‘With science I can have a baby whenever I want’’

[Laughingstock91]

Naomi Campbell had had a baby at 50 - not sure if she’s given birth or it’s a surrogate but her comments really irritated me. She said ‘with science I can have a baby whenever I want’ - do people actually think about the baby? I am sure she’ll be a lovely mum but it makes having a baby just sound like something to tick off on a list when you have decided you have had enough of everything else no matter what age you are. Maybe I am being harsh but if it’s that easy with science, why wait until you are 50?

Aibu?

Ageism yet again on MN. Think about what you’re saying. It’s not ideal to be an older parent but is if ideal to be poor, disabled, having learning difficulties? Yes there are ethical issues about surrogacy but please remember there are older parents reading this thread who feel very unfairly judged. It’s horrible. I was accidentally pregnant at 46 and had a healthy baby girl. Should I have terminated???? Yes, I’m older than some parents but her best friends mum just died if breast cancer at 42 so who the hell knows what’s coming.

@Lonel
As someone who has looked into adoption, I disagree. I don't know any agency or government guidelines that would let you adopt a baby at 50, an older child yes.

You may not know of such guidelines, but it's up to the adoption agency. I was 52 when I adopted a baby.

I was aiming my comments at the people who said that having babies older is selfish and should be outlawed. We don't get to police other people's fertility and like I said I wouldn't go TTC at 50.

I have had an awful time having my kids and a dear friend offered me surrogacy - for many reasons I turned her down (with much thanks and gratitude). I have many misgivings about it, but there are times it is done with altruism.

It's the inevitable ageism that comes up everytime on these threads about parental age.

Surrogacy is exploitative.

I disagree that this is always the case. From the cases I know, the surrogate receives a lot of psychological support before, during and after. They also need to understand the implication of this before agreeing to it. It's not as simple as throwing money at someone and saying "Let's get on with this". The process is not easy for both women and most women who use surrogates don't take it lightly either. They do go through the process, both with the surrogate and separately.

Some women all over the world don't have this opportunity and agency to decide for themselves. They're exploited both psychologically, physically and financially. This isn't what I'm talking about.

@Xanadu7

It’s weird for me personally, coming on here and reading posts stating it’s unfair on child. My father was 55 when I was born, I had 24 years of him before he suddenly passed away and I was blessed to have such a gentle, loving Dad. He lost his Mum when he was 9 and she was only 29...nobody knows what life is going to be like, being a good parent is all that matters, not age.

I am pleased that you had your gentle loving dad, and that you had him for 24 years, despite him being in his mid fifties when you were born. And I am pleased that no illness or disease or condition, ever hit him. (Apparently!)

However, the reality is, that if a man - or woman - has a baby past their mid 40s the child is more than likely going to lose their parents at an early age - like YOU did.

OR, the child will be a carer for the parent, when they are a stage in their life where they should be enjoying life, partying, going on holiday with friends, and starting a serious relationship. They will also be getting their first home, getting married, and starting a family.

All of the these 'young adult' experiences often need parental support. It's grossly unfair that the burden of having to care for elderly and ailing (and often sick and infirm) parents should be resting at the feet of someone so young.

Having a child past 43/44 is grossly unfair on the child IMO. It's remarkably selfish, and no thought goes into the future, and what the child is going to have to suffer, with having elderly (and often ailing,) parents, when they are barely out of their teens!

When they are starting out in young adulthood, they often need parental help and support; they should NOT be having to deal with ailing elderly parents.

And please save your breath, anyone who is planning on regaling me with their tale of their 89 year old great auntie Fanny-Lou, who skateboards to her top corporate job 17 miles away 5 days a week, and runs a marathon every weekend, and who is fitter than YOU are at 49!

Because we ALL know someone being superfit and healthy with NO ailments whatsoever past the age of 70, is as rare as rocking horse shit. And anyone who IS as fit and healthy as a butcher's dog at 70+, is the exception to the rule.

@MotherOfGodWeeFella

I haven't read the whole thread, but those who criticise older mothers are usually 1. younger and 2. already have a child. Imho it is no less selfish to have a child when you are older as long as you can provide for that child.

Things have moved on in my lifetime and people are no longer old at 60.

Just because people don't seem that old as 60, as they did 70+ years ago, that doesn't mean they should be any more likely to be having babies past middle age, than they should have been then!!!

@Laughingstock91

Yes you always get the ‘my auntie Doris had her last baby naturally at 50 in 1953’ posts on here but it’s really not that common.

You're right, it's really not. It's very rare. Even having a baby past 43/44 is rare. I know very VERY few people who had a baby naturally around that age, (3 actually, in the past 25 years.)

And as for the amount of people BORN to a mother that age. I have known 4 (in the past 25 years or so...)

And let's just say, all but one (of the 7 in total,) were not without issues.

The babies of all 3 of the older mothers had health issues, and 3 out of the 4 people born to the older mothers had health issues.

pegpeople that is why I said often

At what age is a baby too old to be sold? 12 hours? 12 days? 12 weeks?

You're right, it's really not. It's very rare. Even having a baby past 43/44 is rare. I know very VERY few people who had a baby naturally around that age, (3 actually, in the past 25 years.)

And it’s even more rare for it to be their first baby. And while people may look younger than ever at 50 or 60 thanks to lifestyle changes or surgical interventions their reproductive systems are still ageing at the same rate. There hasn’t been a rise in the average age of menopause as far as I am aware.

I posted this towards the end of the thread that got zapped. Whenever something is called a choice three questions must be asked:

1. If this is a choice, what were all the options?

2. Are some groups of people more likely to make this choice and others less likely, and, if so, why?

3. Is there a reward for making this choice or a punishment for not making it, and vice versa?

So many things that women are said to choose to do to their bodies are anything but free choices. Sexism, racism, classism and poverty all play a role. A few years ago I was researching surrogacy in India and discovered that most living kidney donors in India were women and most recipients were men. Selling kidneys in India is illegal but there are suspicions that people are corrupting the system and sexism, poverty and the caste system are playing a part in deciding who gives a kidney and who gets one. If surrogacy is a choice, why aren't the women of Knightsbridge choosing to have babies for couples in Ukraine?

I don't want a future where pregnancy and childbirth are things the rich outsource to poor women.

@Mummyratbag

pegpeople that is why I said often

Yes I know, but I was just sharing my opinion that actually it's often much harsher from those who have not had children despite long struggles with fertility.

If surrogacy is a choice, why aren't the women of Knightsbridge choosing to have babies for couples in Ukraine?

Quite. More likely to be a poor Ukrainian student selling her eggs for the benefit of a wealthy woman from Knightsbridge.

@JaninaDuszejko

So I see it more as renting a womb. But that could be where my problem lies.

Is prostitution OK because that's just renting a woman's orifices?

I honestly believe a woman can choose to have sex in exchange for money.

I don't agree with women being forced to do so.

Pegpeople I think we actually agree that on the whole surrogacy is not great - though where it is done with love (usually by family) I can see it having a place. Most of my comments are aimed at people having a go at women (who mostly not through choice) had kids older. In my case divorce, neonatal loss and multiple miscarriage led me to having mine later than I ever imagined.

@Mummyratbag

Pegpeople I think we actually agree that on the whole surrogacy is not great - though where it is done with love (usually by family) I can see it having a place. Most of my comments are aimed at people having a go at women (who mostly not through choice) had kids older. In my case divorce, neonatal loss and multiple miscarriage led me to having mine later than I ever imagined.

I agree sometimes life gets in the way and things out of our control make the journey a little more bumpy. I don't necessarily have a problem with a 50 year old having a baby but I do not and will not ever be able to see surrogacy as a positive. It actually makes me quite cross so many celebrities choose to go down this route and I genuinely believe that many do so because they know they would not be able to jump through the very necessary hoops involved in adoption.

because they know they would not be able to jump through the very necessary hoops involved in adoption.

I suspect you’re right, with an added dose of adopted children being seen as damaged. The irony is that they don’t see that they are damaging their child by removing it from its mother.
(Plus the awkward fact that adopted children in the U.K. all have other families, who may not be as inclined on motivated as a surrogate mother to keep quiet.)

Having a child past 43/44 is grossly unfair on the child IMO. It's remarkably selfish, and no thought goes into the future, and what the child is going to have to suffer, with having elderly (and often ailing,) parents, when they are barely out of their teens!
It is unlikely to be the case for Naomi's child though - I have doubts that they will be forced to personally care for their elderly ailing mother, and won't have any time to explore their youth though.

I also believe that women have a right to choose. No one agrees with exploitation. No one agrees poor women should have to resort to surrogacy for financial reasons becayse they have no other options. No one thinks rich women should be able to outsource to poor women.

But I believe there is a place for choice here. For women who have already had their families, who enjoy pregnancy who want to help infertile couples, who are not poor and doing it out of some form of desperation , and who have a support network in place and are emotionally capable to rationalise, understand and manage their experience. Denying these women exist is wrong.

There is no evidence a baby is traumatised by being placed on a different woman from birth, in fact the opposite is true, people can google it, as so many babies have been born through surrogacy now the evidence so far suggests these children are actually cherished more and the bond closer between mother and child. Possibly due to the high link of infertility v those using surrogacy. There is no impact on the babies development either.

Of course it should be tightly regulated. But I simoly don’t agree that it’s so cut and dried it’s always wrong.

There are some very emotional words being used here. Selling babies, rich women exploiting poor women. Desperate women selling body parts.

They are not selling babies. That makes it sound like they are selling their own biological children. They are selling or providing gestation only. And it should be tightly controlled to avoid exploitation. But past that if a woman wishes to gestate another’s woman’s baby for her, becayse she herself cannot, I take no issue with it.

@OhHolyJesus

could Naomi Campbell pass the adoption process with her record of violence

I think it would depend on which country and what requirements they have for age, circumstances, physical and mental health etc. We don't know whether the baby was from international adoption, which along with surrogacy is common in celebrity circles as compared with people who aren't wealthy and famous. I imagine a lot of it is down to money.

Thanks to science Patricia Rashbrook had a baby at 62

I posted this on the deleted thread. This woman had a baby for her son aged 61 despite being post menopausal, the husbands sister didn't do it despite her age being better in terms of risks.

www.insider.com/woman-gave-birth-to-her-granddaughter-surrogate-2021-4?fbclid=IwAR32JpMC8e4TMXLPg7PHNxMSoIk4g7O1r4enqlO8PdsWEGB7b5HUxY8ep_Y

The U.K. Law Commission propose no upper age limit (and for 18 to be the lower limit, the youngest surrogate mother in the U.K. was 21 with triplets) in their reform paper, their report was launched last month.

www.andrewpercy.org/accountable/appg-surrogacy

Re surrogacy - and acknowledging that we don't know if NC's baby was the result of surrogacy - I've just been blindsided by the observation above. The UK Law Commission has lost its collective mind. No upper age limit for a surrogate pregnancy! Why not? As others have said, just because something is possible doesn't mean it's desirable. I'm not far off 60 and the idea of coping with a pregnancy and birth in this post-menopausal body fills me with absolute horror. I'm far more easily tired than I used to be, my joints are creaky, my sleep is disrupted by hot flushes and yet I think I'm in comparatively good shape for my age.

And again - why would anybody think it's a good idea for a 21yo to be pregnant with triplets which she will then hand over to someone else immediately after birth?

The welfare of the child should be top priority and as I said on the now deleted thread I'm sickened that it seems to be bottom of the list in many jurisdictions, including, horrifyingly, the UK. There's plenty of evidence on how separation from the mother affects the baby, from studies of adoption and children who have to be taken into care. Why don't they look at those to inform any changes in the law?

And why don't they attach more weight to the known health concerns for egg donors and women who agree to be implanted with a baby who is not genetically linked to them? I learned from yesterday's thread and other similar ones in the past that surrogate pregnancies are known to be higher risk and more complicated than natural pregnancies. Does the woman's welfare count for nothing either?

Final point, which many will disagree with (and I know this is hypocritical, as I was lucky enough to be able to have two children without any fertility treatment) - this planet is overpopulated with humans. We don't need to make it easier to have a child, we need to be facilitating and encouraging people to have one or two children, early enough in life for all concerned to have the maximum chance of good health, and then make it easier for their mothers to get on with their working lives alongside family life, just as fathers have always done. Sadly, some people will be unable to have children. Rather than put them (and by them I mostly mean the intending mother) through gruelling fertility treatments for years and years, wouldn't it be better to help them come to terms with this?

I have a problem with the sentiment quoted in the thread title, because it’s untrue - for ordinary people the “science” needs to be backed up by quite a lot of cash. The message that women / couples can delay and delay is incorrect and causes a lot of heartache because it typically does take longer, rates of miscarriage are higher, birth risks greater, higher statistical likelihood of things like Down’s. Ttc a first at age 40 isn’t a picnic, let alone older.

They are selling or providing gestation only.
So they could keep the baby and the money? As long as they do the gestation, because that’s what they’re being paid for.

@womanity

They are selling or providing gestation only. So they could keep the baby and the money? As long as they do the gestation, because that’s what they’re being paid for.

They can keep the baby, but if any money exchanged bands it should be paid back, otherwise that’s a right bloody scam.

They can keep the baby, but if any money exchanged bands it should be paid back, otherwise that’s a right bloody scam.
So it is the baby they’ve paid for then, not the gestation.

I have a problem with the sentiment quoted in the thread title

It's a single sentence from a much longer interview NC did 4 years ago, but taken on it's own it's better for a thread title in AIBU presumably.

@CounsellorTroi

You're right, it's really not. It's very rare. Even having a baby past 43/44 is rare. I know very VERY few people who had a baby naturally around that age, (3 actually, in the past 25 years.)

And it’s even more rare for it to be their first baby. And while people may look younger than ever at 50 or 60 thanks to lifestyle changes or surgical interventions their reproductive systems are still ageing at the same rate. There hasn’t been a rise in the average age of menopause as far as I am aware.

100% agree. You can try and make yourself look younger with fancy make up and procedures, (although no-one looks more than 5 to 8 years younger than their age anyway, when you look at them properly,) but you can't defy ageing, and the natural deterioration of your body.

And although people don't look as old at 50 as they did say, pre 1970s, many people still do look their age. People just looked OLDER than their age back in the day, now they look more like their age, or maybe 5 years younger. And as you say, even if you look 38 years old at 48; that is irrelevant. You are still 48!