It's probably quite well known that women usually make less than men over the course of their lifetimes, and that's in large part due to taking time off to have children, and the career sacrifices one must make if one wants to raise a happy, healthy child. Thus, it's difficult for a career minded younger woman to have a stable environment, financially, in the family, and career-wise, to have a baby. So, in general, it seems better to have a baby when older. But, just to depress you, here are some great statistics from Baby Center on fertility to show that having a baby in your 20s is what biology wants you to do:
In your 20s, the stats are on your side, says leading fertility specialist Sherman Silber, director of the Infertility Center of St. Louis at St. Luke's Hospital in Missouri and author of four best-selling fertility books, including How to Get Pregnant. You have about a 25 percent chance of getting pregnant in any single ovulation cycle. Your chances of conceiving within a year of trying are about 98 percent in your early 20s and about 84 percent by your late 20s.
Only 7 percent of 20-year-old women struggle with infertility — whereas two-thirds of women over 40 have infertility problems. A 20-year-old woman has only a 6 percent chance of remaining childless, while a 40-year-old's chance of never having children is 64 percent.
A woman in her early 40s is three times as likely to have a miscarriage as a woman in her early 20s. For women 45 and older the rate leaps higher still.
As for other risks, at age 20, the risk of carrying a child with Down syndrome is one in 1295. That risk jumps to one in 759 when you're 30.
Tuesday, May 18, 2010
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1 comment:
Yep. The point of limited return seems to be around 31 - 35. Hence B and I having our daughter now, at 32/31, despite all the good reasons to think "we can't afford it."
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