Sister says my husband and I are selfish for wanting a child in our 40s

[MyTaupeSwan]

I’m 40 this year and my husband is 42 We have a son who just turned 4 and started school in September, and now we feel ready for another child. We left things quite late in terms of having kids we’ve been together 18 years, and in that time we’ve had a lot of fun, traveled, and done everything we could while we had the chance and without too many worries.

Now that we’ve finally settled down, we got married 9 years ago. We were one of those couples that were engaged for a few years not because we didn’t want to get married or weren’t sure, but because we wanted to experience other things before having a wedding. We did couples counseling to make sure we were a good match, both for parenting and for marriage. I was worried about repeating my mum’s mistakes, so I did individual counselling as well.

We’ve always wanted children, but we wanted to have our freedom and experiences first, because having a child is such a big commitment. We’ve faced a lot of judgment, mainly from my family, but we feel ready now. I think we’re great parents even though it’s only been four years, the journey has just begun. Our son is the light of our lives, and we really enjoy being parents.

I’m glad we got to do all the things we wanted before having children, but I do feel judged sometimes. My mum thinks I was selfish for not having kids in my late 20s. I’ve told her that we’ve been trying recently and struggling, but she doesn’t really offer support just says I’m old and should have done it when I was “more fertile.”

My husband and I have had a lot of conversations about this. We’ve decided that if trying naturally doesn’t work, we’ll try a few rounds of IVF, and if that doesn’t succeed, we’ll continue living our lives. We’re lucky to have our son, and he is incredibly loved.

Is 40 too late and are we being selfish.
Seeing my brothers and sister with all their children and their children having siblings, I want that for our son. Maybe I should have spent my 20s having children and we wouldn’t have this issue

Your mum and sister are both really rude. I wouldn’t ask their opinions on anything ever again.
40 is a very normal age for first time mum in professional circles in south east. If you live somewhere else you might feel older but it sounds like you’re very well grounded and in a much better place to begin /continue parenthood than the average pregnant families.

Exactly. I would have the phrase ‘mind your own uterus’ on repeat like a broken record. Possibly even send a meme of it to them at any mention of an opinion.

Yep
Having a child is having hope for the future. We must NEVER give up hope

It is the parents' child who will suffer from that mindset. What moral right do they have to visit what they know will be an extremely difficult future on an as yet unborn child? Because they like the idea of having a baby?
With Generation Z we already hear a lot of "I didn't choose to be born" comments. Multiply that by a thousand.

Agree. The main reason I am childfree by choice is that I've never wanted children, but if I'd had them I'd now be worried about their future on so many levels.

I’m 59, my youngest is 20, I was slightly younger than you when I had her but honestly, I could easily cope with a younger teenager and all that brings with it, now. Go for it if that’s what you want, plenty of people do.

Absolutely gorgeous for it! Youve done things very well thought out and at 40 you are still young. I had my 4th baby unplanned at 42, with 3 autistic kids already. If anyone had called me selfish I'd have told them to go jump in the sea

But we don't know for sure they will have a difficult future. Don't get me wrong - I'm worried for the future of my DCs, but at 60 I've been through it all before, and we really don't know how it's all going to pan out at this stage. In 1968 Erhlich's book "The Population Bomb" resulted in a widespread belief that there would be mass global starvation as a result of overpopulation. This didn't happen at anything like the scale predicted because of the Green Revolution, but in my lifetime we have had the Cold War and the whole "protect and survive" business, almost continuous financial crises, civil wars, regional conflicts, growing understanding of the impacts of climate change and pollution, the rise of the digital era etc. At all these points people have been saying we shouldn't be bringing more children into the world.

We can sadly never guarantee our children will have good lives and live in a peaceful society, but equally, and luckily, we can't be sure they won't. And even though we may worry that our children will live through troubled times, we certainly don't know it will be bad enough to make their lives not worth living. It's up to each individual to decide whether they want to have children or not, but the idea that we shouldn't be bringing more into the world as they will face a difficult future could have been expressed at almost any time in history.

@Unexpectedlysinglemum According to recent data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS), the average age of a first-time mother in the UK is approximately 29 to 31 years old. The mean age for first births in England and Wales was 29.4 in 2025, while other reports suggest the average age of all mothers, not just first-time, is around 30.9.

This is the UK children are being born into. And that's only one of many extremely serious problems they will face: It's lazy and naive just to say that bad things happened in the past, so everything will be okay in the future. Global warming is permanent.
Scientists warn of severe climate-related risks to UK economy and security | Climate crisis | The Guardian

@PuceGreen no-one is saying everything will be OK - but we are saying it wasn't necessarily all OK in the past, and we do not know that what happens in the next 50 years or so will make our children's lives not worth living.

I think you are a bit unusual for 1) being together and waiting so long and 2) having quite a long delay after your first. Everyone I know that was 35 plus with their first seems to have the second quite rapidly unless they had trouble conceiving. Realistically you need to crack on. You wouldn’t be unusual trying at 40 but I don’t think it is optimal if you have a choice and I suspect that is what your mum is getting at. Lots of people trying at that age didn’t really have a choice (met partners later, trouble conceiving, no money etc).

This kind of sentiment is always from people who already had children or dont want children anyway, which is convinrent.

Every single point in time has had threats and dangers, for every single species on earth. This isn’t really going to be a major consideration if you want to have a child and your actual life is stable to welcome a child.

@PuceGreen- no one really thinks climate change won’t be an issue. But that you are yet another person who closed their eyes and ears to terrorism, environmental issues and war risks (if you were an adult in the 80s you definitely lived through the risk of nuclear war and in the 90s rogue states getting nukes was an issue!) and went ahead to have a baby because you wanted one.

agree this sentiment is always shared by people who already have DCs or don’t actually want them. I’ve never heard it from someone who really wants to be a parent.

Having a baby has been a selfish choice since contraception became available. It’s arguably less selfish now when the birth rate in the west is low.

You keep your view of the future, I'll keep mine

I dont think you are being selfish trying for a second child at 40. You both sound like you have thought things through sensibly by living your lives for yourselves before making the big decision to become parents. As long as you live a healthy enough lifestyle and arent having another child purely for your first child to have a sibling then I would say go for it! I know some people who had children late 30s/early 40s and are fine. In my friend group I could be considered on the older side after having my second child at 37 as alot of my friends had all their kids by 35 at the latest but everyone's circumstances are different.

If you’re still reading the thread, OP, my perspective might be helpful. I had DS1 at 33 and DS2 at 40. DH was almost 41.

Yes, it was a little harder than in our mid 30s, but DS2 was less colicky than DS1 so in that respect the early months were no worse. I have absolutely no regrets.

And as for the assumptions re amniocentesis etc - My blood test results were absolutely fine, quite low risk, and I was advised by the hospital to not have an amniocentesis at all. I was also very low risk with DS1 so I’d be guided by that. My friend who did have an amniocentesis was quite high risk with all 3 of her pregnancies in her late 20s and early to mid 30s.

I have never felt like i was an old mum. DS2’s school is full of professional families and there are very few parents who are young!

Every child is a risk and a selfish decision to some degree. Most of us know this.

An increase in maternal and paternal age does increase the risk of complications for mum and baby, by small margins but it does increase. IVF can also do the same. We all know this.

On the flip side having a sibling was the single best thing we did for our eldest. But we did think about the potential changes for all of our lives if our second wasn't healthy and decided that it would be ok, we had enough resources that the eldest would be fine regardless.

So it's a calculation you have to make as a couple, and the child you have,m between yourselves, prepared for the worse hope for the best. And if you have thought about as many potential future scenarios and know you can work together if a curveball is thrown your way then whatever anyone else says is and will be irrelevant.