What a luxury to be able to plan whether or not to have your child!! If I had followed the plan I set for myself, I never would have had my wonderful awesomely beautiful daughter in 2008.
When I was 43 I found out that I was 3 months pregnant. The absolute shock of my life. Sometimes I still can’t believe it!! I had resigned myself to the fact I would never have kids of my own. My husband was 54 at the time and has 3 grown children, and we had just welcomed our grandchild who is now 2 years old. A couple weeks after he was born I went to the doctor with stomach pains, a few hours later I was looking at a sonogram of my little baby!
The pregnancy was fairly smooth other than I had gestational diabetes (common in women over 40), and the birth was much easier than I expected it would be. (I was so scared about the actual birthing process!) We also decided against all the invasive testing, deciding what will be, will be.
My husband tries not to think about the fact that he will be 72 when our daughter graduates from high school, and instead focuses on making the most of every minute he can spend with her. He feels like he’s been given a bit of a 2nd chance on being a parent because when he was raising his older children he was focused more on his career than his kids. And he has regrets about that. I’m so happy to have been able to give him that 2nd chance with our girl.
As for me, I admit I’m quite a bit intimidated about being the older mommy in a group of 20-something mommies. It’s a strange dynamic. They seem to feel that because I’m older that I should already know what to do at each stage of babyhood. They forget that I’m experiencing it for the same time myself! But it’s just a minor annoyance.
Like others have said, you will not regret having a child. In many ways it’s hard to convey this point until you’ve had a child yourself. Lord knows I never listened to anyone who told me “You don’t know what you’re missing” during my childless 20’s and 30’s. But now just imagining life without her is too much to bear.
We do get mistaken all the time for grandparents, but that’s not so bad, many times our grandson is with us too, so they are half right!!
Well, as I believe I’ve alluded to: at 20 (well, 25 for my first) you have more energy; at 40 you have more wisdom and patience. I think 20 is too young. In fact, I’d have to say that, at 25, I was on the cusp of ‘too young’ when I had my first. But I’d done my ‘clubbing’, etc. so I never felt I missed out on anything by having a baby at that age.
My second child, born when I was almost 30, I felt a need to have another baby. It was as undeniable as true hunger or thirst. My body was saying “Hey, bozo-head, have a baby! Now, if possible!”
Our third, when I was 38, was a “last shot” for a boy. Didn’t work, but I can’t imagine my life without her!
Lots of great advice from (mostly) everyone. As usual, the opinions and experiences of Cat Whisperer and Ferret Herder closely resemble mine.
NOTHING you could imagine doing will change your life as much as having a kid(s). And once you are in, you are in it for a minimum of 18 years. So, barring unforeseen circumstances, you should treat it as potentially the most important decision you have ever made.
On the negative side - I am now 48 and my youngest of 3 recently went to college. I have friends my age with young kids. Having a young kid would kill me now. Just simple things like getting up and down off the floor, and waking up for a sick kid in the middle of the night is SO much easier in your 20s than in your 30s. And pregnancy and birth can take quite a toll on even a healthy young woman. I would have to imagine it would age most older women quite quickly.
I think I was a better parent of young kids when I was younger simply because I did not know as much and was not as set in my ways. At this point in my life I couldn’t imagine trying to pretend I gave a shit about all the stupid stuff that goes on through the grade and middle school years. And, being set in my ways, and having gotten used to some comforts and routines, I imagine I might find it difficult to have some unreasoning little stranger demand control over all I enjoy.
Of course on the flipside, I have a lot more money than I had then, and while money doesn’t buy happiness, it can go a long way towards renting it…
I know turning the clock back 20 years is not an option, but with my kids becoming young adults while my wife and I are still young enough and healthy enough to enjoy ourselves, added to the prospect of seeing them live their lives, getting to know grandkids, and all - I’m very pleased that we decided to have kids when we did, relatively young. But it is entirely a personal choice, and many people do well (and poorly) however they go about it.
If you’re financially stable and want to have a baby, have a baby! I’m not financially stable but I’m still tickled with my daughter. I’m forty now, thirty-five when she was born. I spend more time with her than I was able to with her twenty year old sister. I’m more mature and much much more patient than I was 20 years ago.
Happy, loving soul mates probably make gosh darn good parents.
The ‘more money’ thing helps in other ways, too, when it comes to parenting. Kids are darned expensive! We have quite a bit more money now than I did when my older kids were little.
On nights when I’m too tired to cook, I can order food in. If I’m too tired to clean the house after a hard Saturday (our ‘family fun day’), I can pay someone to clean for me.
I have a friend who is very, very wealthy. He says that what having money does for him is that, stuff he doesn’t want to do, he can just pay someone to do it for him. Now, we’re not anywhere that level of wealthy, but I certainly can buy some things that, otherwise, I’d have to expend effort for. IOW, I can ‘buy’ physical effort!
Only do it if you both 1) have a lot of energy and 2) have plenty of money. No sense in struggling with retirement while you’re trying to get your kid through college.
My parents became parents for the 3rd time with my youngest brother (twas an accident) when they were 40 and 50. Even still, when my mom told my dad “Honey, I’m pregnant” my father said “WITH A BABY!?!”
They have a TON of energy, and having a child so late in life didn’t hamper their retirement decisions - they’re both semi retired at age 55 and 65 now, and my youngest brother never sees them as old. Quite a few of his friends have parents who are both professionals, they have older parents - a lot of his friends help their mothers dye their hair! He recognizes how lucky he is - instead of going back to his yucky hometown while on break from college, he’ll choose to spend time with me (in a city he loves) or with my parents in their beachfront condo in Florida.
I’ve seen a lot of people struggle if they’re medium or low energy people when they have a kid late in life. If you’ve got a lot of energy, go for it. My mom can stay up just as we (23, 19, 15) can, playing scrabble or hanging out on the weekends.
My parents had me when they were both 36 or so, and we have a better parent-child relationship than most. Are you basing this on your own personal experience?
A friend’s dad had my friend when he was 50. That I think has led to some awkwardness.
My father was 45, so 5 years older than you, when I was born. The age difference was not a problem when I was a child, except that it alienated me from some of my friends; their grandparents were not much older than my parents.
The thing that has been difficult for me is that my dad died when I was in my early 30s. I know people can die at any age, and he had lived a full, long life, but I wish he were still around. My sister has children, and our father did not live to see the birth of any of them.
But I’m certainly glad I was brought into this world, and my father loved having children. I’m sure he never regretted it for a moment.
My daughter did at 42 and is happy as a clam. Although she had some health issues not related to the pregnancy which made a vaginal delivery inadvisable, she came through it fine. It is hard, though, taking care of a baby at that age. Be prepared for not much sleep for some months and the financial burden (daycare, larger apartment in NYC, etc.) is substantial.
Oddly enough, my youngest brother (my dad was actually 49 upon doing the math, mom was 39) has plenty of friends whose parents are as old as ours are - though none older. Of course, he’s just a freshman in high school, and parents become older and older nowadays, especially educated parents. In most cases, however, it was their second or third child. The bottom line really is how much energy you have and how old do you act? My dad has never been mistaken for the little’s Bluth’s grandfather - but he dyes his hair, works out 4-5 days a week, practically stopped drinking, and is pretty handy with technology. He would always entertain his friends with magic tricks and the like, making him a cool dad.
My SO’s mother adopted her youngest when she was 44. She’s now 51, and I can see it’s going to be A Problem. She’s slowing down as is. She hates technology, won’t dye her hair (in spite of the fact the 7 year old tells her to) and is often too tired to play with them much.
One of my little brother’s best friends’s mom stopped dying her hair - she went from jet black to stark white one day! My brother that night BEGGED my parents to swear to him that they’d never stop dying their hair.
Something to consider - when you are already in your 40s, your parents are significantly older, so if you were hoping on them to help you out from time to time, they might not be up to the job. I know my parents play a huge role in my nephew’s lives - it’s not unusual for the nephews to spend an entire weekend with them, which gives my brother and sis-in-law a much needed break and adult time together.
Another point for the OP (assuming he’s still around) - your reactions to this thread could be very enlightening. Do you feel all happy inside when someone supports having a baby, or do you feel relieved when someone says it’s not a great idea?
My aunt has been known to say she doesn’t regret having the children she does have, but she does regret having children, if that makes any sense; that’s the good version, the bad one was all the years she mistreated her son for the sin of looking like his dad.
My mother, on the other hand, always wanted children, but did not want two of the three she got (as in, doesn’t like us personally or feel a lot of interest in us as people).
As for the OP, add my voice of “if you want to do it, the sooner the better; if you sort’a-but-not-really want to do it, don’t”.
At 40, it may not be your choice. Fertility begins to decline at 28. Are you willing to get IVF if you need to? That may be something to consider- are you only wanting to have a child for the hell of it, or are you willing to jump through hoops to do it because you want it that badly?
