quote:

---

Originally posted by North East Quine:
Are you actually broody, or just realising that the option for more might not be there for much longer and panicking?

---

No I'm not broody. But then again I've never been the broody type. But I'm having constant baby dreams. The last one I had was a few nights ago. It was a girl. A girl with my husband's big grin of odd teeth.

While on my deathbed, I will honestly be able to say the best thing I ever did was have and raise my two boys and enjoy their company, but I found the chores of raising kids to be bloody hard, lonely work. I'm not sure if I can go through it again and remain sane. And an insane parent is no good for kids.

Feels a bit like damned if I do and damned if I don't.

Makes it doubly hard that my husband is totally into his kids (always has been) and really wants more.
 

---

Posted by Thyme (# 12360) on :
 
Forgive me if I have got this wrong, but I thought you were training for ordination? How does having more family fit into that?

I think I would find it hard to to both things justice.
 

---

Posted by North East Quine (# 13049) on :
 
I still get the baby dreams! And I'm 50, and 99% not broody. Well, 98%.
 

---

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :
 
YOU need to want to have more children - forget about the practical parenting routine because that can be out-sourced a bit if you want to; what can't be out-sourced is the love, cuddles and mothering.

If you really want more then have them - you'll work out the best way to cope when they've arrived.
 

---

Posted by Niminypiminy (# 15489) on :
 
The thing I would say -- and I say this as someone who had the children she had longed for for many years at 41 and 44 -- is that having a babies in your forties is ok. Of course you are more tired, but there are lots of positives. BUT, having teenagers in your fifties is less easy. It's not that having teenagers is ever a picnic, but one's resilience does really get less. And, depending on your situation, you may well end up with young children/teenagers and parents who need your care.

None of these are reasons not to have children later in life. But they are factors which change the experience of bringing up the children you have then.
 

---

Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Thyme:
Forgive me if I have got this wrong, but I thought you were training for ordination? How does having more family fit into that?

I think I would find it hard to to both things justice.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by North East Quine:
I still get the baby dreams! And I'm 50, and 99% not broody. Well, 98%.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by L'organist:
YOU need to want to have more children - forget about the practical parenting routine because that can be out-sourced a bit if you want to; what can't be out-sourced is the love, cuddles and mothering.

If you really want more then have them - you'll work out the best way to cope when they've arrived.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Niminypiminy:
It's not that having teenagers is ever a picnic, but one's resilience does really get less. And, depending on your situation, you may well end up with young children/teenagers and parents who need your care.

None of these are reasons not to have children later in life. But they are factors which change the experience of bringing up the children you have then.

---

quote:

---

And I wouldn't' want just one either. I'd have to have at least two.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Thyme:
Forgive me if I have got this wrong, but I thought you were training for ordination? How does having more family fit into that?

I think I would find it hard to to both things justice.

---

quote:

---

I'm finding it hard to tell if that's what it is or if God is trying to tell me something.

---

I hope God isn't trying to tell me something by sending me baby dreams!!!

I prayed day in, day out, for years and years, for another baby. Now I'm terrified that those prayers are in a celestial "pending" tray somewhere, and I'll find myself pregnant in my fifties.

I'm not being cynical, well not much, but trying to work out if another baby is right, from what you think God is telling you in a dream seems to add an unnecessary complication to the decision. Make the decision, then lay it prayerfully before God.
 

---

Posted by Leorning Cniht (# 17564) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Boogie:
Our last Vicar had a baby while still vicaring - whyever not??

---

Well, Evensong has made clear that, in her view, she would have to be a stay-at-home mother with direct full-time care for her small children. She would not be happy about placing her small children in childcare for any significant period.

Vicaring is certainly a more flexible job than many, but I'm not sure that you'd be able to do the pastoral care parts of the job successfully with a toddler in tow.

You might be able to combine attachment parenting with a part-time / assistant role, though.
 

---

Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
fwiw, I was serving as a full-time pastor when I had my two later kids (fyi: I misspoke my age at marriage above-- the gap between my daughter and my sons is 12 and 16 years).

Parenting teens in your 50s is hard, yes. But so was parenting a teen in my 30s. Parenting teens is just hard. I'm not sure it's any harder this time than it was last time.

It really just comes down to listening to your heart-- and God's heart. There are challenges that come with it. And there are complications that come with a pregnancy in your 40s*. But all those things can be managed, successfully and even joyfully. The bottom line really isn't how old you are or what you're doing for a living. It's really just about where your heart lies. It's OK to say no, this isn't where my life is going right now. But it's OK to say yes to this as well. Give yourself time to listen to your heart, and to God.


* (When I was pregnant with my last child at 43 I developed gestational diabetes, one of those complications. On one visit to my endrochronologist, the good doctor began a conversation, "now the next time we'll want to..." which just caused me to cut him off with my riotous laughter. Never did hear the end of that sentence.)
 

---

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
When you're older you have less energy, but you also have more patience and a more laid-back attitude.

If you've raised teenagers, then raising two more won't be uncharted territory.

Good luck, whatever you decide.

Moo
 

---

Posted by no prophet (# 15560) on :
 
I'd have had more children if we could at any time. In a heartbeat. Waiting for grandchildren are we now. I'd have them any time as well.

People say raising teenagers is hard. Didn't find it. I often wondered if difficulties with teens is the teenagers' fault or the parents. It's a hard one to decipher.

But I do like the sense of humour of the preteens. Like the joke I was told by a 10 year old this week (the fall term just started post-Labour Day:

Q- What did the father buffalo say to his son as he went off to school for the first time?

A- Bison!
 

---

Posted by Spike (# 36) on :
 
I have experience of this from the other side of the fence.

My parents married in their late 20s and had three daughters within the first seven years of their marriage and then I came along nine years after the youngest daughter when my parents were in their 40s. (Mum was 44, dad was 45).

My three older sisters, being of a similar age, are very close to each other but I grew up without any siblings of the same age. My oldest sister married at the age of 21 when I was 6 and I was an uncle at the age of 8! (In later years I had a criteria for dating women in that I wouldn't date anyone older than my youngest sister or younger than my oldest nephew, but that's another story)

Growing up, I was very aware that my parents were much older than all my friends' parents - I think it would be fair to say I felt a bit of a stigma about it.

My dad suffered poor health for a number of years (asthma and a heart condition) and died at the age of 61 when I was only 15.

I'm not saying "don't do it" and I'm not saying I had an awful time. I adored both my parents and had a really good upbringing, but think carefully. Will your husband be able to run around or play football with a new child as he did when he was younger? Will a new child be embarrassed at having parents with grey hair when all his/her friends' parents appear to be really cool? Do you want to live long enough to see this child produce grandchildren for you?

All things to think about!

[ 10. September 2014, 23:03: Message edited by: Spike ]
 

---

Posted by Lamb Chopped (# 5528) on :
 
... Though if the alternative is not to exist at all, concerns about having a gray-haired Dad who doesn't play football might go by the wayside, no? I hope so anyway, as that was the reasoning we used to justify having our son when Mr. Lamb was over 50.

The good side of having older parents is that they are more experienced, less apt to sweat the small stuff, and probably more financially and emotionally secure. They may not play football, but they probably aren't going to utterly flip out the minute you walk into the house with a C on a test or a new boyfriend. I hope.
 

---

Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 
...or at least, as I joke out of hearing of my two teens, we'll be so deaf or senile that we won't hear them sneaking in past curfew...

Seriously, I get the old parents thing. I have been mistaken for my son's grandmother a time or two. But there are offsets as well, as Lamb pointed out.
 

---

Posted by Derf (# 2093) on :
 
I suspect that having older parents is probably less unusual now than it was when Spike were a lad, so some of the potential stigma may be less (although I also suspect this depends very much on where you live - it freaked me out somewhat when I was sat in a school show thing at one of the schools I'm chaplain to, before I had my own child (at 32), and realised I was closer in age to some of the grandparents than parents!)

The parenting/ministry challenge is a huge one. I think realistically if you'd want to do full time parenting and not use any form of childcare you'd need to step aside from at least full time ministry for that time (recognising that of course ministry is far from just what we do as the job IYSWIM). There are ways of combining the two, but there's a whole lot of the job that isn't possible with a toddler around the place. I do wonder what people are thinking when I turn up e.g. to take a funeral, and they ask where the sczlet is! So you might manage a part time role, working in the evenings and around whatever a small child allows during the day, but if your house etc comes with the job that obviously presents other issues.

I hope you can come to a decision that you are at peace with, and that if it is to have more kids that biology works in your favour.
 

---

Posted by Dafyd (# 5549) on :
 
The Dafling was born when I was just the other side of forty, and we're planning that she won't be an only child.
I'm exhausted all the time(*), but I think that's down to a condition called parenthood.

(*) I exaggerate; I'm not exhausted all the time. Sometimes I'm very exhausted, and occasionally I'm shattered.
 

---

Posted by Ethne Alba (# 5804) on :
 
How lovely that you are considering this!

Hope all goes well in your discoverings.
 

---

Posted by Jack the Lass (# 3415) on :
 
I'm a health visitor (public health nurse - we work with families with kids under 5) and have come across this scenario, although as mentioned above it was usually through a remarriage. The main things that those mums mentioned to me were that they were sometimes mistaken for the baby's grandmother, and that sometimes the older children (who were late teens/early 20s) freaked out and found it really hard to accept (I guess the thought of your parents having sex never stops being icky ).

More personally, although I didn't have kids in my 20s, I have (at the end of last year) had a baby at 44. I don't know if it would have been different if I had already had experience of what it would be like, but I did find as an older mum that I really struggled with issues of identity. Until the baby came along, I worked in an intellectually challenging job, had been travelling, got a PhD, had all these various life experiences, then all of a sudden it was an achievement if I got to the end of the day and had managed to do the washing up (and I didn't always manage that in the early days!). I felt really deskilled as a person, and it took me ages to adjust to that. I also worried about being the oldest mum at the school gates, but although I'm still the oldest mum I know, I have met a few others so am reasonably confident that I won't be too much of a freak when the time comes. I have once been asked if I was the baby's granny, that was by a kid at the bus-stop who had no idea she was being spectacularly undiplomatic, and at least her mum was clearly mortified, but I expect I'll have more of that in the future (perhaps I should explore the facelift ads that facebook has been showing me since I hit my 40s ).

The other thing I've had occasionally is an assumption that because I conceived over 40 that I had undergone fertility treatment. Perhaps irrationally I found myself getting really irritated about that.

I think in your case, given your views (as stated on SoF threads passim) about childcare then the biggest issue if I were in your position would be how to reconcile having young kids with the demands and calls of ministry. That's not something I've had to face though. My prayers as you get your head round all these things.
 

---

Posted by L'organist (# 17338) on :
 
Oh, just do it. You can take the baby out and about with you until it gets old enough to protest and in any case, the older two (once over the teenaged mortification of proof that mum and dad are still doing it are likely to be, for at least some of the time, doting babysitters.

Just remember that older mothers are more likely to have twins...
 

---

Posted by Tukai (# 12960) on :
 
If you oldest is already 19, just wait a few years and you could be a grandparent. That way you receive and give all the love that youngsters bring but without all the responsibility.

At least that's what we have found (married in early 20s, which is now 40 years ago).
 

---

Posted by Moo (# 107) on :
 
{tangent alert}

quote:

---

Originally posted by Jack the Lass
The other thing I've had occasionally is an assumption that because I conceived over 40 that I had undergone fertility treatment. Perhaps irrationally I found myself getting really irritated about that.

---

It's infuriating how some people do not hesitate to comment about other people's deeply personal matters, especially to strangers. My daughter gave birth to twins; two of her father's brothers were twins; it runs in the family.

Total strangers would ask her if she had undergone fertility treatments.

{/tangent alert}

Moo
 

---

Posted by Chorister (# 473) on :
 
For reasons you can probably work out, I'm extremely glad my mother-in-law had another baby at that age!

I guess you'll be fine as long as you don't mind loads of people rather rudely asking you if it was an 'accident'.
 

---

Posted by Caissa (# 16710) on :
 
I was 38 when our youngest was born. When I have my grey beard on, I have been mistaken for his grandfather.
 

---

Posted by Doublethink (# 1984) on :
 
I know when I have been at hard and frustrating points in my training and career, I have thought about reverting to apparently simpler or better phases of my life (not children in my case but other paths).

I would say, be sure its about wanting more children, rather than feeling beaten down by current circumstances.
 

---

Posted by Patdys (# 9397) on :
 
One of the considerations is work.
If one or both of you have just completed training and are looking to cement a professional career, then the time demands of this needs to be taken into consideration.

In my case, having put training on hold for ten years and watching my kids grow up was great, but with a greater work focus now, I would struggle with the competing time demands.

I think the key is discussing goals together. And for some, more children will be right. And for others, not having more children will be right. And for others, ceasing contraception and just rolling the dice will be right.

My only caveat is that friends who wanted their third child in their early forties, have a beautiful family of seven with their five boys thanks to triplets...
 

---

Posted by Ariel (# 58) on :
 
If you want to do it, if you can do it, if you have the resources to support it then do it. Women in their 50s have had children before now.

I worked with a woman who found herself unexpectedly pregnant at 53. She'd thought she was going through the menopause and was really quite shocked as she already had three grown-up sons. In the end she decided to go ahead with it and had a fourth child - another boy. His older brothers were delighted.

quote:

---

Originally posted by Boogie:
PS - Have you considered puppies? Deadly serious, they give me everything kids did (and more, if I'm really honest! - puppies want to please YOU, kids want to please themselves!)

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ariel:
A pet is one thing, but they never grow up, and they won't look after you when you reach the age where you need help.

---

Either do many kids. I know a lot of older people whose grown children don't or can't "look after" their elderly parents.
 

---

Posted by Edith (# 16978) on :
 
Don't worry about being mistaken for a granny. I'm a granny and I'm often mistaken for my grandchildren's mum.
 

---

Posted by cliffdweller (# 13338) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Edith:
Don't worry about being mistaken for a granny. I'm a granny and I'm often mistaken for my grandchildren's mum.

---

quote:

---

Originally posted by Pigwidgeon:

quote:

---

Originally posted by Ariel:
A pet is one thing, but they never grow up, and they won't look after you when you reach the age where you need help.

---

Either do many kids. I know a lot of older people whose grown children don't or can't "look after" their elderly parents.

---

But pets never leave home and become independent like children (hopefully do)
 

---

Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on :
 
Thank you all very much for your comments. You have helped me a great deal to work through my own thoughts and feelings on the issue.



One interesting comment that keeps coming up is the possible stigma of being an older mum or mistaken for a grandmother. Seeing how I was the youngest mum by about 15 years when I was raising my two boys I'm quite familiar with the opposite stigma and couldn't give a rat's arse about it. Been there, done that and that's not what matters!

[ 14. September 2014, 10:46: Message edited by: Evensong ]
 

---

Posted by Evensong (# 14696) on :
 
Tho to be sure, it does make it harder to find friends in mums and bubs groups (on both ends of the spectrum).
 

---

Posted by Zacchaeus (# 14454) on :
 

quote:

---

Originally posted by Evensong:
Tho to be sure, it does make it harder to find friends in mums and bubs groups (on both ends of the spectrum).

---

© Ship of Fools 2016


UBB.classic^TM 6.5.0