I Called Off My Wedding At 32 And Thought I’d Lost My Chance At Motherhood

It was just another morning walk.

As we strolled along the winding path of a street just up the hill from our home in Boulder, spring flowers poked their vibrant shoots through the freshly mulched garden beds, and bulbs, full of promise for the new life of spring, threatened to burst open at any moment. I breathed easily at the pleasure of a simple stroll with my dazzling one-year-old daughter.

I was awash with gratitude at the reality of the memory I was creating, a moment I’ve dreamt of my entire life. A memory which, though it was ordinary, was a scene of peaceful perfection that I would have dismissed as impossible just a few years earlier. 

Six years ago, I canceled my engagement, effectively gambling my likelihood of naturally having children of my own. Panic and shame don’t even begin to describe my emotional state at that time. At 32, social media, cultural pressure, and even science were telling me that my biological clock had already run out. I felt like one more pregnancy announcement or well-meaning comment about freezing my eggs might actually push me over the edge. The mounting pressure meant I was prepared to rush to the altar like the spring rain rushes to the budding flowers below, even if it was with the wrong guy.

Electric green leaves littered the ground after the hailstorm the night before, but the effect was dynamic, and the sidewalk seemed alive underfoot. The still-damp morning air was a cooling caress upon my cheek, and the cozy blanket of lingering clouds was a welcome respite. 

As we walked, my daughter said ‘mama’ for the 98th time that day, and babbled on, telling a story only she knows for now. Though she walked unsteadily, she knew the drill and released my hand to sneak away and hide behind the nearest bush. 

That was my cue. 

With a heart so full of love it could burst, just like the new blooms surrounding me, I began the countdown, and the delight of an impromptu game of hide and seek unfurled. 

It was just another springtime walk, but it struck me there were days, not so long ago, when a short walk down a flower-lined aisle had filled me with dread just as strong as the joy I was now feeling. 

And as I caught a glimpse of myself in a puddle lingering on the road, I was transported back to another moment of reflection six years prior–the day I tried on my would-have-been wedding dress for the last and final time.

With only seventeen days remaining before I was to say “I do” to my then fiancé, it was time to button up the remaining details of our over-the-top, stunning yet filled-me-with-fear wedding plans, including my equally extravagant but inauthentic wedding dress. 

One final try-on to confirm the perfect fit, and the marathon year-long planning process would be complete. 

One final hurdle in the race to the altar. 

I was already teetering on the edge of my biological sell-by date, so distraught or not, I was determined to walk down the aisle of matrimony, bursting with color and rebirth, just like those silly crocuses lining Boulder’s paths in the spring. 

Standing there, though, I felt anything but awash with color and good cheer. I felt more like the waterlogged earth after a storm: drab, heavy, soaked to the core, and aching for some light. 

It was then that I made the choice that changed my life forever. I shook myself out of the fog of confusion, out of my designer wedding dress, and ultimately out of the wedding I had told the whole world I wanted. 

You see, I finally realized no matter the outcome, I was unwilling to sacrifice my happiness just to meet the standards laid out before me. I could not betray myself in such a way, and I would not marry the wrong man just to secure my chances at motherhood.

Single again in my mid-30s? Manageable. 

Potentially childless? I realized it was a price I was willing to pay for choosing myself, trusting my gut, and walking away from a marriage I knew wholeheartedly was not my forever. 

Come rain or shine, it was time to stop performing. It was time to get real and time to call it off entirely. 

With this one big choice, my fairytale disintegrated right before my eyes. My dream wedding devolved into nothing more than a heap of best-laid plans splattered about for all to see—and judge, for that matter. 

Not unlike the storm-thrashed leaves I was currently walking over, the carnage of the stormy dissolution of my engagement would ultimately lie bare around me. 

I was back to square one, and many thought it was the end of the road for this 32-year-old maid. Yet to me, it was a new beginning. 

Looking at my life now, I’ve often wondered how I got myself in such a predicament in the first place. 

Was I really that afraid of being left behind, of losing what felt like my only chance, of failing in such a fantastically public way? Of being invisible as a woman who may never be a mom or wife? 

Well, I’ll tell you—with time and reflection—I’ve realized the answer is yes. The tick, tick, tick of my biological clock was undeniably to blame. 

Despite knowing we were heartbreakingly wrong for each other, I wanted a husband. What’s more, I wanted a baby. A family. I wanted to experience the exquisite chaos of motherhood. I wanted the titles of Mom and Wife, and once my thirties hit, I acutely felt my clock wind down with each passing day.

To me, it felt like I had only two options. Option One: marry my ex-fiancé, start a family with him, and then, most likely, break that family apart when we inevitably get divorced. Option Two: call off my wedding and risk never having a biological child of my own. 

Keep the wedding and lose myself, or lose the wedding and risk losing motherhood.

There was no version of this choice that didn’t hurt, but it was exactly what I needed. 

I needed to feel stuck. Trapped. I needed to grieve the potential loss of never having children. I needed to let the intensity of those emotions pour over me, feel them in my bones, and then use them to pull myself out of the swamp of doubt. Without being forced to confront this grief, I may have never walked away from my biological clock, thereby removing it as a decision-making factor in life choices it should never have been involved with in the first place. 

I had to feel the loss in its entirety, or I would have never been free to step into whatever season came next. Sure, my engagement season was thunderous, but it was also revealing and ultimately led to the very best awakening. 

I don’t actually think the biological clock is all that biological anymore (within reason), it’s societal. And the truth is, the fear I thought was coming from my body was really just the lingering story I had been told about my body for years. 

The societal pressure is intense for us all in one form or another, and this was the real internal timeline I was fighting so hard against. It was all just my fear of failure, dressed up as urgency. 

And yet, by calling off my wedding, which I could argue is the ultimate act of love for my ex and myself alike, I had officially told my societal clock to hush. I believed in my worth, with or without a motherhood title attached, and decided I was already enough. Just me. 

The irony is that telling this clock to zip it is precisely what allowed me to find myself, find my forever partner, and find my path to motherhood in the end. 

Imagine that. 

These days, I still hustle to keep up. As a mom and storyteller, I constantly rush to get things done. Of course, there are standards I’m trying to meet, but I no longer feel like I’m on the same clock as before. It’s true that things constantly need to happen in a timely, sometimes immediate manner, but time pressure is most certainly not the same as a countdown to expiration. 

What’s more, though I am now 39 and have expanded our family by having another little girl, I refuse to let the fear that my sell-by date has passed take root. I’m grateful to have learned that lesson the hard way. 

Instead of biological imperatives, I’ll happily keep my countdowns to those starting at 10 and ending with “ready or not, here I come,” opening my eyes to delighted giggles from just around the corner of the nearest spring rose bush.