The Sooner Marriage, the Better: 88% of Women's Eggs Gone by 30

Life Site News ^ | Monday February 1, 2010 | James Tillman

[GonzoII]

Monday February 1, 2010

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The Sooner Marriage, the Better: 88% of Women's Eggs Gone by 30

by James Tillman

Monday, February 1, 2010 (LifeSiteNews.com) -- A new study from the Universities of St. Andrews and of Edinburgh is offering a more accurate understanding of fertility and its decline with age, which researchers say is steeper than previously thought.

The study, which involved about 325 women of different ages from the United States and Europe, investigated the number of eggs that remain in the ovaries over time.  This number, said the researchers, peaks at about 20 weeks after conception and subsequently drops until no eggs are left at menopause.

At the age of 30 years, only 12% of the maximum ovarian reserve - the number of eggs with which women are born - is typically present; by 40, only 3% remains.

The average egg quality also decreases with age, which increases the difficulty of conception and the chances of an unhealthy baby.

"Women lose eggs a lot faster than we thought," said Good Morning America medical contributor Dr. Marie Savard. 

She pointed out that women need to hear that the biological clock runs fairly quickly, and that the chances of having children are jeopardized the longer one waits. 

Savard also pointed out other factors that can help fertility from decreasing, such as not smoking, keeping down body weight, and controlling stress.

URL: http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2010/feb/10020113.html

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[Woebama]

Young women get pregnant if they get anywhere near a spermatazoa. Women at 40 often spends tens of thousands of dollars and still have difficulty having a child. Take heed young women.

And remember Sarah older women, and take heart, if God wills it, it is done!

[Palladin]

Interesting. But I’d like more evidence.

All the women in my family had babies when they were in their forties.

One aunt was 47, and had just sent her “last” child off to college, when she conceived and had another (very healthy) son.

The info in this article could be misused to pressure women over forty into having abortions.

[sickoflibs]

The exception to the rule will be the good looking girlfriend you DON’T want to have kids with. A real bad day goes like this : “Good news. You get to pay me child support”

[wagglebee]

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[PhilCollins]

I’m 42, and my wife is 41. We got married last Aug., and we want to conceive. I hope that we can, if we keep trying.

[traderrob6]

Maybe but we went for 11 years with no kids and at 42 my wife up and has twins, go figure.

[CharlesWayneCT]

I’m confused. There’s only supposed to be one egg a month. That’s 13 a year, or about 500 or so in a lifetime. What difference does it make how many eggs are sitting around?

And over time, I’d expect there to be fewer eggs left. If the first egg is releaased at age 12, and the last egg is released at age 45, that means 33 years of eggs, and 88% of those eggs would have been gone by age 41 anyway.

Is the study saying that as you get in your late 30s, you have months when no egg presents itself, because you are running out of them? I just don’t get it.

[Palladin]

If you’re both in reasonably good health, there should be no problem.

Good luck,and have fun trying!

[MIchaelTArchangel]

Is more really better? After all it only takes one to have a baby. It could be possible that a woman's body is simply getting rid of unneeded ova.

Most women produce a single ovum per month from menses to menapause, over a period of at most 40 years. A woman really only needs about 500 ova yet starts with several million.

[Palladin]

A double blessing! You are very lucky.

[Nea Wood]

One aunt was 47, and had just sent her “last” child off to college, when she conceived and had another (very healthy) son.

Wow. I think that's the oldest I've ever heard of a woman conceiving naturally, except for a Seattle woman a few years ago who had a baby in her early 50s, and that was so unusual it made the newspapers.

[Palladin]

I think the study is bogus.

325 women is a very small sampling.

[babygene]

“I hope that we can, if we keep trying.”

Trying is 100% of the fun...

[Palladin]

She holds the record in our family.

[Balding_Eagle]

The article infers that the eggs are simply “lost”, beginning at the 20th week, while the female still in the womb.

I’m not sure I believe them.

[SnakeDoctor]

I hope that this is true.

I’ve got 2 kids (with my wife ... its kinda sad that I need to say that outright), and broke through 2 different birth control methods to get them. It would be good if we were through 80% of her eggs ... not sure I need another rugrat (I kid ... I love them to death).

If a third birth control fails ... our next birth control method may have to be kryptonite.

SnakeDoc

[PGR88]

The info in this article could be misused to pressure women over forty into having abortions.

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I think it says the opposite - to me it says (to both men and women), don’t buy into the “you can wait” and feminist nonsense, because you do NOT have as much time as you would like.

My view is certainly not a scientific sampling, but all abortions I have heard of seem to have been done by women in their twenties (or even teens). By 40 years old, all the women I know without children are desperate to have kids.

In my view, the lies of abortion are mainly sold to the young and scared.

[chris_bdba]

It isn’t always one egg at a time! You do realize that multiples are not always identical, right?

[library user]

Phil Collins wrote...

We got married last Aug., and we want to conceive. I hope that we can, if we keep trying.

It's in the air tonight.

And it's just a job to do.

There must be no misunderstanding.

That's all.

Sorry, too easy to resist. :)