The ticking bio clock

n many ways, the issues of work family balance are well known. The real challenge is to understand how to use this information in making one�s own life choices.

Should one marry early or late, or not at all, should one have children or not? What�s the best time to start a family, assuming that is what one wishes to do? Is it easier to manage an only child, or do siblings provide each other with companionship and reduce the need for parental attention?

Clearly there is not going to be a clear answer that will be right for every one, but equally, it�s likely that certain life paths will offer more benefits than others.

In the 21 century, we would not like biology to be destiny, and yet women have biological clocks, and refusing to acknowledge them, will not make them go away.

Here is a shocker:
Women have lost 90 percent of their eggs by the time they are 30 years old, and only have about 3 percent of their eggs remaining by the time they are 40. These are the results of study published by the University of St. Andrews and Edinburgh University in Scotland found.

The study was based on information collected from 325 women of varying ages in the United Kingdom, the United States and Europe….
While it is well known that the quality of ovarian eggs also deteriorates as women age, increasing the difficulty of conception and the risk of , this study shows that the decline is more rapid than was previously believed.

That said, the chances of getting pregnant when women are in their early thirties tend to be only slightly lower than when they are in their twenties, however, by age thirty five, the decline in fertility accelerates even as the possibility of having a child with Down�s syndrome or other genetic abnormality becomes more of a concern, as do the rates of a miscarriage.
All around me, I see the daughters, and daughters in law of very good friends going through what I believe are really painful, and emotionally wrenching fertility treatments. There�s a mushrooming of fertility clinics in Indian cities today, and many flaunt success rates quite boldly. Apart from the fact that these procedures are time consuming, expensive, and often fairly heartbreaking as the treatment does not work at all, or results in a pregnancy that ends in an early miscarriage, there is also some concern about the impact of this treatment and procedures on a woman�s long term health.

This is especially true when high dose IVF is the procedure followed. So, when young women are making their decisions about whether to establish themselves in their career first and then think of marriage, or choose the opposing route, of marrying young and focusing on career concerns later, makes the decision making especially difficult.