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[johnr]

So, then I suppose the question becomes why, from an evolutionary perspective, would women become fertile before the rest of their body is ready to bear children?  This is a bit of an oddity in the world of nature, n'est-ce pas?  It would seem to me that would have been weeded out by evolutionary factors by this time, and women wouldn't become fertile until they're about 18 - 25 yo?

No, not an oddity in nature at all.  Many animals (and plants for that matter) are physiologically able to reproduce (and do) at an early age, but reach reproductive maximums later in life, followed by a gradual decline.

[kaysixteen]

Obviously, it is certainly true that a 30-ish or even 40-ish academic woman can have a baby, and the odds would still be that the baby would be healthy.  That said, people make choices in life-- to have a newborn when one is trying to write a dissertation, or trying to earn tenure, is not the same as to have one when one is not trying to do anything like that.  Like it or not.  So, when a senior advisor advises a woman to put her career as no. 1 priority over her kid, the woman needs to consider this advice, and the ramifications for accepting or rejecting it...

[frogfactory]

Maybe because we're pack animals, and would all help raise the baby? I'm guessing. I've no idea.

I know what you meant here, but this made me giggle.

[temporaryname]

There's also a HUGE amount of variation among women.  Many women in earlier generations of my family (i.e. before effective birth control) had successful pregnancies well through their 40s and into their 50s, and the kids turned out fine (no Down's syndrome, etc.).  Lots of women in their 40s have perfectly healthy babies, and plenty of younger moms have babies with serious developmental issues.  35 as gyno-geriatric is an arbitrary cutoff.  The risk of genetic defects due to imperfect egg formation in "older" mothers increases with age starting at the onset of fertility.  It doesn't jump from zero to high upon hitting 35 any more than gray hairs pop up magically at age 40.  Doctors *should* take things like individual health and family history into consideration before simply stating "you're old, thus you're high risk" as it makes a little sense as putting everybody over age 30 on a statin or an arthritis medication.

According to my partner's ob/gyn, 35 is the magic age at least in part because that's the age where the risk of miscarriage from amniocentesis is matched by the risk of age-associated genetic abnormalities. No idea if that's actually true or just medical folklore, though.

[menotti]

Once you hit 35, you are "geriatric" according to the OB/GYN community,

The OB/GYN community also labels women who have multiple miscarriages as "habitual aborters."  I'm thinking a terminology makeover may be due in that field. 

There are the lovely terms


elderly primigravida
cervical incompetence
pelvic insufficiency

[lotsoquestions]

We live in a very conservative part of the country where women still seem to do most of their childbearing in their early 20's.  I was just pondering the other day how strange it is that the norm here is for women to have all their kids by the time they're 25, and basically be an empty nester by age 45!  I was thinking about how strange it is that people seem to live to their 80's, but childbearing is basically over by the end of the first half of their lives.  I remember thinking that I would have no idea how to fill my time if I was done with childbearing by age 45.  I suppose in a time when the average life expectancy was 65, it didn't seem to strange to have 20 or so years to putter in the garden and be a grandma, but it seems weird to have 40 or 50 years to do those things.  (that and the fact that on the rare occasions when I help out at my child's school, the only women MY age are grandma's, not moms.)

[charybdis]

As someone who will have an empty nest, knock wood, by 47, I can say that I plan on enjoying those years when my offspring leaves for college. And I hope that there are at least 30 or more of them. I plan to travel, kick my academic work up a notch, and continue to be a productive scholar and mentor. If blessed with grandchildren, I'll enjoy them and will hopefully be healthy enough to be an active and involved grandparent. And unlike some of my colleagues, I actually plan to retire, at least if TIAACref is still around. I know that having children in your 20's isn't for everyone, but that choice doesn't have to turn on whether you are afraid to have an empty nest at 45. 

[janewales]

... kick my academic work up a notch 

I had my kids on the young side for an academic, too-- so I'm also looking towards a time soon when I can be a bit more single-minded about my work, and that will indeed be great. The catch with having children early is, of course, surviving the job search and pre-tenure period. I was lucky enough to have a family situation that made it possible, but not everyone is going to have that luxury. So sure, there are advantages to emptying the nest early, but I can easily understand why so many academic women hold off until their positions are secure.

[monita]

Maybe because we're pack animals, and would all help raise the baby? I'm guessing. I've no idea.

There are some good anthropological/primatological arguments that humans are an obligate co-parenting species.  It make evolutionary sense to postpone reproduction until there is a social network available to ensure those kids' survival. 

[polly_mer]

I was thinking about how strange it is that people seem to live to their 80's, but childbearing is basically over by the end of the first half of their lives.  I remember thinking that I would have no idea how to fill my time if I was done with childbearing by age 45.  I suppose in a time when the average life expectancy was 65, it didn't seem to strange to have 20 or so years to putter in the garden and be a grandma, but it seems weird to have 40 or 50 years to do those things.  (that and the fact that on the rare occasions when I help out at my child's school, the only women MY age are grandma's, not moms.)

I'm not sure what to make of this post because people who never have children aren't usually to be found wandering the streets doing nothing and some of them will have a good 60 years of time on their hands to fill.

I had a full life before becoming a mother.  I have a full life as a mother of a small child.  I will have a full life when my child is an adult.  The children-at-home phase is a phase of many women's lives and I won't diminish the busyness of this time, but people who aren't currently raising children for whatever reason aren't necessarily lumps trying to figure out how to fill a bunch of extra time that "should" be taken up by children while waiting to die.

[frogfactory]

Maybe because we're pack animals, and would all help raise the baby? I'm guessing. I've no idea.

There are some good anthropological/primatological arguments that humans are an obligate co-parenting species.  It make evolutionary sense to postpone reproduction until there is a social network available to ensure those kids' survival. 

My point was that 'pack animal' means 'beast of burden', not 'social species'.

Never mind.

[navelgazer]

Reality is reality.  People like to believe lies that tell us we can have our cake and eat it too, the sky's the limit, be all you can be, etc., but, in reality, well...

The reality is that most careers, I'm thinking of friends in law, medicine, high tech, are more supportive of two-career families. Academia and big law are the two big exceptions I can think of off the top of my head, among my high-achieving friends. So, we have the choice of saying "reality is reality" OR saying "let's make the world better." I choose B.

[spyzowin]

On Mary Ann Mason's recent article there were quite a few things of interest to me. For example the bitterness in some of the comments was surprising, only till I recalled all the other comments some of my favorite feminist blog-writers receive on a regular basis.

But a point I wanted to bring up here besides a hope to initiate a more general discussion of the article, was Mason's comment that "women find that their institutions probably do not support them in starting a family even if they are in their 30s, their chief reproductive years"

I am interested to know what the forum inhabitants think about the 30s being the chief reproductive years. I believe that if you asked women of fifty years ago, these chief years would be the 20s. Do you think perhaps there will be a shift to the 40s as we make medical progress and academic lives remain the same?

Well, this is the main point that intrigued me about the article as I am quite personally aware of the situation in STEM fields and the rest was not much too surprising... However it is an interesting read for others who may not be as familiar with that...

the chief reproductive years are certainly the 20's. People in their 30's are just kidding themselves, and people reproducing in their 40's are selfish and dumb.

[navydad]

Choices, choices, choices.

Consequences, consequences, consequences.

[temporaryname]

For presumably obvious reasons, I'm hereby making a late New Year's resolution: DNFTT. No matter how hard it is.