Career over Children?

This new research on the chances of getting pregnant after 35-years-old is pretty interesting. However, I would hate to think that women will start having babies before they are ready to care for them or with the wrong fellow. That would be even more alarming than this study!

My husband and I met when I was just turning 21-years old. We still didn't have children until I was 26 years old. So I guess women my age (32) are supposed to be like-"hey you like me, you wanna have kids?"Of course I am saying this tongue and cheek. I guess I just feel like most of the people I know who want kids and haven't had them yet are single.

Some medical research out today has a lot of women and men, for that matter talking. A new fertility study finds once a woman hits 30, she has only 12 percent of her eggs left. And by age 40, the decline is even more extreme. These are huge implications in a country where millions of career women put off marriage and children while their biological clocks tick.

The news and the numbers sure startled the women we met at this gym. “At 30 women have 12% of their eggs left." Lyssie Lakatos: Wow Kate: So when I say that what runs through your head? Lyssie: That's shocking yeah. It makes me nervous." Amanda Galmiche: "I think that sounds a little extreme. I mean that surprises me yeah. Researchers used a complicated math formula to show that after the teenage years it's all downhill in terms of how many eggs a woman has left in her ovaries. Andi Barreiro: "I guess I better hurry up. Yeah that's scary."

In the past 30 years the number of women over 35 having their first child increased by eight fold. "There's so many examples of people having babies so much older that I think it makes it a lot easier for people my age to be like yeah I don't have to rush into getting married and having kids." Dr. Goldfarb: "Unfortunately, nature is what it is, and that once you get much beyond 35 the chance of getting pregnant are gonna go down quite a bit. But before you panic... A numbers check... It can vary a lot-- but on average a girl starts life with 300-thousand eggs. So what this study is saying is that by age 30 she has 36-thousand left. And it only takes one egg to get pregnant. By age 40, the study says women are down to three percent of their eggs... Or about 9-thousand.

Dr. Goldfarb: "The numbers are scary. The positive is that those 12 percent of eggs work very very well. By the time you get to 40 those 3% of eggs don't work very well. In other words quality may matter more than quantity. Andi Barreiro "My moms friends they all ask me when I'm gonna have kids cause my eggs are getting old." K: "Well, I guesS they're not wrong according to the study we're looking at. And what do you tell them back? Andi: "That I have to have a boyfriend first."

-NewsAnchorMom Jen

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