When is the best age to have your first baby?

Greatnan, To answer your question. I think teaching about fertility in sex education lessons is theoretically a good idea but I think in practice most 15 year olds, or thereabouts find it impossible to imagine being 30 plus, still less able to think about decisions they need to make that far ahead. Our high teenage pregnancy figures suggest many of them cannot connect what they learn in sex education lessonswith what they do later that day, let alone in 15+ years time.

I think what you say is very true, Anagram....I believe that the more education a woman has, the later she is likely to have her first child. In my family, we have had our babies when we were young and then gone back to education.

My grand-daughter is nearly 24 and has a 3 year old and 18 month old. She wants to go back to college and train for a career. She is heartened by my experience, and that of her aunt - we both had babies young and took degrees later and had successful careers. This meant that we did not need to take career breaks once we had qualified.
My grandson's fiance also has two little girls, about the same ages and she is also in her early 20's and planning to complete her education once they are both at school.

Nobody has actually commented on my original post - do you think it would be a good idea to teach about fertility in sex education lessons? There is some evidence that older mothers (and now older fathers , too) are more likely to have babies with congenital defects, to have premature births and to miscarry. Unfortunately, it also seems to be the case that babies born by IVF also have more health problems. Of course, I know that very many babies are born to older parents without any problems at all.

My first daughter was born when I was 25. I wasn't even sure if I was ready then. I had my second at 30. I was happier by then and feeling a bit more confident.

My younger daughter was 21 when she had her first child and my older one 34 when she had hers.

I believe that women should have a child when they feel able to cope mentally, physically and financially.

I was also an 'elderly prima gravida' at 28. I lived in a new town where many of the new mothers were very young indeed and when my midwife excalimed at my age I told her I had decided to make sure I was grown up myself before I had a child of my own. She stopped, looked through the door at all the other (very young) pregnant women in the waiting room and said. 'I wish other women were as sensible.'

When I was 16 and thinking about careers and my life ahead I decided, whatever else might happen I did not want to have children before I was 27 on the basis that if I had 6 or 7 years in work experience after university before I needed to give up work to look after such children (those were the days before maternity leave and flexible working) this would stand me in good stead when I wanted to resume my career. And it did. I was back at work part time by 35 and full time at 40 leaving me 25 years of working life to reach a reasonable level of seniority in my career

Of course events can knock all such plans sideways. In my case the first bit went to plan but the end didnt. I worked for a large company that in the mid-1990s had to halve its staff from 70,000 to 35,000 and had a very generous redundancy scheme. I was 53. After considerable thought I decided that although my career was progressing nicely and I didnt want to go, opting for 'voluntary' early retirement was in my best long term interest and I moved into another life. Nevertheless I still believe that that the best age to have children when you also want a successful career is between 27 and 32.

Not quite sure, absent. Many teens these days really want a baby because they think it will fill a gap in their lives and give them someone to love - but it's not necessarily the right time.

Spot on absentgrana

nanakate, I enjoyed your post very much

I would make an educated guess that the genuinely best time to have a baby is when you really want one.

I know a lot of young women, partly through having 3 daughters, but also because I have employed many in recent years as dance, drama and singing teachers. Almost all saw 30 as the age they were aiming for to have had their first baby, and in fact most have gone on to have their 1st as they approached 30.
My middle daughter had her first at 27, and my youngest (24) is aiming for 27/28 too.
I had mine aged 28, 31 and 36. I was aiming for 35 for number 3, but a late miscarriage when I was 35 set that back.
I don't actually know any young women who've had babies in their early 20s.

I had my 1st at 32, not by choice. DH and I had been trying to conceive for 10yrs. I was 37 when I had my 2nd. That came as a complete surprise as I had a coil fitted at the time

In some ways I wish I'd had them younger, but we wern't as financially stable when I was in my early 20's

I was 23 when I had my first. I was a postgrad student at the time and the pregnancy was the result of missing one pill - honest! I was 15 weeks gone and unable to do my skirt up before the university doctor would take me seriously. When he felt my tummy he went white as a sheet and promptly offered me a termination! I reassured him that actually I would be quite happy to go ahead with the pregnancy, and he got quite excited about it. Uni doctors in those days were just dealing with contraception and hardly ever had a wanted pregnancy to deal with.

Although we didn't have two halfpennies to rub together we have never for one minute regretted having our daughter young, and the second one came when I was 25. My only regret was that I didn't have a third one in my thirties, but my husband announced that he thought I was too old at 35. How times do change.

I would like to think that more women could be confident about having their children in their twenties. The pendulum of opinion seems to have swung so far the other way that young people are regarded as irresponsible if babies come before car and house. And today you need a second mortgage to buy all the baby paraphernalia. It would be nice if gransnet could fly the flag a bit for frugal motherhood, that is, not burdened with a mountain of pink or blue plastic.

I had my children between the ages of 23 and 29. My GP told me he felt that women should have their babies in their twenties as that was when they were best able physically to deal with the strains on their bodies. Makes sense I suppose but then there will always be those who disprove the rule. He was generalising.

If you wait until you can afford to have children then the chances are you won't. I don't think there is ever a right financial time but tbh it doesn't matter because you cope and you have something far more valuable than money.

I was 28 when I got married and 32 when absentdaughter was born. I should have loved more children but my husband (now ex) was firm in his opinion that one was enough. I too was an elderly primagravida – very flattering. My mother married aged 26 just before World War II and didn't start a family until afterwards, having her first child at the age of 34 and me at the age of 39, with a miscarriage in between. Absentdaughter got married at 17 and had her first child at the age of 19, subsequently divorcing her husband and remarrying. Her fifth child was born in March this year when she was 29. All three of us managed okay and any problems we had with the births seem to have been unrelated to age. I grew up to be a reasonably responsible adult and managed to raise a fabulous daughter, who is proving to be a terrific mother. There's probably too much agonising about all this, although I agree that that medical facts about conception, childbirth and age should be included as par of sex education. People will continue to have babies because their desire to do so is overpowering.

How silly to call you that! DD jad her first at age 28 and was the youngest in the ward!

I was (and still am) Vintage Mum.

Surely not 'senile', eGJ!
I know I was an 'elderly prima gravida' at 29.

I was a "senile prima gravida" in the military hospital when I went for antenatal visits and I was only 28 at the time!!

I think we worry about these things too much. Had my eldest in my mid-twenties and my youngest in my mid-forties and loved it all (and them all). I think I was tireder with DD3 but the tiredness wasn't a shock, which it had been with DD1. I think enjoyed the whole baby and child-rearing thing more as an older mum because I'd had enough practice by then to be getting good at it . Not that I was ever a worrier and my babies, thankfully, enjoyed rude health.

It's just Life. Reproducing is what animals do, and then they cope as best they can whatever their circumstances.

Hurrah for contraception though. I wouldn't have wanted hordes of the wee darlings.

I had my first at 26 (planned) and my second eleven months later (not planned)!!

Hard work but all over in one go!

I meant stuck alone with a baby.

I put it off because my husband was in the Navy and I didn't want to be stuck in Portsmouth, 400 miles from family and old friends, with a baby.

I had my first at 30 - stillborn alas, then healthy boys at 34 and 37. It seemed right to me - each to her own I suppose.

It's my youngest's 30th birthday tomorrow - I'll feel a lot better at his party tomorrow than I did 30 years ago!!

My mother was about 41 when I was born - she was always a bit cagey about her age. She always seemed much older than my friends' mothers and never took part in cycling, swimming, skating, etc. with us. Of course, women of 50 in those days were very different from women of 50 today. I was certainly still teaching my grandchildren to roller skate when I was 60.
DD1 started early, having her first baby at just 20, but kept going another five times until she was 35. Fortunately, her last two, who are now 14 and 13, are very sensible and hard-working and don't seem to be the type to give her any aggro in their mid teens.
The woman who had IVF abroad when she was about 55 has been reported as saying it was a mistake and she is finding it difficult to cope. Of course, many women have to take over their grandchidren's upbringing when their parents have died, or are unable to manage in some other way. They seem to do very well, and I take my hat off to them.

I had my first at 22 and my last at 25, for me the ideal age. They were grown up and left home while I was still in my early 40s and then I had time to myself.

I had my first at 20 and then 2 more before I was 28, first was quite by accident and the other two just because we wanted them.. not much thought went into whether we could afford them , luckily all worked out well for us but I hope my grandchildren will put a lot more thought into planning a family than I did..

The convention was to get married and then think about starting a family so I was 27 when my first child was born, and I discovered I was regarded as 'elderly' in obstetric terms! My children have had their babies at this age and over, too! By the time I had my twin girls at the age of 33, I had started to think I was getting a bit too old for crawling round on the floor and getting up in the middle of the night! Little did I know!

My sister, who is 61, still fosters tiny babies, so she does all that now.

I think some are well organised these days. Both my DiLs were in their 30s before having babies and well established on the property ladder and career paths.