Author(s): Elizabeth Gregory

Health & Wellbeing

n the wake of all the scare stories about waiting "too late" to become a mother, this powerful book backed with solid evidence argues that women who wait until they're 'ready' are often happier with their choice. If you believe the media hype of the last several years, women need to start having children when they are young - or else they can't be assured of having a family. Women everywhere have felt terrorized by these dire predictions and have wondered how to chart a successful, satisfying course through life that includes work and family both.The average age of British women giving birth is stable at 29, but, despite the alarm and anxiety ripping through the media, the numbers of women choosing to start families in their late thirties and early forties has risen sharply. In 2006 in England and Wales, more than 22,000 women over 40 had babies, of whom nearly 5,500 were giving birth for the first time. Other figures suggest this is a trend: in 2005, 10 times as many women - 102,228 - had their first child between 35 and 39 as in 1975 and 13 times as many had their first between 40 and 44. A huge number of women clearly want to wait, but as a culture we've not yet come to terms with all the changes that this choice brings.University of Houston professor Elizabeth Gregory aims to fill that gap. In conversations with over a hundred of what she terms "new later mothers" (that is, first-time mothers over the age of 35), Gregory discovered something that we all need to hear: most women who want to can and do have children when they are ready, once they have established themselves in their careers and found the right partners. She also found that, contrary to panicked media reports, the new later mothers are overwhelmingly happy with their choice - in fact, most felt that it was one of the best decisions that they had ever made. And, even better, these women articulated a whole host of benefits to having children later that include higher earnings, increased self-awareness, greater potential for family stability, and the ability to focus more on their families."