No grandchildren

I have two daughters . The eldest has twin girls aged 10 , they are my only grandchildren as younger daughters relationship broke up several years ago ( they were not married) and she has not found anyone else she is interested in. She is a fabulous auntie always has been, but she is mid thirties and I think she will probably never have children of her own now. I feel sorry for what she won’t have as she would have been a marvellous mother and she is very close to her nieces the one especially so. Sometimes life doesn’t happen how we want it and is often not fair .

Never say never!
My youngest brother and his then partner always said they were not interested in having children - about 2 years after this announcement, they had twins.
My sister said she didn't want children - she had enough nieces and nephews to borrow - along came her millenium baby!
If you feel that you are missing out on spending time with children, there is an excellent charity called Schoolreaders that organises volunteers to visit primary schools to listen to children read. It's not in every county as yet, but they are spreading out from central England bit by bit.
If you google them, there is an online form to complete and they will contact you back with any information that you need.

My first time on this page
My daughter and her husband are about to embark on there road to NHS ivf... She is very fragile at the moment... I am hoping I am being as surportive as I can... But very aware of what I say to her.. Any advice would be grateful from mums who are on this road with me or have been on it... Thank you Debbie

I feel for you mrsmopp, We've just found out that our son and his wife don't want children, and our daughter has been told that its highly unlikely that she will ever have children. I'm desperately sad as I have longed to be a grandmother. I work in a primary school so at least I have a little contact with young children. People in general can be so thoughtless when they find out you have no grandchildren. I wish people would think before they speak!

Had they not had children, no surrogate children of any kind could have filled the hole. We would just have had to rebuild our lives to a different pattern.
Don't agree with you MOnica. I have no grandchildren of my own and would dearly have liked some, but one child has a partner with two children, and I am an almost a step grandma, and it fills the gap.
At least I can extract my revenge for all the years of having to admire endless photographs and videos of My Grandchildren Doing Something Really Mundane. Surprising how uninterested they all are.

I’m very sorry to hear this news. While I agree that you can always hope for the best (having grandkids when you least expect it), and preparing for the worst (not having grandkids at all), you must find something that can fill the void in the meantime. Have you considered volunteering at NICUs to cuddle premature babies or babies born to addicted mothers? I’m sure they are always looking for volunteers.

I stumbled onto this forum and realized that it's a wonderful place to get advice. I found in February that after 3 years of trying (we didn't know), my son and DIL have decided to give up on fertility treatments and will not be able to have the baby that they've so desperately wanted. Seeing their pain has been so heartbreaking and has left me with a feeling of sadness and emptiness. I'm generally a positive person, but I just cannot seem to come to terms with this as I always imagined that they would have the child they wanted so much. Any advice on how to learn to accept this situation?

Rosie you might want to start a new thread as this was started in February. I would say that my daughter and husband have been in the same situation so I do understand. Luckily they have coped well and now have full and busy lives.
You are obviously upset, they are devastated, so be there if they want to talk, and if like mine they don’t, then be there anyway without asking questions. It’s very raw.