Tag: older mothers

Hopping Lanes

D'EbiLeave a comment

I want to talk today about the fast and slow lane.

If like me you drive regularly, you will understand what I’m talking about. There is a fast lane, where drivers can drive at the maximum speed limit, it’s faster than inner lanes on the dual carriageway. Often, these lanes cannot be distinguished during traffic congestion giving the perception of a faster or slower lane.

How one sees traffic during such times depends on how much of a hurry you are to get to your destination.

Sometimes it also depends on what you think is happening in front of you or around you. So often I’m driving and seem to be stuck in my lane while the lanes to my right or left is moving, I veered into “fast” lanes, only for it to become stationery.

I look back to the lane I had just come off, which is now the faster lane, my goodness I should have stayed on that lane which is now or appears to be faster, sometimes I go back and repeat the process a few times, before I give up.

This happens to me often and I am hoping to improve on my lane hopping skills.

Every time, I tell myself, today is the day I’m not going to switch I’m not going to look at what’s happening to my right, or my left I’m just gonna stay in my lane but soon find myself switching.

A bit like the grass being greener on the other side.

We sometimes look at other people’s journey and we think they have it all good we look at the people in our lives for whom life seems to be going smoothly.

It seems like they have everything going for them, no ruffled feathers, are married with 2.4 kids, good jobs, good house, well manicured lawn, and we wish.

“Oh my goodness I wish I could have that”

Have you been trying to be pregnant since forever, multiple IVFs, and failed cycle and Still no child. While your friends, neighbour or sister in law keeps popping them? It’s natural to sometimes wish you were in that other person’s shoes.

We really don’t know what’s going on in that lane, in other peoples live, until we switch lanes, an appearance of speed or bliss isn’t always the case.

My encouragement to us, is to stick it out, in your lane, in your world, while hoping for the best outcome.

Expect, prepare, be at peace, regardless of what is going on in other peoples lives, around you.

Your lane maybe slower but it will move and in time take you to your destination.

There maybe detours, road blocks, temporary traffic lights causing serious traffic jam, in the form of IVFs, endometriosis, miscarriage, delays.

“Key word they are temporary”.

Your journey is not compared with anybody else’s so stick it out.

Take the detours, complete the IVfs, do the treatment again if possible, hope, Pray, expect and repeat.

Your Partner in Hope

Debbie

Related Post Don’t tire, keep trying. Whatever you do, Don’t Stop Trying. Purpose in Pain , FaithfulWait: A Reflective Journal for Those in Waiting.

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The Over 50 Debate

D'EbiLeave a comment

I am always excited whenever I hear about couples finding joy in having their dreams fulfilled in the birth of a baby. Especially having gone through hoops and loops in the form of several IVFs, miscarriages and to finally triumph and hold one’s child, is joy indescribable. .

The internet went into overdrive last week when Brigitte Nielsen the ex-wife of Sylvester Stallone posted a picture of her pregnancy at 54.

This rekindled the conversation about having a baby over a certain age. And once again a woman’s decision is questioned her whole life is being judged by this singular act, nothing else.

I don’t know anything about her, but I was happy to read this news because there is something about a woman who decides to birth again. I am a firm believer in going for your dreams against all odds, against the norm no matter what.

I know first hand what it is like to want a child so bad your belly ache, you live, breath and dream of that one desire. Nothing can replace it, no amount of fame and fortune can quench the hunger or desire to hold one’s child. Hope Against Hope

It’s about Choices:

Recently, Ireland vote to change the abortion laws to give women a choice. So it’s all about one’s choice knowing the risk in becoming pregnant late in life.

Why should a woman in her 50s give up a life of peace and quiet for a life of nappies, sleeplessness, school runs?

Unless they know that at the end of it all they may find happiness. They put everything on the line for the 1% chance of being a parent.

Statistics:

According to recent Statistics, there are more women having babies over 40s and well into their 50s. I have previously wrote about it in A woman’s Dilemma? is 40 too old?

There is an increase in children born to women over this age group than at any other time in history. Here are a few reasons why this is so:

  • Advancement in technologies, and in being able to treat women in this age group, means more couples are trying again, daring to hope again and take a shot at being happy.
  • Also, women who have previously given up all hope of having children can believe again due to the increase rates of egg donations which is helping to raise the odds that women in their fifties and even sixties can have successful pregnancies.
  • Higher life is also another reason couples are willing to take the risk. As people live longer, they are not longer afraid that they will die and live their children orphans.

According to the medical director and chief Scientist at the Center for Human Reproduction, Dr. Norbert Gleicher who specializes in treatments of last resort for women who are either older or have had complications.

A healthy woman will have a completely normal pregnancy, and with careful screening can help  obstetrics prepare for any pregnancy complications by detecting the risks and problems before pregnancy.

Children are joy givers, they bring happiness.  They fill our days with love, laughter and Joy. In my worst moments whenever my kids walk in nothing else matters, it doesn’t matter how bad the issue is, they always make me feel better. They help put things in perspective it. Who wouldn’t want that?  Why should age determine whether one should be happy?

Of course there is risk in becoming pregnant well into our 50s, risk for both baby and mother, but we live in hope.

Hope that we will come through.

How that our babies will be fine.

Hope that perhaps we will become part of the few who to make it through to the other side.

Hope of joy at the end of our trials.

We can only try if the desire persist and hope lingers.Medicine can not explain this desire, nothing can take one’s hope away simply because we are judged as too old.

A woman should be the judge of that. Having sort medical advise and are aware of the risk involved if she and her partner still wants to go for it, it is their call, their choice, their Joy.

I pray that you find your rainbow and your desires for a child becomes a reality.

Your Partner In Hope

D’Ebi

Source: New scientist, Human fertilisation and embryology society,NHS direct.

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The “age” thing

D'Ebi1 Comment

make-dreams-happenI get excited about the news of my friends becoming pregnant or anyone who has tried for a while becomes a parent, especially if they’re over 40.

I believe women have it tough with our biological clock and all… so the story of a 40 something year old becoming a mum excites me…I am not sure why I get excited this way, maybe it’s something to do with the miracle of a child developing through the stages in a woman’s body.

So the news of Janet Jackson expecting her first child at the age of 50, was sweet music to my ears. I don’t know her story, I don’t know if she tried to conceive several times or not, I am not sure. But here’s what I do know, to be pregnant at 50 is medically classed as high risk, almost impossible. Being married to a medical doctor I know my husband constantly reminded me of the facts of having babies beyond 40 while we were trying.

Medically as a woman ages, it takes longer to conceive and the risk of not being able to get pregnant increases. Also, the risk of miscarriages, complications in pregnancy and childbirth, increases.
Starting at about age 32, a woman’s chances of conceiving decrease gradually but significantly, from age 35, the fertility decline speeds up. By age 40, fertility has fallen by half. At 30, the chances of conceiving each month is about 20%. At 40 it is around 5%. This post details when to seek help. Infertility: When to seek help

Hence my excitement at the news of any woman who becomes pregnant at any age above 35 especially age 40 and above…. it is nothing short of a miracle….

The stats are there: facts not fictions, however, there is hope for anyone who is over 35 onwards, as the stats also shows that., for the first time in decades ‘older mothers’ I.e. over 35s are now more than under 35s.

If you really have a desire to be a parent, woe betide me or anyone else who tries to quench the fire of your hopes and dreams. The desire to become a mum or dad is God given and unless he takes that desire away, never ever give up hope to believe against all odds, that you will become a parent.

I don’t know Janet’s story, did she try for a long time? Did she had any miscarriages? Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t, regardless she’s an expectant mum at 50… that’s encouraging. 

If you are out there reading this post, be encouraged by it, fuel your zeal with faith, don’t give up on your quest towards becoming a parent , no matter what, try, try. Try, again…

 

Your partner in Hope

D’Ebi

 

Related article: Causes Of Infertility In Women