Has anyone considered adoption in their late 30s because life fell apart financially—not because they didn't want their baby?

I'll be 37 in a few months, I'm 11 weeks pregnant, and I already have three children who are 15, 6, and 1. This pregnancy wasn't planned.

I've been battling unemployment and homelessness since early 2025. Before that, I had an established career and earned well into six figures. My last job paid $150K+, and I was on track to make around $190K that year before I lost my job.

My older two had a beautiful, stable life before all of this happened. I lost my job while I was pregnant with my youngest, and despite trying like hell, I haven't been able to recover. I've submitted 2,000+ applications, done 200+ interviews, and made it to the final round with around a dozen companies without receiving an offer.

I don't say any of that because I think income determines whether someone deserves to have a child. I say it because this isn't the life my family has always lived, and I genuinely believe things won't be this way forever. I believe I'll eventually get another job in my field and have the opportunity to rebuild our lives.

But I'm pregnant now, while we're still in the middle of it.

I don't want an abortion. It isn't for religious reasons or because I think abortion is wrong—I just don't feel like it's the right decision for me and this pregnancy.

Then I think about adoption. And every time I do, I think, How could I carry my baby, give birth to them, and then give them to someone else?

On the other hand, I wonder whether keeping this baby is selfish. I'm already under an immense amount of pressure. Another baby means stretching myself even thinner and potentially taking time, attention, and already-limited resources away from the three children I have.

And then there's this weird thought I keep having: Do 37-year-old women with three children even place babies for adoption? I know logically adoption isn't just something teenagers or women in their early 20s do, but that's overwhelmingly the situation I associate with it. I feel almost embarrassed that I'm this age, have had a successful career, have already raised children for 15 years, and somehow I'm sitting here trying to make this decision.

I don't think I'm looking for strangers to tell me whether to keep my baby or place them for adoption. That's ultimately something I have to figure out myself.

I think I'm looking for women who have actually been somewhere similar—older moms, women who already had children, women whose lives were previously stable and then fell apart, or women who considered adoption because of a temporary but severe financial/housing crisis.

If you've been there, what do you wish you had known while you were trying to decide? How do you feel about the decision you made now?