I [F23] don't want biological children and want to adopt, but my [M24] boyfriend of 4 years wants a biological child. What do we do?

TL;DR at the bottom!

So backstory on me [F23] : I've known I wanted to adopt children ever since I was very young. I know I never want to give birth and I have lived the majority of my life having everyone and their mom try and convince me otherwise. As a young adult I'm more in the camp of I don't want kids at all but if I ever do have kids they're going to be adopted. Especially with dating, I've been open and honest about this as well as the fact that I don't particularly have a great family life either. I'm open to surrogacy but with a donor egg and not mine. In my eyes, I'm not passing down some million-dollar legacy and I know I have the capacity to love outside of my own blood. It's selectively altruistic on my part to want to give at least one child a home that they otherwise would not have.

Backstory on my [M24] boyfriend: He was raised a completely different way than I was. He had a loving supportive family and really sees value in continuing his bloodline. Not in the crazy cult way but in the sense that he would love his own flesh and blood more than anything else. He wants to have a family together, and to connect and love something that he created with me. He knows that he wouldn't be able to see an adopted child the same way, especially knowing if he could have potentially had a biological child. He also never really thought of kids until dating me and now he really sees this as a major priority in his life. He’s recently been open with wanting a child but we never had a serious talk about it now. He thinks that it would be great to not have a child and spend all of our money on each other, but he knows down the line that he’s going to feel regret on not having children – which is of course unhealthy for a relationship. He understands what I’m thinking and feel, but we’re both unsure of what to do.

We've been dating for 4 years, officially moved out together about 6 months ago. This is the only reason we would potentially break up. We have great communication with each other and whenever we have a problem we talk it out. We truly love each other and want to get married and spend the rest of our lives together. This is the first issue that has left us legitimately torn, even after talking it it and crying. Our apartment lease renews in August and we'd like to make a concrete decision before then. We only plan on having any sort of children in about 10 years or so, but facing this problem now what do we do?

Do I give up on 4 years of an amazing relationship because of this? Do I eventually have a biological child for the sole purpose of keeping this relationship and not because I really truly want it? Do I hold on to the maybe hope that either of us will change our minds? Do I bank on him being able to truly love an adopted child on his own, or have enough money for a surrogate?

TL;DR: my boyfriend of four years has started to seriously consider having children in the future. I still don't want any biological children. Our lease renews in 6 months, what do we do?

Submitted February 05, 2020 at 09:48AM by Pe4chle4f https://ift.tt/2Uw43Ic