One of the interesting topics that readers wondered about when I announced my pregnancy was WHEN to get pregnant. So let’s talk about it today. This is kind of a long post, so I’ll start with the questions: When is the best time to get pregnant? What considerations should you factor into the mix?
Psst: you may want to check out some of our more recent discussions on family planning and pregnancy, including our top tips on preparing for pregnancy. Over at our working moms’ blog, you may want to check out advice on work-life balance from working moms to their pre-mom selves.
(Pictured: Pregnant, originally uploaded to Flickr by Phil Of Photos.) Social media pictures via Stencil.
When Is The Best Time To Get Pregnant In Your JOB?
You need to build a bank of credibility before you get pregnant. I recently attended a panel discussion at the New York City Bar on when women should get pregnant, and I loved one of the phrases I heard: “the bank of credibility.”
Realistically, when you start a new job, you need to build up a bank of credibility so that people know who you are and what you’re capable of. I think this is key — as I mentioned earlier, the first trimester can be very trying (particularly on your energy) and you may not want to tell your superiors or coworkers that you’re pregnant until you’re into the second trimester.
Furthermore, your bosses will want to know what they can expect both when they send you into a maternity leave (will you get all of your projects off your desk that you need to? will you be responsive to occasional emails or questions during your maternity leave, or will you completely disappear for 12+ weeks?), as well as how responsive you’ll be when you come back from maternity leave. The nightmare (if you haven’t built up enough credibility) is that your job will basically be gone entirely by the time you come back because your bosses didn’t think they could rely on you to juggle your job and your new role as a parent. On the flip side, the dream would be for your boss to say “Oh, I had this great project and I knew you were coming back to work so I held it for you.”
Personally, I think you need at least 2 years on a job to build up a bank of credibility.
So build up a bank of credibility — but aim to get pregnant when you’re still replaceable. I’ve heard that planning for maternity leave is basically like planning a vacation — but with 3x more stress. That stress is much, much lower if you know that your coworkers can do much of your job as well as you could.
A lot of tasks can be assigned to other people very easily — yes, there may be some teaching involved, and yes, you may need to spend some time supervising your coworker, but ultimately you’ll be happy that you can take your maternity leave without being bothered too much by work concerns.
I’m sure with enough help (paid or unpaid), anything is possible — for example, both Victoria Beckham and Ivanka Trump have planned as little as two weeks of maternity leave! — but it may not be the kind of motherhood experience you’re hoping for.
Don’t worry too much about job stress factoring into the health of the pregnancy. During the City Bar panel discussion, the doctor noted that when articles and studies discuss “stress” as being a factor in conception, miscarriage, and the health of the baby, they generally mean stress more along the lines of “I was being physically abused,” “I only ate one meal a week,” or “I didn’t quite manage to kick that crack habit” — not “I had a big project due and had to work late to do it” stress.
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Career Considerations: When Is The Best Time to Get Pregnant?
We’ve talked before about jobhunting while pregnant.
We’ve also talked before about how to insulate your career if you want to be a SAHM mom for a year or two.
Medical Considerations For The Best Time To Get Pregnant
Fertility peaks in your 20s. It starts declining (for most women) when you’re 27 — I’ve heard that whatever your fertility is at 25, it’ll be half that by 35, and half THAT by the time you’re 40.
If the mother is over 35 when delivering, the medical profession considers it a “high risk pregnancy.” (For those of you uncomfortable with the term “high risk pregnnacy,” another super fun term for it is “geriatric pregnancy.” Yes, seriously.)
According to the doctor on the City Bar panel, fertility problems appear (for most women) at age 37 or 38, but she noted that women can have babies with help well into their 40s. She did note that egg freezing is still an experimental technique, though (and readers should note that both egg freezing and IVF are very expensive treatments).
You’re born with all of the eggs you’ll ever have — so as you get older, not only do you have to worry about aging eggs, you also have to worry about dwindling supply. (But as Dr. Oz says, how many eggs do you really need, anyway?)
Relationship Considerations On When To Get Pregnant
May you all be lucky enough to be in a strong, healthy, loving partnership when you want to have kids.
Two notes if you’re not:
Single motherhood has to be one of the hardest things out there — huge props to any of you readers who are doing it. I’m in the midst of Lamaze classes right now, and the other day we all went around the room and shared our “worst pain, ever” story. My answer (“the two days of the NY bar exam”) got some guffaws, but the teacher nodded seriously and said that sometimes emotional/stressful pain is far far worse than anything physical that you’ll go through — and related that one of her previous students had answered “being a single mother.”
I cannot imagine pregnancy or parenthood strengthening a bad relationship. Just in pregnancy I’ve been leaning on my husband a lot. (Sorry, hon.) An acquaintance of mine who’s a divorce lawyer has said that marriage is one thing, but she’d think long and hard before she had kids with someone.
“Being Ready” Considerations:
- Ha! Just kidding. You’ll never be 100% ready to have a kiddo.
For my $.02, I think for a lot of women the question of WHEN is a luxury. Personally, I didn’t meet my husband until I was 30; we got married when I was 32. By this point I was extremely freaked out by all of the medical advice I was reading (plus the fact that I was a very early bloomer (ever the over-achiever!) and had gotten my first period at age 10 — so I was convinced my eggs were dwindling).
Still, I was adamant that my husband and I have a *wee* bit of time together as newlyweds, to ourselves — so the plan was to start trying around my 34th birthday. Business-wise, this could not have been a worse time — I really wish I’d had more time to get used to doing the blog full time before I tried to juggle motherhood with it! — but I just really didn’t want to test fate and my fertility.
(As it was, I freaked out so much in the months leading up to the “Time to Start Trying” that we ultimately decided to go off the pill 3 months early, figuring that by that point it really just did not matter.)
The funny thing is that so many of my close friends have been pregnant along with me over the past few months — about 10 all told. (Just in the past 2 weeks, 3 friends have given birth to 4 babies.) Apparently we all got the “you’re 34 or older so it’s time to procreate” memo…
Readers, what do you think the best time to get pregnant is? What other considerations would you factor into the mix?
P.S. – For those of you wondering about the Corporette Moms Newsletter — it’s here, and it’s a full blog for working moms — come join the fun!
2020 image updates (young woman wearing a pink dress standing over crib) and 2015 updates (baby nestled in white fluffy rug or blanket) via Stencil.
Em
Anyone out there who did not meet the right partner but decided it was time to become a mother anyway? (i.e. artificial insemination). I’ve thought about going it alone, but worry that it will be too hard.
anon
i have not done that myself. plenty has been written about how hard single motherhood is (including Lori Gottlieb’s infamous “Marry Him! The Case for Settling for Mr. Good Enough” – google it) so I won’t rehash the arguments. i do have a few friends/relatives who are also considering single parenthood, key factors in their minds are:
– finances/resources. this is obvious. not just how flexible/stable your work life is, but how much you’ve got in the bank, whether you can start saving for XYZ, whether you can afford daycare and healthcare, and the kind of upbringing you want to your child to have. there’s a reason hollywood stars seem able to pull this off!
– support. the value of having your family nearby, for instance, cannot be overemphasized if you are going it alone.
and on romance. I don’t know if you’re kind of giving up on finding the right one or whether you’d like to have a kid and keep looking (or, just let life happen), but if you think it’s hard to find the right person now, having a kid will certainly complicate the picture further.
good luck to you!
Batgirl
This is what I hate about this whole post and many of the comments–there’s little consideration for the fact that not everyone is neatly partnered off and ready to procreate.
I’ll say this much: many of the “marrieds” who are babying it up now will end as single parents at some point regardless of all their planning. Do what works–but don’t do anything out of fear of time running out. If you don’t meet someone in time to have biological children, you can find another way–you can adopt, you can be a foster parent, you can mentor children in your community or within your extended family, or marry someone with children from a previous marriage–or you can learn that you’re happy without children.
You never know what’ll work out in the future, but don’t settle for something that doesn’t work for you now. If it works, do it! But only act out of love for your choice, not fear of the alternative.
Good luck! More power to you either way! My mom raised four kids after a divorce and we did just fine!
Tyler
It would also be great to hear some responses from women in business (not that you lawyers aren’t helpful!). Before bschool? after bschool? I’m 24 and very likely to marry fairly young, and also want to go to school fairly young. And also want to have children in my 20s, not wait until my thirties.
Possible? Terrible idea?
BB
I’m not a lawyer. I’m 37 and in marketing. I’m going back for my MBA this fall (part-time/exec), and personally I believe people should have significant professional experience before getting their MBA unless they’re going into top-tier finance/banking. At the same time though, I think that it’s likely that any type of graduate program would be easier without children. I don’t think any option is “terrible.” And, professionally at least, anything is possible.
J
I think it depends on what kind of business career you want, how far up the ladder you want to crawl, and how much time you want to dedicate to kids. For me bschool was to cover a resume gap and buy myself later in life insurance so I could have kids in my late 20’s, early 30’s and be a stay at home mom for awhile, at least part-time. With my personality I knew if I didn’t get my MBA early on in my life I might never go back to school. I’m also more looking to run my own business, so in many ways my MBA was like paying for a great toolkit and some credentials. If you’re looking to get into finance or consulting and go to a T1 program, I’m not so sure how easy it would be to have kids after graduation and get back in the game later unless you had some great personal connections you could use down the line.
J
I feel like I should mention that I’m currently 25 and just finished school, my husband is 27, been married 2 years, together for 7.
Anonymous
Any advice for someone who is thinking about changing jobs in the 1st trimester? Don’t want to miss out on a great job opportunity. Don’t want to disclose anything to potential employers when the pregnancy is so early. What is a gal to do? Any other advice on things to consider? Eligibility for insurance is an obvious one. Anything else? Thanks!
R.C.
Thanks for this post. I sent it to the hubs, and we had a long talk about whether we should start trying now. I am 36 and he is 40. I think we may start next month. I am grateful for this community of like-minded ladies (and the occasional gentleman).
Anon
Good luck to you!
Anon
We chose to have our children young. We are the same age and had our first at 25 and second at 28. I started working as a lawyer right after having our first. My husband had MUCH older parents, especially his dad since his dad was quite a bit older than his mom and he felt like he missed out growing up. His dad also died when we were in college and so never got to see his grandkids. His mom is now unable to really do anything with the grandkids, though we take them to visit often. This is compared to my much younger parents who can still play on the floor, play outside, and watch the kids by themselves. This post has no judgment behind it–things are certainly harder for us financially, since I am still a fairly new lawyer, but it was important to us to have kids young.
Jules
I think planning is always good, even if things don’t go according to plan. I waited two years after marriage before trying to conceive, and yes, I ran into fertility problems, even though I was only 28. The first two years of marriage without kids went into the “bank of marriage,” which to me is just as important as the “bank of credibility.” I ended up having 3 kids in a span of 17 months (twins and a single), and I think those first couple of years sustained my husband until I was able to return to being like a girlfriend to him again. LOL.
Anon
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I got pg first month off BC at age 35. Easy pregnancy, health, happy baby. Emergency c-section but all was ok and not related to my age.
Anon
Sorry, this was meant to be in reply to someone who wanted a success story from a mid-thirties who had an easy time conceiving.
workingmomma
This is such a great blog. Thank you for writing about this!
PT lawyer
I think one thing to remember is: don’t assume that anyone at work really cares about you, your pregnancy, or your baby.
I was inhouse at a Fortune 100, “family friendly”, “pro-woman” corporation when I was pregnant with my first. After I told my boss I was pregnant and was due in 6 months (January), I basically never saw my boss again. Meetings were rescheduled multiple times and cancelled, detailed memos were requested instead, and I complied. I scheduled my maternity leave to start well after the end-of-year rush, but assignments for the new fiscal year were given to me anyway — my maternity leave was essentially ignored when planning for the next year. Others told me that my boss started to make odd comments about women, babies, and pregnancy, and basically did a lot of inappropriate oversharing. This, on top of the usual morning sickness, exhaustion, midterm stomach issues, needing free time for doctor’s appointments, and a very heavy workload (70+ hrs/wk).
Long story short, when I was on maternity leave, my boss accused me of stealing funds from the company (I was quickly exonerated) and when I quit, she — yes my boss is/was female — banned me from the office and had my personal things boxed up and FedExed to me.
I realize that my experience was odd, and hopefully not typical. The point I want to make is, basically, that pregnancy causes all sorts of reactions in people, and not all of them good. Its a very personal thing. I can only guess that my pregnancy caused my boss — who at the time was in her mid/late 40’s, childless, and single — to perhaps consider/reconsider her own life and choices, and acted out somewhat. In doing so, she made my life much more difficult in a number of ways, and I chose not to return to working for her, despite that I was at a family-friendly, flextime, pro-woman company.
WorkingMom
I for one am VERY excited for a working mom newsletter. I’ve been a working mom for a year now, and there aren’t enough resources for moms who work outside the home full-time.
I’ve been working with some other working mom bloggers to get similar columns and even one-off posts going. I’d love to contribute if you’re ever looking for guest authors! Can’t wait to see it.
seo
I know this if off topic but I’m looking into starting my own weblog and was wondering what all is needed to get setup? I’m assuming having a blog like yours would cost a pretty penny? I’m not very web savvy so I’m not 100% sure. Any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
Pamelia Clarity
I’ll gear this review to 2 types of people: current Zune owners who are considering an upgrade, and people trying to decide between a Zune and an iPod. (There are other players worth considering out there, like the Sony Walkman X, but I hope this gives you enough info to make an informed decision of the Zune vs players other than the iPod line as well.)
Marise
I was in a private lawfirm and had made partner when I decided I wanted to have a second child. While I was miserable at work, I did not want to look for another job while I was hoping to be pregnant. During the course of that year, I had three miscarriages. I finally said, F–it, and applied for a government job to give me a better work life balance because I did not want to continue to put my life on hold while hoping I was going to be pregnant. I got the job and simultaneously found out I was pregnant and the pregnancy stuck. Yes, it was awkward having to explain my pregnancy to my new boss, but in the end, I worked hard during my pregnancy and after, and gained credibility. Morale of the story: You never know whether a pregnancy will stick and therefore, you shouldn’t delay living your life on the expectation that you may or will get pregnant.
Anon
I work in a government office with mostly women on the management team. Recently we were interviewing for a new position and I can’t tell you how many times these “working women,” all of whom were mothers, spoke up AGAINST younger twenty something women because they were obviously only working for a while, until they could get pregnant and quit working. When I suggested they may have other priorities I was told, quite forcefully that any woman knows you “have to have kids before 30 or else it’s dangerous or you get retarded kids” [their words, not mine].
I was shocked at the way other women, and mothers would try to undercut younger people who wanted the same opportunities they were given years earlier. (I can offer no insight into the pregnancy issue as no one in the office has been pregnant while I’ve been here.) However, I was shocked at how quick these people were to exclude a qualified candidated because the candidate was young and female. If she was unmarried it was acceptable because she wouldn’t be having children but a young married female wasn’t acceptable because obviously she was going to be getting pregnant any day now.
Gold Oguara
I got married at 3o and had my first baby after 2yrs. My younget baby is now age 3, all the 3 children normal and healthy no intervention I am 43 now. Is it advisable to have another baby b/4 45. Ever since we’ve been trying without result unlike before.
Could any thing be the cause?
Anonymous
Am in sku..doing a 2year diploma in early childhood. Am in the second semester and my husband wants a baby..wat sgould i do?
Nagalia
I want to testify of what a spell caster did for me and my hubby.we have been married since 2007 without a sign of pregnancy.I went off birth control then and did not have a period.my gyro gave me progesterone to jump-start a period and it did.,but i did not have another one.we did another round of progesterone followed by 100mg clomid for 5 months,we followed all doctors instructions but all to no avail.I have been buying ovulation kits pregnancy test AND i finally got 3 test when i was ovulating! So ever since that we been trying for years now! Well i was very confused because i keep taking ept test AND they all keep turning out to b negative! I really want a baby girl while my hubby want a baby boy LOLL! I think maybe we are just trying to hard, What i can tell you is that its been so many years now and i still yet do not have my period??nobody to help because every body around us was already at the verge of losing their faith on us.no were to run to until one faithful day i was reading a magazine and i stumble on a page were i found topic or a head line {A SPELL CASTER} who can heal someone from HIV AND AIDS,bring back your EX,enlarge your BREAST,help you win a VISA LOTTERY,losing your WEIGHT and even get six PACKS AND flatten your BELLY,I gave him a try and before i could no it Dr OJuku rescue me from my problem by casting a spell for me and told me to go and make love with my hubby,then nine months after the spell and making love with my husband i delivered a twins A BOY AND A GIRL.This spell caster name is Dr Ojuku so many people have witness his wonderful work..He is nice, contact him on (droyekpenspelltemple@outlook.com if you are in any predicament Hume•Thanks so very much!! All thanks to Dr Ojuku Regard…….
Casey Deborah
I have been married for the past 3years without a child i have look for all kind of help that can make me get pregnant but nothing works, but through an insight i came across Dr.BABA profile at the internet when i was searching for help on how i can get pregnant Quickly i contacted him to help me out, he said he will cast a spell that will make me sleep with my partner and get pregnant, he cast the spell for me and ask me to go and have sex with my partner so i did to my greatest surprise i became pregnant after some weeks, with so much joy in my heart i want to share this out to everyone in need that i have found favor in the hands of Dr BABA, contact him now to via email : fertilitysolutiontemple@live.com or on mobile number on:+2349036348369,Casey Deborah
sharon pite (@sharonrains212)
I am 37 years old, I have one wonderful boy, with one man we were together 13 years. I am now living with a man and been together for three years. The thing is i am scared about it having another child, and being the only parent to care for it. I love the man i am with but he works long hours and is gone for weeks at a time. one day i was browsing on the internet i saw on facebook (Oduduwa Ajakaye), testimony saying that he help people who can’t get pregnant, and people that don’t have any child that are looking for, i quickly took his email and contact him for help after doing what he ask me to do things change and that day i got my self back again and i was having enough power and every thing went through. So i contact my friend that live in NYC she has be married for 12 years but no child, to my best surprise my friend that was childless for the past 12 years was pregnant oh my God with oduduwa all thing are possible
sharon pite (@sharonrains212)
I am 37 years old, I have one wonderful boy, with one man we were together 13 years. I am now living with a man and been together for three years. The thing is i am scared about it having another child, and being the only parent to care for it. I love the man i am with but he works long hours and is gone for weeks at a time. one day i was browsing on the internet i saw on facebook (Oduduwa Ajakaye),oduwalegba@outlook.com testimony saying that he help people who can’t get pregnant, and people that don’t have any child that are looking for, i quickly took his email and contact him for help after doing what he ask me to do things change and that day i got my self back again and i was having enough power and every thing went through. So i contact my friend that live in NYC she has be married for 12 years but no child, to my best surprise my friend that was childless for the past 12 years was pregnant oh my God with oduduwa all thing are possible