Clock ticking?.......................................................................................................................by C.L.M
When I was growing up in the 80's there was a sticker on the fridge in my family home that said, in big pink block writing: GIRLS CAN DO ANYTHING. Now that we are well into the next millennium and I find myself hurtling towards my 30th birthday with frightening speed, I have come to realise that the message has morphed somewhere in the last couple of decades to: GIRLS SHOULD DO EVERYTHING.
And by everything, I mean fitting it all in. There's a lot to cram into your pre-childrearing life if you are young woman of the noughties, and we're closely following the footsteps of the young women of the nineties, those generation-X ladies, who are now spending thousands on IVF and fertility treatments and worrying about maternity leave and the cost of childcare as they try to juggle the high powered careers they were always told they could (should) have with fulfilling their maternal instincts – or, in same cases, duties. After all, in Australia you get a cash bonus for helping to stem the falling birth rate (yet it is still one of only two industrialised countries in the world not to have brought in compulsory paid maternity leave – the other is the U.S.).
There's a helluva lot you've got to pack into just a few years to fulfil the promise of being an educated, well-rounded, successful and fulfilled woman of this century: a University degree (even better- a postgraduate), plenty of overseas travel, climbing up the ladder to a successful career, getting money together to buy a house or flat, all the while making sure that we make the most of all of the frequently expensive opportunities that are offered up to us as young earners of the 21st century.
There are two small little things that turn all of this into a bit of a pressure cooker for woman: ovaries. Why do men get to be fertile from puberty to death? Women know they have a relatively short timeframe in which they are able to breed - that our chances of conceiving drop dramatically after the age of 35, and that the likelihood of having babies with downs syndrome sharply increases after this age as well. The message from governments and the medical profession is loud and clear – don't leave it too late!
For a modern woman, the window of childbearing is getting smaller and smaller because of the number of boxes we're expected to tick before launching into motherhood. That is, of course, if you want to spend your twenties and thirties doing all of the things that we've been brought up being told we SHOULD do (for the sake of our bra-burning sisters gone before who fought for our right to have it all) – sowing our wild oats, getting educated, broadening our horizons, having the fabulous career, getting financially secure…after all, who nowadays praises a girl for choosing to be a mother and housewife at 21?
And the thing is, I DO want it all. I want to fit every bit of exhilarating experience into my youth and still have time to pop out my 2.4 kids before my biological clock falls off the mantle piece for good. What's more, I want to be wealthy enough and yet young enough to enjoy being a mum and not be one of those ageing exhausted-looking parents you see who could be mistaken for the grandparents of the small children running around their legs. This is made all the more difficult by large student loans and rising house and rent prices, making many of us feel like we might not be able to afford children till we're in our 40's, if ever.
To make matters worse, my mother has a tendency to leave articles about premature menopause on my bed when I go home for visits and my father has been buying baby clothes for his yet-to-be-born grandchildren ever since I turned 25 (I'm seriously not kidding). And yet these are the same enlightened pro-feminist parents who always encouraged me to go and have adventures and be a strong and capable female and fulfilled as a whole person (because girls can do anything). I'm sure my brothers aren't feeling this kind of pressure.
Don't get me wrong. I feel blessed to have been born into an age and society which enables me to have amazing experiences and opportunities. Believe me, I know I'm privileged. I just wish mother nature would come to the party and give ovaries a longer shelf life. Although, maybe she really does know best…do I really want to be having my first child at the age of, say, 45?
The scary thing is that I've just noticed that the decade of my twenties has whizzed passed in the blink of eye and I'm now rapidly approaching my thirties. Thankfully, I'm yet to hear the faint tick tock of the biological clock, but, as someone who knows they do want children one day, I wonder how long it will remain silent. Maybe there's never going to be a 'right' time to have kids (that's if you want them at all), other than when you actually can.