Why does barely anyone my age have kids?

[Quietterry]

I’m 25 and had my first young so she’s 9 now and yes I was very young having her but I’m no longer a spring chicken and looking at my cohort who went to school with me out of 200+ people I can count on one hand who’s had kids.

Im not judging them for it I’m just curious on what changed when my mother was my age practically everyone she knew had kids by 25!

I know there’s different theories on this and they probably all have some merit but I’m leaning towards thinking it’s phones. I heard recently some people spend 8 hours a day on their phones.

Phones 😂😂
I was busy getting a degree, masters, doctorate and getting established in a career so that took me well past 25. Zeros regrets, I love my children so much, but I also had the opportunity to travel, study, work, enjoy my twenties and now I’m able to provide for my children in a relatively easy manner. I’m not sure it’s a generational thing, maybe more your circle? My parents would have had me in late twenties and certainly anyone becoming pregnant at 16 would have raised a few eyebrows. I think it’s unreasonable to assume people are either minding children or on their phones non-stop - surely a few other options come to mind?!

I’m 61 and my daughter is older than you. My mum (so your grandparent’s generation) was 26 having her first child and 34 having me. My sister was 27 having her first child. I was 31 having my only. Same story for all but one of my friends, so your parents’ generation weren’t all having all their children before 25. My daughter is 30 and no plans for chikdren yet (though she does have a house).
You are the outlier OP. And it seems to have made you feel old before your time judging by your first post.

Its not 'delaying' anything. its having kids when you want them.
I had my youngest early 40s. Was not tired.

I am almost certainly older than your parents and knew very few who had babies before their late 20s or early 30s. I remember going to a 10 year school reunion in 1988 aged 28 and one girl turned up with her 4 year old daughter. We were all flabbergasted. No one else had babies let alone toddlers.
I do think class and education had a part to play in this. All went to university and took careers seriously.

I’m twice your age, and my peers weren’t mums at 25. For me personally, it was getting DH down the aisle. We met at 24, and got married at 30. Years-and-years-long courtships seem to be a phenomenon that began with Gen Z. Our predecessors, the Boomers, don’t appear to have had such long courtships. Anyway…because I got married at 30, my first baby arrived at 32.

I'm in my early fifties and none of my friendship circle, colleagues or cousins had kids until they were well into their thirties. Several don't have children at all.

I’m 44 so sounds like I am ‘your mums generation’. I don’t think I knew anyone who had a baby by 25. By 30 a couple had but the norm I know is 30-35, sometimes older. There are different cultural groups where younger and older pregnancies are norms. I personally don’t recognise the trend you describe.

I do agree with you that phones played a part in declining fertility, but I think it was already becoming more normal to have babies later. For lots of reasons but education and opportunities for women being a big one.

In MY mums generation, (she’s now 73), getting married and having babies was a central aim of late teens and early twenties for many women. She was old then at 30!

My parents had their first baby at 30, and my aunties were both in their 30's when they had their first children too - and they were born in 1953, 1951 and 1949.

I'm 41 and none of my friends had children in their teens or 20's, out of my large friend group, only 3 people have even opted for parenthood! The times have changed and i am glad women know they can be more than parents these days

This seems like a bait thread? OP still hasn’t advised how they funded their child age 16 as just a child themselves, and seems to just want to criticise the non spring chickens aged 25+. As a pp said, this has an incel tone to it. FWIW I had my first and was married/had bought a house before 25, it wasn’t easy and definitely was outside the norm for my friends and peer group.

Oh no!

Women want to find a partner who isn't completely useless and is actually a partner?

Ok real person.
16 has always been extremely young to have children. 25 (your childfree friends' age) s still very young. As @Beachforever said above, the average age for a woman having her first child hasn’t been 25 or below since the 70s. Nothing to do with phones.

Women have choices now, unlike the earlier 20th C when teenagers and early 20 yr olds were all getting pregnant. We know about contraception and most of us want to make sure we're with a suitable partner, have a job and some savings before having a family.

I spent my late teens and early 20s travelling the world, meeting my now DH, getting an education, and professional qualifications and getting an excellent job which will be a career for life.

Not scrolling on my phone so much I didn't have time to have unprotected sex 😂

Universal credit, cue incoming laughs you got the answer you wanted but this isn’t about me or being 16 I’m 25 now and just observing barely anyone my age has kids which was unusual just a few decades ago

People know better now?

“I’m not judging them” 😂😂😂😂YOU were the one who got pregnant at 16, I mean really

My daughters are in their 20s, so I can’t speak first hand but I imagine there are a multitude of reasons

• We now live longer and science has advanced so there is less pressure to beat the fertility clock
• Mental health crisis, whether we attribute that to phones and social media or something else
• Hustle/Grind culture, more so than every young women are want to and are able to focus on career growth and this is often celebrated
• Cost of living crisis, house ownership is harder, bills are more expensive, many don’t want to bring children into relative instability
• Greater awareness of parental inflicted trauma and a fear of not being healthy enough to not pass it on (I’ve heard this one at work a lot, “I don’t want to have children until I have dealt with my generational trauma”)
• Appreciation of freedom, city breaks, last minute holidays, nights out, why give all that up for children in your twenties?

That list isn’t even exhaustive. I’m glad my daughters are living abroad, building careers and not settling down with a boy they went to school with 20 minutes from where they grew up. I don’t think it’s related to not being able to meet a partner, both my children have long term boyfriends, have done for most of their 20s, they just don’t want children yet.

Money. Plus the normalising of 'you can put off babies until your in your forties". Which you can if your a celebrity and buy some eggs.

Put more than anything, like a lot of twenty somethings, my 22 year old does not want children. Ever. Sure he has got a few decades to change his mind. But he really seems very anti

In 2001, the average age for first child was 26.5. Your mum's group was an outlier.

Yes , good point, by OP’s phone theory we’ll start seeing a drop in the age women have their first babies ?!

As I said, fair play to those who do. Teenagers in my 50s or 60s just not something I’d want personally and no criticism to those who do intended.

Well you know the answer, then, don't you? Those people you are criticising want to create their own stability rather than live off the taxpayer. Which (unless you have a trust fund) most young women in their late teens and early twenties would have to do if they had a child.

@Quietterry Did you go to University? What do you do for work now? Where do you live?

And that was only for mothers, fathers were older.

Plus it weighed heavily into certain demographics. It certainly wasn’t representative of my group

Unfortunately culture has very little impact on reproductive biology and women over 35 are still considered to be of advanced maternal age - better terminology than elderly primigravida or geriatric pregnancy. plus if you have your last child at 40 like I did you can pretty much guarantee peri or full menopause before they are out of their teens.

Not an easy path.