To think becoming a first time mother in your 60s is the height of selfishness?

[CounsellorTroi]

www.vogue.co.uk/arts-and-lifestyle/article/julia-peyton-jones

Had a baby alone at 64. She’ll be 80 years old when her daughter is 16. There’s a good chance she’ll be dead by the time the child is 30. She could well die before the child reaches 25. So very selfish.

Plenty of men do parenthood at that age.

@AtlasPine
Singlehanded?

Not on their own, they don’t.

Selfish at that age for both men and women IMO. Just because you can doesn't mean you should.

Yanbu. You're going to get a tonne of responses along the lines of "Well you could die at any age" and "Men can continue till their 70s and nobody criticises them" etc etc but you have to draw the line somewhere and it's waayyy before 64.

Yabu to say 'mother' instead of parent. Why is it okay for a man not a woman?

@AtlasPine

Plenty of men do parenthood at that age.

With a much younger partner yes. Men don’t generally set out to become single dads in their 60s.

Some ppl choose to become parents in much worse circumstances, so yabu.

@AtlasPine

Plenty of men do parenthood at that age.

And they are selfish too.

@Mummybearroars

Yabu to say 'mother' instead of parent. Why is it okay for a man not a woman?

I don’t think it’s ok for men either, just because it’s possible naturally.

It's never going to be a mass movement is it? Women past 60 having children? And it will only ever be considered by those exceedingly well off, with a network of support.
And besides men do it al the time.
Going back a couple of hundred years you'd say any woman having a child in her late twenties or thirties would be selfish because her life expectancy would he so low.
So I say don't worry about it.

Parenthood is selfish, I struggle to get upset about this, see the thread about one bedroom flat and pregnant with the third, that's no less selfish. Having children is selfish

@Mummybearroars

Yabu to say 'mother' instead of parent. Why is it okay for a man not a woman?

Because the article is about a mother not a father 🙄

Very, very selfish. And unethical of the clinic.

I would say YANBU.
I wonder what their support network is?
My own mum had me at 30 but died when she was 64. My dad had health problems requiring lengthy hospital stays in his late 70s (which I dont think is massively unusual) That situation would be very scary and stressful for a young teen to deal with, without siblings or another parent to share the burden.
Of course the mother could live in good health until she is in her 90s..

It is highly disengenuous to say 'but men do it too'

the article is about a woman having a baby on her own.

If a man had a baby on his own, and the woman wasn't around, then it would be the same. But that is a very veyr unlikely scenario isn;t it?

I think it IS selfish of men to have children when they are in their 70s, but the mother is going to be around to do the ongoing parenting after he dies.

In the example given, there is no-one to share the parenting.

My mum is a very fit and healthy 80. There is no way she could be a full time parent to a 16 year old.

Eh, I can't get worked up by it. For us normal people, yes. But I'd rather have had her as a mother in her later years than the mother I did have who was a bit crap (though had me at a respectable 33)

Yes, it's very selfish.

My first reaction was this is the ultimate vanity project.
But then I thought about the amount of shit parents and their poor dc who bring up their multiple issues on this site.
This child is loved, well cared for and wanted.
Was her dm selfish, imo yes.
Will it really affect this dc more than dc of younger but toxic parents, probably not.

Going back a couple of hundred years you'd say any woman having a child in her late twenties or thirties would be selfish because her life expectancy would he so low

Of course you wouldn’t, go back that time and the woman would have very little choice about getting pregnant and even less aboutnot being pregnant any more

Well, it’s obviously not ideal and this is a very extreme case. But I don’t get the angst generally about “older mothers” (ie in their 40s) generally; often these are people with significant resources who really wanted a child and are able to provide it with a stable and privileged life. It’s the teenagers giving birth that I worry about more; must be a real struggle all round.

I think it's unfair on the child because of the huge generation gap. It depends on how open minded the woman is. It'll be hard for the child with peers.

@RufustheBadgeringReindeer

Going back a couple of hundred years you'd say any woman having a child in her late twenties or thirties would be selfish because her life expectancy would he so low

Of course you wouldn’t, go back that time and the woman would have very little choice about getting pregnant and even less aboutnot being pregnant any more

Yes, an utterly ridiculous comment.

In the article there is mentions of a Nanny, an Aunt and the child's father. So other family and carers around.

I do wince at this. But that's only because none of my grandparents made it to 70. The risk is far too high.