Last year, I hit the most terror-inspiring age for women. It\u2019s not 40, or even 105. It\u2019s 35. <\/p>\n
I was excited to turn 35. I love being in my mid-30s. I have the energy and inclination to still go to music festivals but the money and back problems to pay for glamping. My 30s are the Aer Lingus to the Ryanair of the 20s. I still do the same things and get to the same place at the end of the day but I do it in a more comfortable seat.<\/p>\n
I have accepted certain inalienable truths, which has exponentially improved life. Diet, sleep and exercise do make a difference, unfortunately. You can\u2019t change people, just their access to you. Low-waist jeans are unnecessary and the enemy of self-esteem. <\/p>\n
This should be the golden age. But according to people, medical journals and some IVF<\/a> clinics, I should be panicking because at the 12th stroke of the clock on a woman\u2019s 35th birthday her fertility \u201cfalls off a cliff\u201d. It doesn\u2019t \u201chave a fall\u201d like an older person.<\/p>\n It doesn\u2019t slide down a hill. It doesn\u2019t come to a gentle stop with a ding like the Luas. It has a dramatic and violent end. And in my case it\u2019s happening right now. <\/p>\n I think, like all that rotten banana bread we made during the pandemic, it\u2019s unwise to do things just because everyone else is doing them and you don\u2019t want to miss out. I don\u2019t want to become a mother right now purely out of fear that I may never become one. You can put banana bread in the bin if you regret making it, you cannot do that with a child. <\/p>\n [\u00a0Back home as an adult: \u2018I\u2019m 37 and waking up in my husband\u2019s childhood 4ft bed\u2019Opens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n So I sat in several waiting rooms at IVF<\/a> clinics that pipe out spa-style music to distract you from the fact there is probably some poor man with a cup in the room next door and the future of his family depends on what happens in there. <\/p>\n I had the same set of ovaries at each visit, but have received different advice on egg freezing every time. Some practitioners said I had arrived just in the nick of time. I\u2019ve also been told there\u2019s no need to panic and things are looking okay.<\/p>\n The IVF industry is built on people\u2019s deepest desires to have a baby and their fears it will never happen, and it comes with no guarantees. With some clinics targeting women in their 20s on Instagram to freeze their eggs \u201cjust in case\u201d, even though retrieval rates suggest the procedure isn\u2019t a fail-safe insurance policy, it\u2019s hard to know who to trust and when to seek a second opinion.<\/p>\n They were all united, though, in telling me it would cost thousands of euros to freeze my eggs. <\/p>\n I\u2019m using my house deposit to help the future me to have children, after putting off having one when I was younger in the hope I could afford to buy a house without the bank punishing my borrowing capacity. There are people who think this is what I should rightfully get as a woman who selfishly put it off. But it never felt like a real choice if the two options were \u201cbaby\u201d and \u201cno financial security\u201d. <\/p>\n In the working-class community where I\u2019m from, women have children young. In my kindergarten class, I had the oldest mother \u2013 she was 35. I am the first woman in my family to finish high school. To go to university. To have at least a degree of financial freedom.<\/p>\n I am also the only one in my family\u2019s history to be this old without children. For some the two are not connected, but for me they are. It\u2019s entirely possible for a woman to have children young and achieve all her dreams. But it\u2019s really bloody hard. <\/p>\n