To consider having baby at 27? Will this kill my career?

[maybebaby007]

DH and I would love to have a baby soon. I'm 27. We have been married a few years, financially comfortable, own a house. We have travelled a lot, been to uni and done further professional qualifications, worked a few years and now feel ready for the next stage of our lives together.If possible we would like 3-4 children spaced a few years apart so don't want to leave it too much longer and at the moment our parents are in good health. Lots of reasons for now being a good time.

DH 100% thinks we should go for it but I keep going back and forwards because I'm worried how it would impact my career. I'm in quite a senior management role. I have worked really hard to get where I am and have been in my industry for 5 years, at company for 3 years and in current role for 1 year. I would fully intend to return to work following maternity leave and continue to progress. But any women in similar positions in the organisation haven't had children until their 30s and I'm worried I would be judged and seen as less dedicated to my role if I took maternity leave at this point.

A part of me feels ridiculous for thinking 27 is too young as in my parents' generation it would be totally average but it seems really young in comparison to the norm for women in my industry and social circle which seems to be 35-40. For the past year or so we have kept setting dates only for me to get cold feet and push it back when it gets close because it's a bad time at work, opportunities for me to take on extra responsibility etc. But realistically there will never be a good time at work and if I put it off a few years there is a chance I would be in a more senior role and it would be even harder.

Is a year in my current role long enough? Is 27 too young and what would you honestly think of someone in your workplace if they had a child at this age?

"Don't get influenced by sexist stereotyping and women saying you have to take a year off. It is lose lose if you do that. "

I wouldn't say that's always the case at all. I took nearly a year for both DC (and am very glad I did) and it had no noticeable effect on my career, my sister took a year recently and has also slotted back into her senior role in her own company. Neither of us are in "a sexist marriage", thanks very much, and have very hands-on-parenting partners.

V much depends on your workplace culture (my male manager took two months paternity leave shortly after I came back from my first leave), of course, but I think it's a slightly dangerous message to suggest that taking your full maternity leave entitlement is a "career-killer" ("why bother going back at all!" or "ooh, she took the full year, she obviously doesn't care!") or only happens in "sexist" relationships.

Our situations sound very similar (possibly same career) and I have just had DS a week after I turned 28. Ideally, we should have had at 26 but 4 mmc stopped that so for that reason I wouldn't advocate waiting as sadly we never know what our journey will be like.

Regarding the career, yes mine will suffer slightly in the short term but because I want reduced hours, if you don't then it shouldn't be a problem. We waited a long time for DS so I don't want to go back to the hours I had been. In saying that, some firms are excellent at offering a good balance (not mine, was told no promotion unless FT ) and I'm likely to move there. A few years PT is nothing in the grand scheme of things if it's what you want.

It all depends so much on your company. For my work place you are invisible once you have kids (despite only taking 3 months off to try and stay in everyone's memory), and we don't have flexible working. Part time is OK but you have to be in Mondays and Fridays. I wish I'd played harder before I had kids to try and set myself. But now the youngest starts school in sept I'm planning to ramp things up so networking like crazy !

I had my 4 DCs a while ago but am slightly horrified by some of the posts here. I work in a high pressure, long hours industry and was never made to feel that I was being sidelined, once I started having children. I continued to be given challenging projects and was promoted while on maternity leave.

OP, if you were male, nobody would assume that having a child would impact your career. Why should it be any different for you? From what you said, you have already proved yourself where you are. If you have a baby and return to work successfully, you will have demonstrated that you don't intend to put work on the back burner because you are a parent.

"Don't get influenced by sexist stereotyping and women saying you have to take a year off. It is lose lose if you do that. "

Not my experience either. 6 plus months off and no issue career wise. Did a masters working full time, with 3 young children one still bf, in order to progress. It can happen although I don't doubt for a second other people's experience.

Is your DH worrying about how 3 or 4 DC might affect his career?

Is the assumption is that he will work FT and you PT and / or he is the higher earner? to what extent is he likely to be willing to adapt his working life (and thereby take some risk)?

Do it. Might take you ages to get pregnant anyway. Took us 7 years (IVF eventually). There is definitely no right time in terms of career but I don't think there's a wrong time either.

Thank you so much for all of the responses. They have given me a lot to think about and it is good to hear from people who are/have been in similar positions and have made it work. I'm sorry to those of you who have found it has impacted negatively on your career, it is so frustrating that this is still happening in so many workplace.

Those of you who have asked about my DH and the balance of work between us, his job is quite a bit more flexible in terms of hours/working from home. I tend to work longer hours and have a longer commute so our plan would be for him to do most of the childcare pickups/dropoffs. We do need to discuss in more detail who would take time off for sickness and things like that. My expectation would be that we would split this between us but need to make sure we are both on the same page. We do tend to split other things like housework effectively and I think we have an equal relationship but I know there is a risk of these dynamics changing once children are in the picture.

I think he doesn't have the same worries as me about it because as people upthread have said, no one will make the same assumptions that he will be less dedicated to his career as a result of having children. There are also quite a few dads at his workplace who do slightly different hours for school run etc so he can see how it would work and people would be unlikely to be concerned about him doing the same thing.

We will talk it over further but leaning towards going for it at the moment. I have recently found out a friend the same age is very ill and this is really making me realise that there are no guarantees that our situation would be any better if we waited a few years, and have no idea how long TTC would take in any case.

Good luck with it.
Don't worry too much about sickness. Our children were hardly ever ill and if you bring up strong stoic children rather than slacker wimps (just a matter of family dynamic) things are a lot easier. Also we had a daily nanny (cheapest option for 3 children under 3 rather than 3 full time nursery places) so if one child had a very bad cold or chickenpox or something she could look after them whereas nurseries are less flexible on that.

it sounds like you will split things fairly too. My parents did. 30 years ago with my very first child we did and many couples today do so too. Increasingly employers realise men have children too and need and want to be there with them. Even 20 - 30 years ago men and women who were parents where I worked would want to get home as much as they could to see the children, do bed time stories (something my parents split every night between them with one with 2 of us and the other with the other one) etc.

One thing I think can help is not tell anyone until you are 5 months pregnant. With me it never showed until 5 or 6 months anyway so why tell them particularly as loads of first pregnancies unfortunately end up in a miscarriage with the second pregnancy then usually going absolutely fine.

I had 2 by the time I was your age.

There's never a right or wrong time so go for it.