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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

to get really wound up by the term 'delayed motherhood'

106 replies

hairyfairylights · 04/02/2011 20:03

and other such older-woman-who-has-not-yet-had-children bashing?

It was one of the things the BBC said was responsible for the rise in Breast Cancer.

More to beat women up with, and more to beat older women up with?

Propoganda because the nation will need more children to pay our pensions in the future?

For the record, I have not tried to have children until the last year, and I am in my early forties.

It doesn't mean I have delayed them or put my career first on purpose.

I just feel really got at when I see all those headlines about 'women who put their career before children are compromising their fertility' shite.

Not every woman who is trying for children at a later stage has deliberately 'delayed'.

(and boy do I wish I'd met the right man earlier and had had children earlier, but my life didn't work out like that. So I don't want to feel got at about it, as well as shit that I'm having trouble holding on to pregnancies).

OP posts:

MsHighwater · 04/02/2011 20:05

Yes, the implication that it must be a choice ticks me off, too.

charitygirl · 04/02/2011 20:07

Absolutely - it 100% a SOCIETAL change because men also 'delay childbearing' (they're often the prime movers in this in my experience!), parents are interested in their daughets getting a good education (which tends to delay childbearing past the early 20s).

HingCogNeeto · 04/02/2011 20:10

I think the point about delaying motherhood is that more periods and thus fewer pgs and hence less bf are possibly implicated in the rise of BC

or something

women who delay getting pg ARE compromising their fertility; fertility does pretty much fall of a steep cliff from I think age 35 onwards (wasn't there something from the BMA or fertility council recently about this?)

Original poster

hairyfairylights · 04/02/2011 20:10

Is any young woman seriously going to think 'oh I think I'll have a child now. Maybe then I won't get breast cancer'.

OP posts:

ecobatty · 04/02/2011 20:11

Sorry but it is a fact, medically, that having children later has certain effects. For whatever reason, more women are doing this.

I myself feel that it was worthwhile in my case, the greater physical risks being more than outweighed by the psychological benefits of having children when I was more mature.

And yes, waiting until you meet the right man is a choice (a sensible one imo, but a choice nonetheless).

Original poster

hairyfairylights · 04/02/2011 20:12

HingCogNeeto but I have not 'delayed' it purposefully. I have simply not been in a position to have children until now.

Using the word 'delayed' has an implication of purpose.

I could have got 'accidentally' pregnant with my ex who 1. would not have been the father I wanted for my child and 2. did not want any children, but that would have been wrong.

OP posts:

mackereltaitai · 04/02/2011 20:13

Absolutely OP - i didn't frigging delay - no fucker delightful young gentleman would impregnate me - i would have been duffed at 26 if I'd had my druthers.

Delayed Fatherhood Causes Breast Cancer.

Original poster

hairyfairylights · 04/02/2011 20:13

ecobatty I get that. If they would just use less emotive words, like you have 'having children later in life' rather than the very emotive 'delaying motherhood' or 'choosing to delay children to have a career' it would make us feel just a little less shit about the whole thing, no?

OP posts:

Meglet · 04/02/2011 20:15

I didn't choose to not have children until my 30's because of career / money / having fun. I just didn't have a partner I wanted to have kids with until that point.

Same for my sister, she's almost 35 but she's finding it impossible to find a man who wants to settle down.

It wasn't my choice to wait until my 30's and I don't think it's my sisters choice either. She's bloody miserable about it at the moment .

onimolap · 04/02/2011 20:16

Perhaps they should have said "later" motherhood rather than "delayed".

But there is a medical association between later motherhood (or indeed not children at all - something that is sadly not necessarily a choice at all) and breast cancer, so it was not a randomly inappropriate factor.

Original poster

hairyfairylights · 04/02/2011 20:32

Not saying it was an inappropriate factor, but I really object to the wording used.

OP posts:

WidowWadman · 04/02/2011 21:00

What wording would be appropriate then?

hellymelly · 04/02/2011 21:04

I would have loved to have had a baby at 30,I just didn't find a man who felt the same way.Hence two in my forties.Not ideal,but I'm so happy to have them.

Bogeyface · 04/02/2011 21:08

But delayed motherhood is delayed motherhood no matter what the reason.

If it was delayed due to career, ill health, lack of sperm, money, fetility issues, whatever then it is still a delay!

Factually the word delayed is accurate.

Hardandsleazy · 04/02/2011 21:10

Yanbu- it makes me annoyed. When i did meet dh I didn't delay - we were trying within a few months

amothersplaceisinthewrong · 04/02/2011 21:11

I heard that report, but didn't hear the "delayed on purpose" bit. I just heard "delayed" which as bogey says is factually accurate.

StealthPolarBear · 04/02/2011 21:14

But delayed implies a failing on someone;s part - the wording is very emotive

SpeedyGonzalez · 04/02/2011 21:17

YABU. "Delay" doesn't always assume intention. Train delays, anyone?

And it is incredibly sad how many women struggle/ fail to conceive in their late 30s to early 40s. It is SO unfair that the scales are so imbalanced against women this way, especially given the increased freedoms we have to make of our lives what we want to. But that is the reality we face. And it would be appalling if medics and the press kept this knowledge under wraps for fear of offending.

StealthPolarBear · 04/02/2011 21:21

no but it does imply fault - if your train is delayed, you can complain. If a meal in a restaurant is delayed, you might not all eat together.

Lamorna · 04/02/2011 21:22

I have just looked up delayed and it gave postponed as a definition. I didn't delay or postpone, I didn't have the opportunity earlier in life. I don't think that many women make a choice to 'delay' and many will be forced into it with the cost of university and buying a house these days. I doubt whether many 22yr olds can afford a child.

chandellina · 04/02/2011 21:23

YABU, it is an accurate description, you are making it something emotional. A plane is delayed whether by leaving late, something that happened en route, problems landing, whatever.
And the reality is there are still too many women who think they have until they are 40+ to conceive when in fact their chances greatly reduce after 35 and many will end up childless.
No one wants to be told what to do but it's stupid to pretend that there isn't an ideal window medically to have children, i.e., roughly 20 to 35.

LucaBrasi · 04/02/2011 21:25

I know. I agree. and 'all things being equal' is not the case. We are supposed to marry the first fuckwit that flutters the heart it seems, but when we don't and wait for, well, someone we really have something in common with and also - Good God!- dare to use the brains we were born with, it all becomes undone.

Mother Nature, it seems, was not a feminist.

Still, it can be done - 40's, 2 kids and happy!

SpeedyGonzalez · 04/02/2011 21:29

No stealth, I disagree. Just search online for "delay" and see what terms come up - I found a long-winded term for a delayed sleep condition.

It's an emotive subject, which explains the emotional response.

Original poster

hairyfairylights · 04/02/2011 21:39

I haven't delayed anything. I haven't put anything off. I didn't plan that I wouldn't meet the man I wanted to have children with til I was forty.

OP posts:

SpeedyGonzalez · 04/02/2011 21:44

But your becoming a mother has been delayed. That is a statement of fact, without apportioning blame. And I really am sorry to hear that you're having such a horrible time trying to get pregnant.

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