I Gave Up My Dreams for the One I Loved

And I can’t say I regret it

I was 31 by the time I met my last partner. I wasn’t in a hurry to get married and have children, but I was certainly mindful that I was smack in the middle of my fertile years and that I didn’t want to wait too long before having a child.

During our first Christmas together, my partner and I were helping his parents set up a tree in their house. I remember he peeked around the tree at me, smiling, and said, “I love this so much. It’s like we’re married.”

As the months went by, he talked about how important it was for him to have a traditional family. He wanted to get married to a “Donna Reed type,” have a few children (preferably boys), eat dinner together, and have family movie night once a week.

I was very open with him about how much I also wanted to get married and have children. We didn’t agree on much except that we seemed to want to build a life together. But I suspected it would take him a year or two to be ready to make this commitment and that in that time, we could work out our differences.

Two years into our relationship, we decided to move in together. I was thrilled. I sensed he would propose soon.

My first hint that things weren’t going the way I expected happened when we were shopping and he grabbed my hand, excitedly, and said, “Come with me.” He pulled me into a high-end jewelry store, and my breath caught in my throat. I thought, He’s going to ask me to pick out a ring.

After the initial shock wore off just seconds later, I felt a strange tickle in my gut. He knew I didn’t want a fancy, expensive ring. What were we doing there?

At the counter, he asked the sales attendant for information on tungsten rings. He said his friend had just gotten one and he thought they were cool and wanted to know how much they cost.

I didn’t want a diamond ring. I didn’t really care about an engagement ring, at all. But still…I felt crushed.

A few months later, I asked if we could talk. What had happened to our marriage plans? I asked. It was time to be direct.

He looked uncomfortable and finally confessed that he didn’t believe in marriage anymore and didn’t want to have children. Maybe we could get married in 5–10 years. And maybe we could have a kid at that time. Maybe.

I reminded him I’d be 43 by then and that I wasn’t sure I wanted to wait that long to have a child. He said he was sorry but that it was the only answer he could give me.

I knew I had to make a choice then: Him or my dream.

I chose him.

At the time, I would have said that love is more important than anything. That love asks us to make sacrifices. That it’s okay to give up what you want if the trade-off is worth it. And honestly, I believed, somewhere in the back of my mind, that he would change his mind. I believed he would marry me and we would have our baby someday.

Five years later, he left me for another woman — a single mother. She told him if he wanted to be with her, he had to marry her immediately and consider becoming her child’s adoptive father. He moved out of the house, married her, and for five years, he raised that child with her.

Meanwhile, at 43 — the age I reminded him I would be if I waited for him to be ready to take the steps of marriage and parenthood in our relationship — I am still single and childless.

For a long time after the breakup, I berated myself for choosing him instead of my dreams. I thought I had made a mistake. Obviously, his issues weren’t with marriage and parenthood, as he demonstrated by marrying his girlfriend and raising her kid with her. His issues were with me.

He didn’t want me. It was as simple as that.

Somehow, I thought I should have been able to figure that out, to have stood up for myself and what I wanted. I thought I should have left and doggedly pursued dating until I found a partner who was on the same page — someone who would be eager and excited about marriage and parenthood.

There was nothing more feminist, more self-nurturing than that, right?

But over the years, I’ve come to think that maybe it’s not so simple.

I made decisions based on what I believed at the time. I loved him. I believed he loved me. I believed that could get us past any obstacle.

There’s nothing wrong with believing in love, holding on to hope, or even giving up something important in order to secure something that feels precious.

I took a gamble and I lost. And that’s okay.

I don’t think there’s a simple answer to the question: Should I give up my dreams for the one I love? That question requires serious inquiry and sometimes years of weighing one’s options. Some women wouldn’t be able to give up the ring or the baby no matter how much they loved their partner, while others might find my choice quite relatable.

People have asked, “Won’t you regret not having a child? Won’t you regret never having gotten married?”

The truth is: I don’t.

There was a time when I was quite bitter about it all and felt that I had lost my chance to experience that kind of commitment, or to experience motherhood. I thought I had missed my only window and there was no going back.

But I don’t feel that way, anymore.

I’m grateful that I didn’t experience marriage with that man. Let’s face it: It would’ve ended the way it ended with or without a ring, so I’m grateful that his commitment phobia spared me from a painful and messy divorce.

I’m similarly grateful that we never had a child together. I can hardly imagine the pain that would’ve followed if we had — to watch him and his wife take my baby every other weekend, to have to face the pain of his infidelity every time we met for a drop-off or pick-up. It would have broken my heart a little more every single time.

And to answer the voice in my head that once berated me for not leaving sooner, for not finding another mate: The truth is, I loved him more than I’d ever loved anyone until the moment he ran away with his girlfriend. Even if I had been strong enough to leave him, there wouldn’t have been any room in my heart for a new man, or even a child that wasn’t his.

I had to let the relationship play out the way it did. It was the only way I could have truly let him go.

Five years after our breakup, I can say with certainty that it was okay that I gave up my dreams for him. At that time, it made sense to me. At that time, it felt worth it.

And I know now that my time isn’t up. Forty-three isn’t the end of the road for me. There are still people to date. There might even be a child in my future — maybe. Maybe. Despite what our culture says about women after 40, I believe with all my heart that I have time. And if I don’t…it’ll be okay.

But would I do it again? Would I give up the dream of getting married or having a child for my next partner?

The truth is, I don’t know what my dreams are anymore. I’ve learned that the future is impossible to visualize with any sense of clarity and that trying to do so is a waste of time.

We can only know what we feel in the moment. A relationship is far, far more than an engagement ring, a wedding, a baby. There are other joys, other blessings, other markers, other challenges. It’s not a simple, step-by-step trajectory, but rather a repetitive collision of lives, choices, dramas, passions, and irritations.

We sacrifice things we want, things we love, in every moment. And in every moment, we also receive endless gifts.

Who’s to say what or how much we should sacrifice for something as complex as love?

We can only do our best to answer this question for ourselves and, ultimately, be willing to find peace with the answer we choose.

© Yael Wolfe 2020