Quote:Originally Posted by
lyndeesta
The timing is up to you. I had my kids between 24 and 28. I had a friend that got pregnant when she was 30 and her doctor labeled her high risk because of her age. Once you hit 30 the odds having a special needs child increases and I don't think that's really talked about a lot.
Most doctors do this at 35 - that's where the risks really start to add up. Advanced Maternal Age (what they call the "condition") at 30 seems a little silly, honestly, but hey - doctors, especially OBs, kinda do what they want with the guidelines.
Here's your biggest risk:
A woman's risk of having a baby with chromosomal abnormalities increases with her age. The most common of these being Down Syndrome and the risk for that at various ages is:
- At age 20, 1 in 1440
- At age 25, 1 in 1,380
- At age 30, 1 in 960
- At age 35, 1 in 340
- At age 40, 1 in 84
- At age 45, 1 in 38
- At age 50, 1 in 44
You can see that the numbers really jump at 35. This is true for maternal death stats (both in-labor/delivery deaths and death-before-child-is-18) as well. For all of these statistics, your risk is never zero - expect anything you "plan" with regard to children to go completely and totally sideways at all times and you'll never be shocked.
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