How old is too old to have a baby?

[Miss Chicken]

Here in Australia a 57 year old woman has just birth to twins as a result of IVF. From what I gather the IVF was carried out in India but the woman either returned, or moved, to Australia early in the pregnancy.

I realise that this woman isn't the oldest woman to give birth in the world, but she is the oldest in Australia.

There is a debate going on about what age is too old for a woman to give birth so I am going to ask people here to give their opinions, and also opinions about older fathers as well.

 

[JiNX-01]

I wouldn't make this a law, but it would be nice if the aged prospective parent considered the impact on a very young child of having GrandMommy or GrandDaddy be there one day and be in heaven the next.

 

[Amaris]

I don't know. It's such a personal decision, I don't know how I could possibly make a definitive statement one way or the other. All I could advise would be that the prospective parents be fully aware of all the physical, psychological, emotional, social, and financial implications involved, not just for them, but for the potential child as well.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I wouldn't make this a law, but it would be nice if the aged prospective parent considered the impact on a very young child of having GrandMommy or GrandDaddy be there one day and be in heaven the next.

The average life expectancy, in the West for a woman, is about 82-86 years depending on the country. Therefore ifa woman has a baby at 57 their is a good chance that she will live until that child is an adult.

 

[scotpens]

It's great that we have all this medical technology to help infertile women conceive, but enough already! What about the effect on the child? When the kid graduates from high school, his mom will be 75 -- older that most of his classmates’ grandmothers.

No, I wouldn't pass a law, but this is an issue that ought to be addressed by medical ethics boards. Like the fertility specialist who helped Octo-Mom get pregnant with octuplets when she already had six children.

 

[Brent]

I think our society needs to get over this idea of old being bad. I say let people have children old as they want, granted that it is safe for both the parent and child to do so of course. If it is medically OK, then let them do it if the parents want to be parents! Who are we to say how old someone has to be to have a child?

 

[Miss Chicken]

It's great that we have all this medical technology to help infertile women conceive, but enough already! What about the effect on the child? When the kid graduates from high school, his mom will be 75 -- older that most of his classmates’ grandmothers.

And why would having an older mother have a bad effect on the child? How is the child any different from a child being raised by a grandmother?

I certainly think it is better to have a child when you are older woman than the other extreme - girls having babies in early teens. At least most women having babies in their 50s are financially secure.

 

[SicOne]

I don't want this discussion to devolve into how old is TOO old, but one of the things that has to be considered is the increasing risk of Down's Syndrome and similar situations as the mother grows older. It is my understanding that the risk escalates significantly higher each year after 40. Err...do human eggs have an "expiration date"?

 

[Miss Chicken]

It is quite possible that the woman used donor eggs rather than her own eggs to have these babies.

 

[Joshua Howard]

At age 5 a child fully reaches general awareness.
At age 25 a child fully reaches mental maturity.
At age 45 an adult fully reaches professional maturity.
At age 65 an professional reaches retirement.
At age 85, a senior reaches general decline.

A child who is phase 1 or phase 2 should at no point have a parent who is phase 4 or phase 5.

Using this logic, we would conclude that a parent should not be more than 40 years of age when bearing a [newborn] child.

The reason for this logic is that a parent who is younger than 25 lacks the mental maturity to make wise early parenthood choices, while a parent who is older than 65 either lacks the physical strength or the lifestyle relatability necessary for healthy parenting.

Parents who are too young perform poorly because often they are still trying to figure out what their own place in life is. On the other end of the spectrum, you risk having high energy children in a senior-age parenting situation. The parents aren't there to give good career and early life coaching, because by the time their kids grow up, they have left the workforce.

Is it really good for the kid to have a 57-year-old mother? You're going to have a 15 year old being cared for by a 72 year old who certainly is getting past the age of wanting to chase frisbees or go on long camping trips, or do anything else that a budding young person would like to do. I don't want to be biased, but it just doesn't seem healthy.

 

[Miss Chicken]

I have known plenty of older people over 65 who are physically very active. For example, Sir David Attenborough made the last five of his Life series after the age of 65. The last one he made at 80.

My father was physically capable of playing cricket etc with his grandchildren when he was 65-70.

I also know parents who are under 45 who are not physically capable of chasing a frisbee or going on long camping trips.

 

[Joshua Howard]

^ Fair enough. I guess we could settle this whole darn thing by just agreeing that we should mind our own business and let people raise kids whenever and however they see fit.

If you're going to say old people can't be good parents, then you might as well also say that fat people, or disabled people, or depressed people, or unaccomplished people can't be good parents either. The list could go on.

Certainly, there is appeal in the ideal of perfectly constructed people with perfectly constructed lives raising perfectly formed children during the prime of their lives under ideal circumstances. In the end though, life is what it is. In 200 years, people might be living to be 150 years old... and if that ever happens, we'll look back on conversations like these as crude and insensitive.

 

[T'Bonz]

I'm 52. The thought of pregnancy, a baby, and then a young child fills me with horror and I loved kids (had three of them in fact).

The energy level is *not* what it was in the 20s, or even the 30s. I think I wanted children up to my late 30s. Then the urge to have more went away. Now I wait for grandchildren that I can borrow.

It's an individual decision. No one ever asks though, if a *man* is too old to father children or whether they should, because men don't have the biological shut-off like the women do.

For me, the late cut-off would be 40. I would say, due to lifespan and health, in general, over 50 would be a bad idea.

 

[Mary Ann]

My parents were both going on 42 when I was born (yes, Roman Catholics!). Though this is not a problem for all older parents, there was always a blaring generation gap between me and my parents. I was never close to either of my parents as a child. Again, this is not a generalisation but it can be a problem.

People in their 50s may still be active but very few will be truly as active as they were in their 20s and 30s. It's one thing to play cricket or go mountain climbing; it's quite another to have a baby, which is a 24/7 job. As all parents know, having a baby is utterly exhausting, and there's no let-up. Keeping up with a toddler isn't any easier. So as a generalisation I don't believe that the quality of life for the child (who has no say in the matter) may not always be as good as that of a child with younger parents.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

Using this logic, we would conclude that a parent should not be more than 40 years of age when bearing a [newborn] child.

I had a similar thought process, but I put the max at 45 varying depending on the person. I figured the minimum of 20 instead of 25, but I could also argue some people retire at 70 instead of 65. Either way, I don't think anyone over 50 should be having a kid unless they have given serious thought to all aspects of the future.

 

[RoJoHen]

No one ever asks though, if a *man* is too old to father children

Of course they do. Sure, an old man might still be able to impregnate a woman, but that doesn't mean he is physically capable of raising a child. And if a man has a kid in his 50s, he's still going to be 70 by the time that kid graduates high school. It doesn't make it any less weird just because he's a man.

 

[Holdfast]

All else being equal, I think an age range of 25-40 is probably ideal for the mother, and 30-45 for the father. On average that would give the couple the most chance of having the energy, the financial resources, the appropriate environment, the physical health and the wider social network that all help in the raising of a child.

But "how old is too old" is a pretty silly question to take in isolation, as things are rarely equal, so the more important issue than age is whether they can meet the child's needs, and age is not the bottleneck determinant of that. Clearly, to take an extreme position, a 100 year old is highly unlikely to be able to meet those needs if they adopted an infant, but a cheeky devil's advocate would suggest that there are plenty of young mothers who die in a child's early life or young sick mothers unable to be as active in the child's development as a healthier mother would, and that death or sickness doesn't mean that society calls them bad parents while they lived. In fact, it usually goes out of its way to label them wonderful, wonderful parents, at least in the eulogy.

 

[bigdaddy]

Older than 40 and the risks are too large, so I say 40.

But I hate children.

 

[SPOCKED]

No one ever asks though, if a *man* is too old to father children or whether they should, because men don't have the biological shut-off like the women do.

huh?

I may have a biological clock but it takes a licking and keeps on ticking, baby YEAH!!

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

What if the story were about a fifty-seven year old woman who adopted an infant?

In my mid-fifties now, I have the energy, the emotional and certainly the financial resources to do as good or better (probably the latter) a job of parenting as when I was much younger. Based on my own family history and observations of the cohort ahead of me it seems reasonable that I could expect to raise a child through adolescence without the likelihood of encountering exceptional difficulty. That said, I don't really have the interest; I'd rather do different things with what remains of my life. Other people have other priorities and interests, and really should pursue those things they want to do.