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When I broke up with a boyfriend in my early 30s, I was devastated?not because he was the perfect guy who I was meant to marry but because I feared I might never have a baby.
Every woman?s fertility is biologically unique, but it is a fact that our egg quality declines and pregnancy becomes both riskier and harder to achieve as we age. According to Health Canada, a 30-year-old woman has a 90 percent chance of getting pregnant. That declines to 77 percent by age 35, and the chances decrease sharply after that. It?s also true that we have a harder time getting pregnant as we age.
So what?s a girl to do"
If you want kids, it?s to your advantage to think about these issues early on and get tested. We?re used to being in control of our lives, professionally and financially. The fact that we don?t have control over the duration of our fertility can be incredibly frightening and something that many of us would like to ignore for as long as possible. But I?ve learned that, no matter how scary this information is at first, it?s ultimately liberating to understand your own body?s reproductive possibilities, as well as its impossibilities. And the earlier you know what?s going on in your body, the more control you?ll have later on. I love the advice of Dr. Aimee Eyvazzadeh, a California-based fertility specialist who is otherwise known as ?the Egg Whisperer?: ?Most OB/GYNs are busy delivering babies and doing hysterectomies and Pap smears and aren?t focused on fert...