View Full Version : Should Women Have Children After 50?



MrsSnootyPants
01-18-2005, 06:47 PM
I heard today about a woman having her first child after extensive Assisted Reproductive Technology. She is 66.

How old is too old to have a child?

Keith
01-18-2005, 06:54 PM
Let's see...if she is 66 when the child is born, that will make her 80 years old when the child is a teenager. I feel like the child is the one at the losing end of this deal. While younger parents are able to go out and do stuff with their children and go to school functions, etc..the child with the older parent feels like they are at the school function with their grandmother.

I really can't say how old is too old, however, I feel that if the woman has not had a child by the time she is 50, then she should not try at all. The older the mother is, the harder it is going to be on the child.

Patrick
01-18-2005, 08:07 PM
I echo what Keith said. 50 years would make the mother 68 when the child is 18. What happens if the parent passes away while the child is young?

Patrick
01-18-2005, 08:07 PM
By the way....great thread topic MrsSnootyPants

Midtowner
01-18-2005, 09:59 PM
Also, there is a much higher propability of birth defects. If this practice were to be commonplace, the taxpayers would end up shelling out millions because of some senior citizen's selfish need to reproduce.

I think it should be illegal.

mistipetal
01-19-2005, 09:59 AM
Barring the birth defects issue, which is a big one, if the person wants to have a child, I don't believe the child would necessarily miss out. My grandmother *was* the one that came to my school functions, was my home room mom all that stuff. I thought it was great and my grandmother rocked. And honestly, as many mothers leave their children to be raised by the grandparents anyway, its fairly common. I can't imagine someone wanting to become a parent at that age, but as far something happening to the parent while the child was still young...that happens to people of everyage. If you are a parent, you need to get estate planning regardless of age.

Midtowner
01-19-2005, 10:07 AM
Barring the birth defects issue, which is a big one, if the person wants to have a child, I don't believe the child would necessarily miss out. My grandmother *was* the one that came to my school functions, was my home room mom all that stuff. I thought it was great and my grandmother rocked. And honestly, as many mothers leave their children to be raised by the grandparents anyway, its fairly common. I can't imagine someone wanting to become a parent at that age, but as far something happening to the parent while the child was still young...that happens to people of everyage. If you are a parent, you need to get estate planning regardless of age.

I agree that often grandparents end up being the parents -- and are often better parents than the parents. I work in a family law practice and that is something I see every single day.

What upsets me here is not necessarily how the child would be raised, it's the near certainty that this practice on a wide scale would bring into being MANY new children with serious birth defects. The system is already crowded. Special Ed classrooms are already at capacity. For this to be done on a massive scale is simply irresponsible and selfish. If this old woman wanted a child so badly, she could adopt.

mistipetal
01-19-2005, 10:33 AM
I'm in social work. We are the ones that end up paying for their medical services and for the children to go to day care while grandmother works. Frankly, having done child welfare work, I see a lot of problems with all ends of the parenting question. Adoption would be a far better option and would help a lot of really needing, loving children. The thing is, with fertility drugs out there, this sort of thing is going to happen, and though it might be irresponsible and selfish, the exact same phrase can apply to a lot of people who bring children into the world. If she can get pregnant and has the resources to afford it, I don't feel we have the right to say she can't. Who's to say the child won't be healtier and happier than others born to younger, less competant and loving parents?

MrsSnootyPants
01-19-2005, 12:29 PM
MistiPetal, I agree on that point. Ask any Emergency Room nurse and they will tell you stories about young unprepared or careless mothers who end up with their children in the Emergency Rooms. Ask them how many grandmother's they have seen in the same situation.

While I think that the issue on this topic is more ethical and religious and since it is new I thought I would kick it around. Perosanlly, everyone should have the right to have children if they want. We all know plenty of people who should not be moms or dads and have no interest in their children.

mistipetal
01-19-2005, 01:04 PM
MrsSnootyPants,

I totally agree.

I think fundamentally it is ethical and moral question. It's a lot less about the health issue. If you go down the road of medically should they be able to have children, you will end up having to address the further issue of if these people are limited, who else can you limit. It will intrude on freedom of choice, ect. We don't have any more right to limit them than we do to limit a teenager from having a child or someone just unfit. A parent who has their child taken away can go right ahead and get pregnant again and "replace" their lost baby. A lot of those are drug users who end up with special needs children too. And given the choice between the two, I'd pick grandmother aged lady over druggie lady.

Midtowner
01-19-2005, 03:41 PM
Mistipetal,

It's not a zero-sum game. You don't get to choose the senior citizen "over" the druggie. The druggie will be having their children regardless of your choice. I think the senior question is unique because in order to become pregnant, a serious medical procedure must first take place. It *could* be made illegal with the right laws in place. As far as the druggie goes, their body can naturally pump out wards for the state, so I guess that's the choice that America has made (personally, I wish we could temporarily sterilize them until they could be deemed somehow to be fit parents).

The difference in my mind is that these old folks' bodies aren't naturally able to get pregnant, so it's not really about choice with one's own body so much as the availability of a medical procedure.

BTW: I have utmost respect for what y'all do at DHS. I work in the family law practice and I see the abuse that our clients put you guys through on a daily basis. We do get bent out of shape when a social worker makes a bad choice (happens a lot), but don't really give them credit for all of the challenges they face. Those in your profession truly aren't paid enough.

mistipetal
01-20-2005, 02:09 PM
Midtowner,

Absolutely, its not a zero sum game. The thing is, as long as the woman has the available resources and the technology exists, we don't have any more right to prevent their procreating than anybody else. If the proceedure is available, who are we to say they can't have it? I'm not saying that we get the choice of grandmother or druggie, I'm just saying it isn't our business to legislate against grandmother. And also, who's to say that grandma is less deserving of the fertility drugs that other age groups take. I just don't think the government has an place getting involved in an individual choice. Now, whether this is research that ought to be done and proceedured made available at all, thats a different debate.

Believe me, while overall I believe in personal freedom, there are a LOT of days at work I think sterilization should be a prerequiste for assistance. There really are people that say things like "oh go ahead and take this one, I'll just have another" And that's the sort of thing that just makes me want to weep. I appreciate the kind words about working at DHS. Child welfare is a brutal profession. So much so, I eventually took a pay cut to get out of there. I'm still with DHS but in a different area, one that doesn't make me go home and cry every night. It is bad when social workers make bad choices, but honestly, a lot of times those choices aren't really ours to make, they come straight from the ADAs and the supervisors. I"ve had screaming matches with both over things I didn't agree with. (Another reason I'm out of there) and then there are the social workers so burned out they don't care at all any more and then you see the really poor decisions. Absolutely, we aren't paid enough! I couldn't agree more!!! : ) Wait til I go off about the "pay raise" and "bonus" one of these days.

Patrick
01-25-2005, 11:59 AM
Here's an interesting article discussing the same topic that's been discussed here:

"How old is too old to have a baby?
Fertility clinics should implement age limits


By Arthur Caplan, Ph.D.


Can someone ever be too old to be a parent? Several recent cases involving older single women having children have helped bring this issue into the spotlight and make it a topic of national debate.


At first glance, the question appears pretty straightforward — but it isn’t. In order to answer it there must be an agreement both on what would make a potential parent “too old” and who would enforce rules that limit access to reproductive technologies based on age.

So, how old is too old? Was Larry King of CNN too old when he had a child with his seventh wife at age 70? Was Cheryl Tiegs who had twins at 52 too old? Geena Davis, twins at 48? Tony Randall who had a child at 77 and died a few years later? James Doohan (Scotty from the original Star Trek) who had children at 80? Donald Trump, 58, now making menacing reproductive noises in the context of his widely publicized third marriage? It is very hard to draw an absolute line and say what age is too old to become a parent, although the idea of Donald Trump mating makes the project a particularly compelling one.

The case of the 'world's oldest mom'
Assistance in knowing how old is too old has now been provided by a Romanian woman named Adriana Iliescu. The 66-year-old unmarried professor and writer gave birth by emergency Caesarean section to a baby girl on Jan. 17 at the Giulesti Maternity Hospital in Bucharest. She is now the oldest woman in the world ever to give birth. Her doctor, when asked why he would use reproductive technology to permit a 66-year-old woman to become pregnant, said he helped her because that is what she wanted to do, and because he was impressed with her faith in God and with her “determination."

Giving birth may be what Iliescu wanted to do, and she may well be a very determined person of great piety, but the doctor did something highly unethical when he helped her become pregnant: Iliescu is too old to be having a baby.

Iliescu needed a doctor’s assistance because she is no longer able to produce healthy eggs of her own. Since she is single, donor eggs and sperm were used to make embryos. One of these embryos became her daughter, Eliza Maria. But, while Iliescu did indeed give birth to a baby, all the doctor did was allow her to become pregnant, not to have her own genetic child.

A morally unacceptable price
Why was this act so wrong? It was wrong because there was a terrible price to pay for using reproductive technology to make a 66-year-old woman pregnant.

Any woman over the age of 40 constitutes a high-risk pregnancy — the medical risks rise rapidly for mothers older than 40 and for their babies. These risks became terribly real in the case of Iliescu’s pregnancy. The child she delivered was born premature — a low birth-weight baby. This poses serious health problems for the baby, concerns that are made even more troubling by the fact that Romanian neonatal units are not up to the same standards as those in other, wealthier nations. In addition, Iliescu had to undergo an emergency C-section, not easy for a 66-year-old who must then go on to handle parenting duties by herself with a baby who may well have significant medical problems in the future.


Not as widely reported in all the hullabaloo about the "world’s oldest mom" is that Iliescu lost one fetus early on in her pregnancy and also gave birth to a stillborn baby in addition to Eliza Maria. Iliescu’s pregnancy came with two deaths, plus one premature baby whose fate remains unknown, and one life-threatening emergency C-section — altogether a morally unacceptable price.

But that is not the end of the challenges a pregnancy in a 66-year-old woman brings. Consider that when her daughter enters high school, Iliescu will be 80. Eighty! That should be the end of the argument. If you are 66 and single — man or woman — you should not be having a baby.

Age limits needed
My proposal is that anyone over 65 who is single should not be allowed to use reproductive technology to have a child. If you have a partner, then your total ages should not be more than 130. And if you are a female at or near 55 years of age and hoping to become pregnant, then you should only be allowed to use reproductive technology if you can pass a rigorous physical examination. At age 66, forget it.

So, who will enforce this age limit? Should we enact a law or can we leave it up to doctors at individual infertility clinics?

As it happens, I co-authored a recent survey of American reproductive technology programs led by Andrea Gurmankin of Harvard Medical School, which was published last week in the journal Fertility and Sterility. The survey asked a number of hypothetical questions of clinic directors to try and figure out which values doctors use to decide who can and cannot use reproductive technology to become a parent in the United States.

One question we asked was whether clinics would turn away couples in which both parents were 43 years old. Most would not turn them away, but a surprising 18 percent of clinic directors said they would. Twenty percent said they would not help a woman who was single become pregnant, while 53 percent said they would not deal with single men.

Age was not the only disqualifier. Three percent of programs said they would not accept a couple who were both blind from an accident. Seventeen percent would turn away women who state they are lesbians, while 38 percent said they would not help a couple who were on welfare and using social security checks to pay for infertility treatment.

Government should step in
Clearly there is quite a lot of screening already going on at fertility clinics. Some programs don’t care much about age or whether a patient is single or not, but others do.

If there is an age at which it makes sense to declare someone too old to use reproductive technology — and I strongly believe there is — then who should enforce this age limit? If you leave enforcement up to individual clinics they may decide to implement the rule, but given that their current screening practices are all over the map, this seems unlikely.

In light of the high risks at stake, the medical profession or state legislators should act. The race to create the world’s oldest mom should be declared over."

Midtowner
01-28-2005, 01:16 PM
As far as that article goes, I concur with all it is saying. Very selfish and irresponsible.

This woman and her family that supported this should be ashamed of what they did. The doctors should be equally ashamed.

mranderson
01-28-2005, 07:12 PM
Hey. If they are able and they want a kid, I say more power to them!:welcome5:

Patrick
01-28-2005, 08:54 PM
Hey. If they are able and they want a kid, I say more power to them!:welcome5:
Yeah, it's the woman's body. Who are we to say that someone can't have a child? After all, this country is founded on freedoms.