DiscoverDial Emma"I want children, but the love of my life doesn't": How do we choose between the life we have and the one we long for?
"I want children, but the love of my life doesn't": How do we choose between the life we have and the one we long for?

"I want children, but the love of my life doesn't": How do we choose between the life we have and the one we long for?

Update: 2025-11-03
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Welcome back to Dial Emma! Each week, I'll be answering your dilemmas with honesty, empathy, and a few therapeutic truth bombs to help you make sense of life's stickiest moments. If you've ever wished you had a therapist in your back pocket, Dial Emma is here to help.

In this week's episode, I explore the sharp end of love - those crossroads where heart and future pull in opposite directions.

Two listeners share life-defining dilemmas that ask the same haunting question: What do you do when your heart and your future don’t want the same thing?

In our first letter, a woman faces the agony of wanting children, when her long-term partner does not. To answer it, I unpack the difference between change and self-realisation, how resentment grows in the spaces where love stands still, and why sometimes two truths can both be right but no longer fit together.

In our second dilemma, a happily married listener confesses to falling in love with someone else. I delve into the anatomy of emotional infidelity, the unmet needs that lie beneath attraction, and the difference between a relationship that’s wrong and one that’s simply outgrown.

If you have a dilemma for Emma, please fill out this form. 

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Dial Emma is hosted by Emma Reed Turrell, produced by Lauren Brook.

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Social media:

Emma Reed Turrell @emmareedturrell

Dial Emma @dialemmapodcast

Email: contact@dial-emma.uk

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"I want children, but the love of my life doesn't": How do we choose between the life we have and the one we long for?

"I want children, but the love of my life doesn't": How do we choose between the life we have and the one we long for?