, in clinical terms, really suck. But regardless of the outcome, they will be life-changing.

Is sacrificing your vision of parenthood worth leaving him? Is an increased chance of conceiving a child worth staying with someone disrespectful? I don’t know. I cannot answer that for you. I cannot show you the two paths in the woods and what they would bring. As my mother told me once, “If there were an obvious choice, you would have already chosen it.”

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