Do you blame your age?

[Anonymous]

We all know that it’s much harder to get pregnant when you’re 35+. How old are you all? Do you think it would matter if you TTC younger? What prevented you from doing so ?

[Anonymous]

I’m 39 now and this will be my partner’s first child. Otherwise, I would be done.

That said, I have no regrets about how life has unfolded. I’ve had an ectopic so far but feel like we will end up with a healthy baby or two.

[Anonymous]

Yes, I think that's the main factor (my age and his - DH has low sperm count). We have one DD but waited longer than I would have liked to start our family and now need ART for unexplained secondary infertility. I know we're luckier than many so I try not to stew on it, and we're only going to do one round of IVF and call it if there's no payoff.

[Anonymous]

Nope, I was 33 when I was diagnosed with secondary infertility and premature ovarian failure. Had no way of knowing that my only child was my last good egg. Sometimes there’s just no way to avoid fate.

[Anonymous]

I have two children that I conceived without trying when I was under 35. Now I'm over 35, can't get pregnant, multiple losses and it's awful. We just decided to take a break and I 100% blame my age.

[Anonymous]

It took me one single try at age 35 and nearly a year of temping and testing with OPKs at age 38/39. So yes, I too "blame" age while recognizing how ridiculously lucky I got.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It took me one single try at age 35 and nearly a year of temping and testing with OPKs at age 38/39. So yes, I too "blame" age while recognizing how ridiculously lucky I got.

Similar but 30 for the first and temping/trying/miscarriage/temping/trying cycle was at 35.

[Anonymous]

Got pregnant at 34 easily after 3 months of trying. I did track ovulation. Healthy pregnancy and baby.

I then had two miscarriages in a row at 37. I got pregnant after after two months the first time and on the first try after the first miscarriage. Clearly getting pregnant wasn’t the issue, but my eggs were bad. Only tested the second miscarriage and it was trisomy. Both were early first trimester miscarriages btw.

Took about eight months off from trying and then got pregnant with a healthy baby at 38.

You just don’t know. I do “blame” my age for the miscarriages but that’s just the way it is. I didn’t want babies earlier and I’m happy I lived life. Even in dealing with miscarriage, I would go back and do it the same way. Life isn’t always roses and sunshine.

[Anonymous]

Similar story to PP. Healthy pregnancies at 31 and 33 on first and second month of trying. Began trying for a third at 36 and conceived quickly but had two losses. We consulted an RE and my testing looked good but we thought about IVF/PGT. In the end, we conceived before doing so and had a healthy babe at 38. So, yes, age did seem to factor into egg quality. Very grateful for our new baby!

[Anonymous]

Age can be a factor but there's a lot of luck and there can be other factors too. TTC my first at 31 was hardest: it took a while and we had a miscarriage. TTC my second (33) and third (36) were so easy they were almost accidents. I wonder how much coming off hormonal birth control slowed things down the first time around.

[Anonymous]

First baby at 34- took 8 months of trying. Second baby at 37 took one night. Had miscarriage at 44 not trying.

Hard to know, everybody is different.

[Anonymous]

Got pregnant at 35 on the first try, and took six months at 39. I used OPKs. I had the RE workup done for "advanced age" before trying at 38/39 and it came back pretty good. I do think it's very individual.

[Anonymous]

I blamed my age then had a work up with a reproductive endocrinologist who described my numbers as scary good for age 37, but my (younger) husband’s numbers were not great. You can’t really “blame” anything unless you’ve had testing done.

[Anonymous]

I'm blaming my age, 36, on not getting pregnant. But no one can ever really know, right? Maybe nothing would have been different 5 years ago.

[Anonymous]

Age, definitely.
First child conceived at 30 with no problems
Lots of trouble conceiving and two miscarriages before having healthy baby #2 at 35
Baby #3 never conceived, though we wanted a third.

I plan to tell my daughters not to wait too long. If they are in a committed and stable relationship and are stable financially in their mid-20s, then they should seriously think about starting a family sooner rather than later.