To think young women just don’t realise... (TW: fertility/ TTC)

[DespairingALittle]

Nc as this combined with various other posts would be outing, this is a bugbear I’ve thought about a lot when ttc myself and something today brought it up again...

Anyhow, AIBU to think ladies In their late twenties who freeze their eggs (or plan to as a ‘failsafe’) don’t realise it’s not a guarantee or the same as ‘pressing pause’ on biology?

This comes about as i was chatting to childhood friend (29, same as me) about kids (I have recently had DS so this is why we were chatting about kids) and she said ‘oh x (school pal) froze her eggs recently, if I haven’t had kids by 33 I’ll do the same, x is so relieved to press pause and take the pressure off’ another friend has also mentioned egg freezing recently for the same reason, both have just said they don’t want the responsibility of kids yet but are in a ‘good’ position to do so ... each to their own but all I could think was that it’s all well and good but it doesn’t guarantee anything! Sadly the demon biology also makes it harder to carry as you age too, it’s not all about eggs!

I just think so many in my generation have the attitude that it will just happen later regardless thanks to science but everyone I know who has had kids or tried to have kids later has struggled (not a guarantee ofc but a statistical probability nonetheless)... interested to hear other people’s thoughts on this. Perhaps this is more of a ‘my circle of friends’ issue than a wider one.

YANBU - it’s a concern, many may end up disappointed in the future, not to mention already falling birth rates etc
YABU - mind your own!

All these kind of threads make me think is how important is for us, in our personal life and as a society to start talking to little girls and young women that motherhood isin’t the be and end all.

Shit like this and fear mongering and pressure is only going to lead women grapping the closest sorry excuse of a man and start pushing out useless offspring (if they listen that is).
And then be young single mom’s and likely do it again with another useless man.

The all women must/ will eventually have kids assumption just does damage.

meh it's none of your business really - most of my friends all had kids late 30's early 40s - I know 2 who froze eggs!

we were more interested in partying and travelling and kids was lower on list of priorities - we are certainly not taking anything as a given - some people struggle to conceive - some don't and while age has a part to play sometimes - it could happen in your 20s too that you struggle!

Freezing the eggs at least gives you some more options!

YABU and a bit weird to generalise from two of your friends to "young women" in general. Having your eggs frozen is hardly mainstream.

I'm always a bit hmmmm about these sorts of posts. Or what you expect people to do about it, really?

The reality is that there is no failsafe way to guarantee your fertility. The "best" thing you can do is to start TTC really young but for all sorts of reasons that's not optimal for many women.

I don't think many young women thing "I' can just freeze my eggs and it will all be OK". They just know there is a trade off and for some of them it's as important if not more important to build a career and some financial security and to make sure they are not wholly reliant on a man to subsidise them.

The subtext of these posts is that most young women would be better off rushing to conceive as young as possible but it ignores the significant downsides to prioritising maximising your fertility by having kids as young as you can. And it worries me a bit that more women are being pressured into thinking they should prioritise this over everything else.

Conception and live births are two very different things though. 1 in 2 might conceive naturally at 41 but the odds of them getting to term are quite a bit lower.

I had no problem conceiving at that age but egg quality meant many miscarriages.

The patriarchy and sexist men nenefits from this myth.
Same thing with the women over 25 are past the wall.
They want young women who don’t yet have the independence and intelligence and who are naive about men, to get stuck with marriage and kids.

You seem to be looking down on them for ‘extending their twenties’ and wanting to have more ‘fun time’ before they commit to kids, as if they need to commit to kids and reproduction is the only thing that denotes ‘serious adulthood’.

Good for them, tbh. Why should they have kids they’re not ready for? It doesn’t matter if they appear ready to you, only they can judge on that one. Having kids doesn’t need to be the be all and end all.

The subtext of these posts is that most young women would be better off rushing to conceive as young as possible but it ignores the significant downsides to prioritising maximising your fertility by having kids as young as you can.

Hmmm, there are many huge advantages to having children in one's 20's. Only one of which is better fertility. The 2 biggest ones for me are: Firstly not ending up in a "sandwich generation" caring for aging parents and young children simultaneously. Secondly having a proper crack at your career in your 40's, with a good 20 years of full-time work to build pension contributions before retirement. There are others but these are the main 2 for me.

Agree. I know there's some truth in it, technically, and at a statistical level, but it also comes across a bit 'Suella's Shag For Britain agenda' too. Difficult.

My sis at 34 - oh I hate the thoughts of kids really, but if my biological clock is ticking when I'm turning 40 I'll just do the IVF. Even after seeing me and sis struggle. I had several rounds, multiple miscarriages and spent our house deposit after saving for years. All worked OK for me jn the end thank god, but she actually still has the stupidity to think this way

I think most people know this. And I’m the same age as you and no one I know has mentioned freezing their eggs (despite being high achieving career types) so I don’t think it’s a particularly widespread problem to worry about. Most people are able to have kids in their 30s without issues.

It also doesn't help that all around are stories of women in their forties miraculously giving birth to twins - Julia Roberts, Amal Clooney, Hilary Swank, with no mention made at all that these children must be the result of IVF and very probably egg donation. It actually makes me very cross. Yes younger women should be aware that fertility declines earlier than they might think, however if it's not something they have considered in their early 20s, and all around them it seems that women in their late 30s and early 40s are having babies, why would they?

I had the "one day" approach to starting a family. By 34 it was already too late, if it had ever been possible on the first place. In contrast my sister had three babies in her 30s, the last one at 38. It's a total lottery and nothing about it is fair.

However sometimes a fertility MOT wouldn't tell you all you need to know. There apparently wasn't anything "wrong" with me, nor with ExH. However we just couldn't conceive together and by the time we had jumped through the investigative hoops, we had run out of time to continue with IVF as well.

@Usernamen , I'm not sure what the stats are. I doubt that a woman in her early 40s has a 50:50 chance of conceiving naturally.

In my extended family and circle, there are/were two who conceived their first baby naturally at 45, and a few who had their last (surprise) baby at 43.

I'm not saying fertility drops off a cliff at 35. I'm saying if you start at 35 before trying and don't conceive naturally, it won't make things any easier.

Maybe I just happen to know many who didn't get pregnant quickly or easily. Even couples in their early 30s.

I do think there’s a naivety and a shifting in understanding. People see celebrities having babies later not realising it’s often donor eggs and/or surrogate.
Posts on here of women in 30s with DH wanting to wait. If you want more than one as lots of couples do it’s really pushing limits. Yes women have babies in 40s, they always have but no guarantees.

I think for me its a "mind your own", but in a nice way. I was determined that I did not want children until I was late 20s early 30s. Relatives used to tell me I was playing a silly game, that I would struggle to conceive etc etc, but I knew I wasn't ready. For me it was better and more responsible to take a risk at 30ish than have babies in my early 20s. If you are facing infertility after waiting, it must be difficult to hear women being flippant about what will and won't happen, but it really is up to them. We make our own decisions based on what suits us and our circumstances.

Which is all well and good as long as motherhood isn't a prerequisite to future happiness for you, in which case waiting till you are well in to your thirties is foolhardy.

@Neurodiversitydoctor , The subtext of these posts is that most young women would be better off rushing to conceive as young as possible but it ignores the significant downsides to prioritising maximising your fertility by having kids as young as you can.

Not in my case, just to not take fertility for granted.

The thing I'm starting to realise is that there's this attitude that once you have children, that's your life over forever - if you haven't been travelling, built the career, got the house, before children, you'll never be able to do that. So you have to do it first.

But that's not really true. I'm already looking forward to making plans once mine are grown up. The baby years are pretty full on but then you gradually get your life back as they get older.

Shit like this and fear mongering and pressure is only going to lead women grapping the closest sorry excuse of a man and start pushing out useless offspring (if they listen that is).
And then be young single mom’s and likely do it again with another useless man.

Say what now?

I had my baby easily at almost 38, one month of trying.

At 44, I was fully post menopausal! Scary. Basically, I was peri menopausal/menopausal at 40.

Ilok back and think how lucky I was.
DFriend had a ONS at 44 and had a baby. Menopausal almost instantly afterwards.

There’s a difference between young as you can and 40s though.
In some areas and professional jobs a woman having a baby at 28 would be seen a very young.

YANBU, but it depends.

In my circles people "gift" their daughters egg-freezing as a graduation gift, as though to say "now go forth and focus on your career, you don't have to worry about babies and family". It's a fairly new phenomenon, who knows how it will pan out, but it's happening.

It's part of a much bigger conversation, to me. It's a fact that some people have no or low fertility; it's a fact that fertility declines over time; it's a fact that older parents face different struggles. But it's also a fact that in the West women want and are granted legal protections around equal opportunities in the workplace, and more realistically these days most people need two incomes to get by. These are two conflicting situations, and by and large it's women who pay the price in that conflict. We are all less well equipped in our early 20s than in our early 40s to handle these issues, but that's when our fertility is at its peak.

It's a terrible situation, and I worry for my daughter's generation. I just don't know what the solution is.

Your life isn't "over forever" but for the rest of your life your happiness is conditional on your children's happiness.

Career building and house buying definitely benefit from compounding over time though. And with travelling it’s a bit of a gamble in case your health isn’t up to it later in life. Obviously waiting to have DC later is also a gamble, so I guess people weigh up which they would be sadder about if they never did it.