“Kid Wasn’t Mine”: 50 Men Reveal Why Their Partners Really Became Single Moms

Not me but one of my closest buddies had a 3 year old and a 1 year old.

One day he picked up his wife's phone to check something and when he unlocked it, it was still open to her Ashley Maddison account (a dating site SPECIFICALLY for having an affair).

He tried to make it work for a few months but couldn't.

I have a friend who decided to finally have the "let's get divorced" talk with his wife of maybe 4 years. So he sat her down and told her he had something he needed to talk about. And she said can I go first? And she lays on him that she is pregnant. They [have been intimate] exactly one time in a year and she gets pregnant. They agreed that they would stay together in the house until the child was two and then divorce. They are both pretty reasonable adults and it worked out well, that kid just finished his sophomore year of college and is thriving.

When you have less time to have activities or one on one time, different aspects of the relationship become more prominent. 

For example. When you're well rested. Even uncomfortable moments between movies or activities or travel can be glazed over. 

When you have a baby that is taking up most of your time, the most important part is how your personalities mesh when you have nothing else. 

Humor when there's hard moments. Parenting style. The small things you each find enjoyable. Need to be lined up. If they're not, it's like living with a terrible stranger. Especially with hormones coming into play. 

You find out if they can be reasoned with. What they think of your hobbies. It can bring out their worst selves. 

I went through it myself. Seriously considering divorce after being threatened with it for a year.

PND/PPD plus the hormone crash brought out a treasure trove of undiagnosed mental issues.

Perfect relationship, with her family being a big massive warning sign tbh, but years in there was no evidence/indication she had the list of problems they had. 100% passed as "the normal one" out of a screwed up family.

Pregnancy I had my eyebrow raised a couple of times, minor things but totally out of character.
Put down to pregnancy, it'll pass.

Once the kid was born it just became utterly wild.
Every plan we made, straight into a bonfire at her insistence.
No idea what I was walking into any day, kisses or a kicking, who knows.

Became the one working full time plus majority of anything related to the kid.
Became a walking zombie but I pushed on, I had a kid to take care of.
The relationship was hell, someone you loved and had a kid with, sabotaging every single thing they could.

Around kid being 2yo she cheated and broke us up.
Blessing in disguise.
Straight 50/50 with kid was a break and time to reflect tbh.
She struggled with it as tbh it meant she had to do more than she had been.

The breathing space and time to think flipped a switch in my head, never again.

And she did try to reel me back in.

I was done though.

There a library of books I could write on the utter carnage, but this is the v v basics of 5% of it.

Had a friend whose boyfriend abandoned her while she was pregnant because he ‘wasn’t ready for a kid.’ She did not handle it well and struggled with depression during and after the birth.

She became really mean and violent towards me after our daughter was born. Kept citing post-partum. I kept showing up and trying my best. Eventually it was too much. Filed for divorce a few days after our daughter turned one. Our daughter just turned four, and her mother still acts the same.

I almost got divorced. Was ready to leave.

Long story short. She had post partum blues. What was suppose to be awesome time with first born kiddo turned [into] nightmare.

Never had issues. The after kid everything is an issue. Now my parents were an issue. I just could not win. I remember telling my mom I'm ready to bail. Can't do this anymore.

We went to counseling and got better later on with meds.

22 years later (we divorced 10years later) and I remember that time. The pressure etc. it was hell. Left a bad taste in my mouth till today.

When I hear people say they expecting their first kid I just pray they avoid that.

I was 26 at that stage. 48 now.

edit : Sorry I called it post partum blues... post partum depression I think was the correct term. Apologies people.. been a few decades.

My best friend did. He didn't like how his wife changed after having kids.

She didn't like how he didn't change after having kids.

She had red flags around drinking. Which has always been a big no for me. Not coming home cause she would "fall asleep". Or if we were together, drinking and throwing up/passing out. I kept trying to reason with her over the years cause I loved her and felt like stuff could change...it was just once or twice a year that we had a big issue after all... but the resentment was building over the last 8 or so years i had enough. She got pregnant and had our son and I thought things would be different after that. He was 8 months old when she went to a concert with a friend, went out for drinks and I didnt hear from her til 330 a.m. and of course Im still awake after calling and texting all night. Got home at 5. Something in me just broke, and never recovered. She got pregnant with our second after when I was still trying to get over it and I just couldn't, not even for the kids. I saw her phone at that time and she had flirty messages with a coworker too, and my love just dried up, went poof. Ive stuck around for the pregnancy and birth and to help with our kids but with the knowledge that I am out. Currently working through the divorce process, so if someone has advice or to tell me that I am being dumb, feel free to lmk.

The kids aren't a problem, and we both do our part around the house, and for them. Lucky enough to never deal with hormone issues from her side during the pregnancies as well.

I only know of two guys that left. One during pregnancy, one right after. The one during pregnancy was just fed up with [bad] treatment. He didn't want to stick around and see it through, even though I told him it would end eventually.

The second was just pissed because his wife was a SAHM and expected him to work 50+ hours a week, then spend most of his free time caring for the kid. And being responsible for the overnight care. Despite having to be up at 5am. She was spending most of her time on social media and sleeping. He did 100% of the errands too, because she refused to get a license and drive. I understand his perspective much more than my other friend. I raised both of my kids form birth, while working from home. She was just ridiculously lazy and had always been that way. Still is, as a matter of fact. His life got 10x easier* after the divorce. Her life got 10x worse.

Well when it turns out the kid isn't yours...

Accidental pregnancy and wife wanted an abortion. We grew apart and separated about 8mo later.

My old boss was married but he said he never really felt happy - he went with the relationship just because it was easier at the time. No huge fights, just no deep love. She got pregnant and at about 8months he left her, having fallen for my coworker. The coworker was also married but her husband was the most useless guy - he seemed to think because his wife was falling out of love with him he was allowed to check out without trying, but never actively initiating a divorce. Just waiting for her to leave him. It was an awkward time. From what I know there was an emotional but not physical affair for a few months while Mrs was pregnant. There was a lot of anger after the birth and it took a while for them to coparent. They did though and the new partner and boss are married with kids of their own now. It was sort of two people married the wrong people originally and found each other.

Haven’t pulled the trigger on divorce just yet but we’ve been on the brink since our daughter was born 2.5 years ago… I’m sure there are [bad] dads out there but the biggest thing is having kids is [freaking] HARD. It is so much worse than anyone in real life ever talks about. I’d say it completely ruins 90% of marriages and the other 10% the marriage isn’t the same as it was. Take all of your problems that you have right now. Now imagine dealing with them while dealing with sleep deprivation and adding a whole new slew of obligations on top of it because you had a kid. I’m sure at the end of the day most people split up after kids because they feel the other partner isn’t doing enough of the child care.

The only one I know of who did this was because there were indications that she cheated. He wanted a paternity test which she refused.

So this actually just happened to me last month.

I have a 3 year old, and a 7 month old with this woman. Those are our only kids, we were together for 6+ years.

I told her I was sick of being [mistreated] by her physically (she threw things at me and hit me in the past but this actually small because it hasn’t happened that many times maybe less than 5) and mentally. She told me she no longer had the capacity to kiss me, hug me, or tell me she loves me on top of a completely dead bedroom, the last time we [were intimate] was when my daughter was conceived. So I told her to think about if she even wanted a relationship with me.

A few weeks before that I had caught her having an ongoing conversation with her ex boyfriend. I knew that she had talked to him a bit, but then I expected the conversation to stop. When I confronted her about it she told me “out of respect for you I will stop talking to him”. Well weeks went by and the night that she broke up with me, I put in my AirPods and they connected to her phone and I heard a text from him. Nothing other than her saying she wanted to talk to him about something. Vague but made me very angry. And then the night before she had a late night psychiatrist appointment at like 8 at night.

So my brain connected dots and I confronted her on it, and I got accusatory and said I thought she went to [sleep with] him the night before because I thought it was weird to have an appointment like that so late at night. And it’s hard when you find out you’re being lied to. You start questioning what else you were being lied to about. Then she told me, she didn’t want to be me with me anymore.

I was devastated ofc. I work midnights and sat there crying. Not because of her but because it meant my kids would grow up in a broken home. I’m actually pretty okay with breaking up with her I’ve realized. She didn’t make me happy. She was constantly in a state of being “sick” always an excuse to be lazy. I did all the cooking, cleaning, money making while she often sat on her phone while the kids destroyed the house. I’m excited to be a person again. The hardest part is the kids. My ex won’t let me keep my son overnight. My daughter is still too young to entertain the idea. So it feels like she’s keeping them from me. We don’t have a lot of money so it’s not like we can both split assets and go buy houses, we are both looking at renting places.

Happend to my dad. My mom just had my 6 month old brother and cheated with her boss. Shortly after she broke up with him and started dating her boss. He still resents her for it and I understand that. They started coparenting and 6 months after the divorce he met the love of his life. My mom had a few rough years but after 15 years she remarried. Everything worked out eventually but is was messy and there was a lot of resentment from both sides.

A relationship that's on its last thread is not repaired by a baby, but many people try.

I'm impacted indirectly. My wife came with 2 children.

Ten months was more than enough time for me to experience psychological and physical [mistreatment]. Even our couples counselor eventually told me I needed to make the decision that was best for both me, my gf and our child and leave the relationship.

I never wanted an abortion, and it was an unexpected pregnancy. As a man, I didn’t have any say in whether the pregnancy continued (I tried to support her however I could with her decision of what to do with her body), so it’s hard to equate pregnancy with willingness to stay in a relationship. Sometimes people stay because they want the child, not because the relationship is healthy.

A friend of Mine was abandoned just after birth. Her ex said delivery was gross.