3 Steps to Rediscover the Lost Art of Mothering

Although it was many years ago, the image of a young woman with a tear-streaked face and blank stare is forever etched into my memory. She sat in front of the television cameras, shredding a soaked tissue, telling her story. Once a happy new mother, now distraught and on trial for the death of her baby — the infant died in her arms. The cause of death was starvation and malnutrition.

The first-time mother said she loved her baby and breastfed her regularly. She cared for the child to the best of her ability. She claimed that she had no idea the newborn failed to get the nourishment she needed. Nevertheless, the baby languished in her arms until she became too weak to suckle. It was only then that help was sought.

Of course the outrage came quickly. Bony fingers of blame pointed in all directions. Some held the hospital responsible, believing the first-time mother got released too soon. No doubt a direct result, others moralized, of the cold, cost-calculating insurance companies. Always pressuring hospitals for earlier discharge of maternity patients. Others cast the blame on social services. The government let this poor young woman slip through the cracks. Over and over, the resounding cries filled the airways.

Their haughty laments over that young mother’s fate still echo in my mind: “Where were the pediatricians? Where were the lactation experts?”

The answers were never found. Perhaps because no one asked the right question.

Where was her mother?

Are Born Children Suffering the Effects of the Abortion Culture?

Media seats left empty at Gosnell murder trial

Recently, English woman Isabella Dutton admitted in writing that she regrets having her two children. She lamented,

…like parasites, both my children would continue to take from me and give nothing meaningful back in return.

Dutton, 57, was married at the age of 19 in 1975, just eight years after the 1967 decision to legalize abortion in England and three short years after the fateful Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion in America. Each sent Western culture down the pro-abortion rabbit hole.

This polarizing article has been shared across the globe to mixed reviews, some appreciating the writer’s honesty, others criticizing her coldness toward her own offspring. Similar comparisons of children to parasites became popular and rampant in pro-abortion circles to argue the case for abortion. Found on the hideous far-left rag the Daily Kos,

Anyways, back to the whole fetus= parasite thing. That is how I see them. I don’t see them as cute and cuddly. I see them as terrifying and scary. I see pregnancy the same way.

The Z/E/F sucks the nutrients from the mother.
The “relationship” only benefits the fetus.
The mother’s organs and body parts become damaged.
The fetus controls the mother.
The fetus doesn’t give anything “back”.

The author then goes on to list more reasons a baby is the same as a parasite including specious claims that pregnancy damages the mother’s internal organs.

Now we have the trial of Kermit Gosnell, the mass-murdering abortionist who kept the severed feet of his victims in bottles around his office, ignored by the national media. A doctor who murders full-term babies outside of the womb cannot garner national interest. Perhaps studies like this one by Oxford self-labeled “ethicists” don’t help matters.

What we call ‘after-birth abortion’ (killing a newborn) should be permissible in all the cases where abortion is, including cases where the newborn is not disabled.

With public discourse lowered to such a level, is it surprising at all that a mother publicly disparages her children and it is called “honesty” or that the public is more interested in Kim Kardashian’s exercise routine than in hundreds of slain infants in a dirty Philadelphia abortion mill? For all the talk of protecting the children of America by writing more gun-control laws, none of which would have stopped shooter Adam Lanza in Newtown, there is no concern for the millions of nameless children abortionists have literally thrown in the garbage. No one is proposing laws to stop abortion butchers from stabbing full-term fetuses in the neck and freezing their bodies in plastic bags. No one is even asking where Gosnell got such an idea, because the answer would be the undoing of the abortion industry. Gosnell isn’t one monster in a field of saints. He simply shone a light on the ugly truth that abortion results in a dead baby and a desensitized public no matter which method is used.

Who’s to Blame for Fueling Pop Culture’s 5 Worst Female Stereotypes?

Poor Seth MacFarlane. The guy sings one song about boobs and suddenly he’s #1 on the Hates Women List with a Steinem next to his name.  (That means if they capture him, she gets to rag on him incessantly. Who wouldn’t want a bullet after that?)

It’d be too easy to join the chorus singing, “MacFarlane hates women.” As a woman, I despise the cop-outs women often take, chiding every man as being both the desired master of her universe and the despised crafter of her fate. If we really believe in Girl Power, what’s our responsibility in all of this? Are we allowing the fate scripted by guys like MacFarlane to come true?

It took about 10 minutes to pull video for the following five most common stereotypes about women portrayed in Family Guy. The sad news is that it took about 15 to pull five examples of the same behavior from the most popular Girl Power reality television show out there: The Kardashians. Praised by some feminists as career women comfortable in their own skin, it has been observed that “50 years ago, the Kardashians could never live the way they do. It’s all thanks to the Feminist movement that they are who they are – and they embrace every benefit from it fully.”

So, culture judges that you are, tell me: Is the evidence compelling? Is MacFarlane a He-Man Woman Hater, or do the Kardashians prove that girls finally busted through the glass ceiling in the tree house and joined the club?

Should Parents Take Over Failing Schools?

Should parents take over failing schools? Currently, seven states have “parent-trigger” laws, which empower parents to take control of the fate of low-performing schools their children attend. Depending on the state, parents can vote for various options when schools are failing their children: They can vote to convert to a charter school, replace teachers and administrators, have the state take over the school, or even close the school altogether.

Last year’s movie Won’t Back Down, starring Maggie Gyllenhaal and Viola Davis, told the story of a group of parents who took over their children’s failing school. “Inspired by true events,” it illustrated with heartbreaking clarity the frustrations parents—and often teachers— feel when children become lost in bureaucracies and schools where it seems rigor mortis has set in. Not surprisingly, the movie was panned by unions and other anti-school choice activists.

In California, the only place parents have actually pulled the trigger on a “Parent Empowerment” law, it has been tried twice. The first attempt was the Compton Unified School District, where fewer than half of students graduate from high school and just 2% attend college. Under the California law, parents can use the trigger law if a district has failed to meet adequate yearly progress three years in a row and is in “corrective action” status under the federal No Child Left Behind law. It seems like a no-brainer that a major overhaul was in order, but it will surprise no one that when Compton parents organized to call for change, the unions and administration objected. Strenuously. They promised that reforms were right around the corner and that they just needed a little more time for their programs to work. It’s understandable that parents grew tired of waiting for promised reforms that might never come while their children languished in lousy schools.

In order for parents to take control of a school, they must file a petition with signatures from 50% of the parents of each targeted school. Parents chose to try out the California law on McKinley Elementary School, ranked in the bottom 10% of schools in the state. They turned in signatures from 62% of parents in the district and that’s when the claws came out. The school district demanded that parents verify their signatures in person and—I am not making this up—that parents show photo identification. Some parents claimed the schools threatened them with deportation, and others said teachers told children the school would be closed or the kids wouldn’t receive special education services if the parents succeeded. Some parents rescinded their signatures. Board members claimed “outside groups” pressured the parents to sign the petition. Leaders of the trigger movement dispute that claim, as does the state school board president. The board also said the petition was “materially non-qualifying” and rejected it on a technicality with a 7-0 vote, saying it cited the wrong education code and didn’t contain correct information about the charter school operator they had selected.  Despite pro bono legal help, parents failed in their bid to reform the school.

5 Things Planned Parenthood Doesn’t Want You to Know About Pregnancy Resource Centers

Planned Parenthood certainly blusters a lot about helping women in need, but the truth is they make an awful lot of money off the grisly business of abortions. Their most recent annual report shows nearly $1 billion in assets and $997 million in revenues distributed to their local affiliates, plus another $177 million in revenues to the national office. By conservative estimates, abortions constitute 37% of Planned Parenthood’s revenues. Fair enough, I suppose, but isn’t it a little disturbing to think they have a business model (and a profit motive) that requires getting women onto the abortion tables with their feet in the stirrups?

With all the vitriol surrounding the abortion debate, it’s sometimes easy to lose sight of the fact that every day mothers with unplanned pregnancies make life-altering decisions about their unborn babies. While politicians and activists battle over the legislative issues, compassionate counselors at non-profit pregnancy resource centers (and their donors) quietly make a monumental difference in the lives of mothers, fathers, and babies every hour of every day across the United States. They literally save the lives of babies.

It’s no wonder Planned Parenthood warns women to avoid these non-profit pregnancy centers which, let’s be honest, hurt their bottom line.

Here are some things you may not know — 5 Things Planned Parenthood Doesn’t Want You to Know About Pregnancy Resource Centers:

Extreme Makeover: Planned Parenthood Edition

Planned Parenthood recently decided to jettison the “pro-choice” label. “It’s a complicated topic and one in which labels don’t reflect the complexity,” said Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards at a press briefing earlier this month. Rather than replacing “pro-choice” with a new and improved slogan, Richards said the organization’s polling indicates a need for a more “nuanced” message rather than definitive labels. Planned Parenthood found that many of those polled rejected both the pro-choice and pro-life labels, saying their views change depending upon the situation, so the group says their new messaging reflects the shift.

In a video released with the announcement, a cartoonish Julia-type character tells us: “Most things in life aren’t simple and that includes abortion. It’s personal. It can be complicated. And for many people, it’s not a black and white issue.” (Technically, for the baby, it is a very black and white issue as far as his survival is concerned.)

After a lengthy lecture about politicians — specifically male politicians — having no business making laws about abortions, we learn that,

The next time you talk about abortion don’t let the labels box you in. Have a different conversation. A conversation that doesn’t divide but is based on mutual respect and empathy.

The video then directs viewers to Planned Parenthood Action, the political arm of Planned Parenthood. At the site we find charts with surveys purporting to demonstrate the no-label narrative and stating that most people believe abortion should be legal. In the tiny print at the bottom you can see that the polling comes from an online survey.

A Christmas Eve Musical Gift of Love

On Christmas Eve, gather up your loved ones and to listen to Amy Grant sing Breath of Heaven (Mary’s Song).

This is my favorite modern Christmas song and one I cannot listen to without tearing up.

The song takes you inside the mind and heart of the person who would become the world’s most revered Jewish teenage mother as she is about to give birth, in the most difficult of circumstances, to a baby she was chosen to bear — the One who will impact the world like no other.

Merry Christmas to all and especially those who truly love this mother and Baby.

The 5 Most Overrated Pop Culture Heroines

Even while women devour the Twilight books and flock to the recent release of Breaking Dawn 2 most revile the series’ heroine Bella Swan. The savvy modern woman prefers the vampire-slaying Buffy Summers. As a fan of both the Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Twilight franchises, I think that we have this partially backward and that the Buffy v. Bella arguments common on the web underscore dangerous assumptions about women. Feminists have co-opted Buffy and the female superheroes for the gender wars in order to perpetuate their illusion of no differences between men and women.

Conventional wisdom tells us that women can do anything men can. With rare exception owing to strength or stature, this is true. But we don’t always want to do what men do, and even if and when we do we have to account for our biology. Sometimes it is the strength and stature deficit, sometimes it is our heavier role in reproduction. The feminist intelligentsia thinks this unfair, so, couching their advice in terms of equality, they tell us to ignore biology. Accordingly, the female heroes who we admire today are the ones who work around reality.

It is great that we have heroes who happen to be women, but we mistake them as role models for womanhood. Five pop culture heroines to illustrate my point:

5. Hermione Granger, The Maligned Hero

Hermione helps Harry Potter figure out how to defeat the evil wizard Voldemort and, at great personal sacrifice, she accompanies Harry on his final quest.

As a role model for womanhood she is the best of this list. She shouldn’t even appear but for what we like about her. The oft-cited favorite Hermione part in the movies: when she punches Draco Malfoy.

Over eight films loaded with powerful women defying evil—Luna Lovegood, Molly Weasley, Lily Potter, Narcissa Malfoy—that inconsequential punch makes number six of the 50 greatest moments. What was a slap in the book was rewritten as the crowd-pleasing punch because we like it when a woman acts like a man, which is ironic considering the next most overrated heroine, Wonder Woman.

6 Things Down Syndrome Parents Wish You Would Stop Saying

As a parent of a child with Down syndrome, I’ve been lucky enough to have supportive, understanding, and positive friends and family.

Then there’s everyone else.

Most people don’t mean to be hurtful or ignorant. When confronted with a friend telling you, “Hey, my baby has been diagnosed with Down syndrome,” your mind goes blank. What do you say that’s appropriate? Too many people just blurt out the first thing that comes to mind without stopping and thinking about what they’re  saying.

The excuse is that they just don’t know what to say. They don’t understand why apologizing can be insulting. They think saying that people with Down syndrome are happy all the time is reassuring. There’s an endless parade of ignorance, and it makes us cringe every time. And there are six things in particular that Down syndrome parents wish you would just stop saying.

6. God gives special children to special parents.

This is supposed to be a compliment, right? It’s not. It’s actually pretty annoying. And it’s a two-fold insult.

First, you reinforce the idea that people with Down syndrome are a bigger burden than other children. This is obvious, because if you didn’t see them that way, then clearly you wouldn’t think they need extraordinary parents. There is this idea out there that only some people can handle having a child with Down syndrome, while for most people, it’s just too hard.

Would you take kindly to hearing in a roundabout way that your kid is such a pain that only a certain kind of person can handle him?

Second, we aren’t “special” parents. We’re people who received a child with Down syndrome and we still love and raise them like our other children. Would you tell a parent whose child suffers from cancer that God gave them this burden because they’re special parents that He knew could handle it? Probably not. There are any number of difficulties and issues that can pop up during the raising of a child, and it doesn’t take a “special” person to handle any of them. All raising a child with Down syndrome requires is unconditional love. That’s something all parents must possess, right?

So stop sanctifying us. We’re just like you.

What Happens When Abortions Become Free?

via France to Cover 100 Percent of the Cost of Abortions – By Veronique de Rugy – The Corner – National Review Online.

The French national health-care system is called Sécurité Sociale. It is currently running a $13 billion deficit, but President François Hollande has some ideas about a new direction for the program. For starters, in 2013, it will start covering the cost of abortion entirely. That’s right: If you get an abortion in France, the “government” will pick up the tab and it won’t cost you a dime. But in the name of fiscal responsibility, the president will pay for the new spending by taxing seniors. Hes planning on imposing a tax of 0.15 percent on retirees, which will double in 2014. To be fair, the revenue from the new tax is not just meant to cover the new “abortion” spending, but also to reduce the deficit. We’ll see how well that goes.

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Uma Unsimulated?

Murderer Joran Van Der Sloot, Daddy

via Joran Van Der Sloot, Stephany Flores Killer, Impregnates Woman While In Prison.

AMSTERDAM — A newspaper said Monday that Joran van der Sloot, a Dutch man who is serving a 28-year-sentence for murdering a young Peruvian woman, has impregnated a woman while imprisoned in Lima.

The Dutch newspaper De Telegraaf cited Van der Sloot’s lawyer Maximo Altez as saying the pregnancy is past its third month, and Van der Sloot himself as having confirmed the news in a telephone call on Saturday.

“A test has proved” the pregnancy, the paper quoted Van der Sloot as saying.

The woman, identified by the paper only as “Leidi,” was said to have become pregnant during an unsupervised visit with Van der Sloot. It was not clear whether that is allowed or possible under Peruvian prison rules.

Media in Peru last year identified a woman named Leydi Figueroa Uceda as Van der Sloot’s girlfriend, and said they had conceived a son together, but she denied it. Altez then described the pair as “friends.”

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America’s Birth Rate Down For 4th Year In A Row

via My Way News – Baby bust continues: US births down for 4th year.

NEW YORK (AP) – U.S. births fell for the fourth year in a row, the government reported Wednesday, with experts calling it more proof that the weak economy has continued to dampen enthusiasm for having children.

But there may be a silver lining: The decline in 2011 was just 1 percent – not as sharp a fall-off as the 2 to 3 percent drop seen in other recent years.

“It may be that the effect of the recession is slowly coming to an end,” said Carl Haub, a senior demographer with the Population Reference Bureau, a Washington, D.C.-based research organization.

Most striking in the new report were steep declines in Hispanic birth rates and a new low in teen births. Hispanics have been disproportionately affected by the flagging economy, experts say, and teen birth rates have been falling for 20 years.

Falling births is a relatively new phenomenon in this country. Births had been on the rise since the late 1990s and hit an all-time high of more than 4.3 million in 2007.

But fewer than 4 million births were counted last year – the lowest number since 1998.

Among the people who study this sort of thing, the flagging economy has been seen as the primary explanation. The theory is that many women or couples who are out of work, underemployed or have other money problems feel they can’t afford to start a family or add to it.

The economy officially was in a recession from December 2007 until June 2009. But well into 2011, polls show most Americans remained gloomy, citing anemic hiring, a depressed housing market and other factors.

The report by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is a first glimpse at 2011 birth certificate data from state health departments. More analysis comes later but officials don’t expect the numbers to change much.

Early data for 2012 is not yet available, and it’s too soon to guess whether the birth decline will change, said the CDC’s Stephanie Ventura, one of the study’s authors.

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image courtesy shutterstock / Big Pants Production

When The Abortion Ship Sets Sail For the Muslim World

via Dutch abortion ship heads for Morocco – FRANCE 24.

AFP – A Dutch “abortion boat” has set sail for Morocco, its first trip to a Muslim country, to provide abortions to women who are exposed to grave health risks if treated domestically, its organiser said on Monday.

“The ship is on its way. We can’t yet disclose the place and time of arrival… We expect it to stay for up to a week.” Rebecca Gomperts, the founder of the Dutch non-profit organisation Women on Waves, told AFP by phone.

The group says that, according to figures published by the Moroccan government, between 600 and 800 abortions take place every day in the north African kingdom, where the procedure is illegal and taboo.

“The problem is that only about 200 cases are done properly, by women who have money,” the Dutch abortion doctor said, with the rest resorting to dangerous methods because they are unable to afford the expensive treatment.

This leads to the deaths of 78 Moroccan women each year on average, Gomperts claimed, citing statistics provided by the World Health Organisation.

Hat Tip: Drudge

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The Designer Family: Putting a Dollar Value on a Little Girl

Over at Acculturated this week  editor Emily Esfahani Smith highlights a disturbing development, the rise of services that help couples choose the gender of their baby. Couples are paying tens of thousands of dollars to make sure they have girls (the reverse of what we commonly see in China and India), and are heartbroken when they end up with a boy:

Simpson was inseminated with the slower sperm that same day. Fifteen weeks later, she asked a colleague at the hospital to sneak in an after-hours ultrasound. The results felt like a brick landing on her stomach: another boy.

“I lay in bed and cried for weeks,” said Simpson, now 36, whose name has been changed to protect her privacy. She took a job in the operating room so she would no longer have to work with women who were giving birth to girls.

Even more disturbing is her reaction when she finally did get her baby girl:

“My husband and I stared at our daughter for that first year. She was worth every cent. Better than a new car, or a kitchen reno.”

Aside from the obvious hints at eugenics that can be seen here, what does this say about how we view children? From the high rates of abortions of babies with Down syndrome or other disabilities to choosing the sex of our babies, are we beginning to view our kids as accessories? As “things” meant to bring us happiness? When parents are paying to make sure the baby they have is the one they want, it really is like buying a new car or renovating a kitchen. It’s a purchase. It puts the child on the same level as the little chihuahua Paris Hilton carried around in her purse: a designer object meant to be used as a status symbol or to make the parent feel good.

And where do we go from here? What if we could choose our children’s eye color, hair color, height? Would we? The reason this is disturbing is because it allows parents to play God… to engineer perfect children, and toss out the not-so-perfect ones. Along the way, would we lose our humanity as well?

Science may allow us to create designer babies, but that doesn’t mean we should.

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9 Reasons Down Syndrome Won’t Ruin Your Life

Hearing that your child has Down syndrome is life-changing. And in that moment, your life typically isn’t looking too good.

When I found out, at 16 weeks pregnant, that my son Wyatt had Down syndrome, I felt like my life was over. I cried for days, thinking about all the terrible things that we would surely have to suffer. I feared we would be doomed to a lifetime of suffering and misery, having to struggle through the terrible ordeal of raising a special needs child. The images I had in my mind were of a dumb, ugly child who wouldn’t be able to do anything for himself and would depend on us forever.

I’m embarrassed to admit that now, because it isn’t even remotely close to reality, but it’s the truth. When you get news like this, the first thing you think of is the worst-case scenario. And most moms who find out their kids have Down syndrome don’t often have accurate, up-to-date knowledge of what someone with the condition is actually like.

So now that my son’s been born, has my life been completely ruined? What is having a kid with Down syndrome actually like?

9. You Won’t Be Scared Forever

When you first find out the news, it seems like there is no light at the end of the tunnel. And all you can think about are all the bad things that can happen: heart defects, leukemia, thyroid disorders, infertility, Alzheimer’s, intellectual disabilities, and on and on. It’s so easy to get overwhelmed when you start to read about Down syndrome and see all of the health risks that come with it. Before you know it, you’ve convinced yourself that your baby is going to have a million health problems and you’re panicking and terrified.

But trust me: the fear doesn’t last forever. Eventually, you’ll see that light at the end of the tunnel. And day by day, you’ll start to realize that it’s going to be all right. Your baby is not going to have every single malady in existence, and there will be some point when you see that. Yes, there is an inevitable period where every negative emotion under the sun completely consumes you. But that doesn’t last forever.

The Male Birth Control Pill Arrives

via Possible Man-Whore Pill Would Make Testicles More Forgetful at Jezebel:

Yet another ship has (a little by accident) sailed into the largely uncharted waters of male birth control pills, having discovered that a drug being developed for cancer treatment might actually make testicles temporarily “forget” how to produce sperm. This latest breakthrough in the burgeoning field of sperm obfuscation comes on the heels of news in May that a Scottish research team had pinpointed a gene necessary for sperm production, a breakthrough that opened the imaginarium of hormone-free male contraception.

The latest discovery in the quest for the male pill comes by way of Dr. James Bradner from the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School, who believes that he and his team may have alighted on a way to trick the testicles into shutting down sperm production without any discernible side effects. What’s more, the treatment would be completely reversible.

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Tax-Funded Sterilizations for Teenagers (No Parental Consent Required?)

The Winston-Salem Journal published a series of stories about forced sterilizations performed years ago in North Carolina. Other states had similar programs, but most retreated in light of Nazi Germany’s notorious eugenics policies. North Carolina, however, expanded its program after WWII and didn’t end it until 1974.

Elaine Riddick Jessie, now in her late 50s, was sterilized at 14 in 1968. She and her seven siblings had become wards of the state, and five were sent to an orphanage. Jessie and a sister were sent to live in their grandmother’s crowded house. A man raped Jessie, and she became pregnant. Fortunately, the state didn’t kill the baby. Unfortunately, the state labeled the abused Jessie “feeble-minded” and killed her chance to have more babies. Her illiterate grandmother had signed an “X” on the sterilization consent form without knowing she was signing a sterilization consent form. Jessie didn’t find out until years later she was sterilized.

The North Carolina Eugenics Board sterilized over 7,600 people from 1929 to 1974, and 2,990 ranged in age from 10 to 19. But those days are behind us, right? Yes, and no. The days of forced sterilizations likely are long gone, and good riddance. But the days of minors “consenting” to sterilizations are upon us.

President Barack Obama believes pregnant minors should be allowed to have their unborn babies killed without their parents’ consent. The man who stated he was going to teach his daughters “all about values and morals” also said he wouldn’t want them to be punished with his grandchild “if they make a mistake.” What about sterilization? Would he want his teenage daughter to have herself rendered infertile?

A story on CNSNews goes into detail about an Obamacare regulation that took effect on August 1 that requires health care plans in the U.S. to provide taxpayer-funded (or free, in liberal terminology) contraceptive methods that include sterilization “for women with reproductive capacity.”

Because the recommendation doesn’t specify age, it theoretically could apply to any menstruating girl. CNSNews learned that Oregon allows a minor to consent to sterilization. In that state, a 15-year-old girl can give her “informed consent” to allowing a doctor to render her permanently barren. Whether her parents approve or not has no bearing on her choice.

Think of the average teenager and imagine the scenario. A 15-year-old girl who’s perhaps mature for a 15-year-old girl (benefit of the doubt) decides for whatever reason she never wants to be “punished” with a baby, or that she wants to have sex without worrying about getting pregnant right now. She brings her mature-for-a-15-year-old self to the doctor, tells him/her she wants to be barren, reads and signs the consent form, and has the surgery. Ten years later and more mature, she marries and desperately wants children but must bear the consequences of an “informed” decision she made as a 15-year-old girl. It’s appalling.

Medical Advances in Delaying Motherhood

Doctors have developed a way for women with premature menopause, either due to cancer treatment or natural causes, to have babies post menopause. At least, those are the women for whom the treatment — doctors take a piece of active ovary, preserve it, and then re-implant the piece when the woman wants to have a child — was designed. Now, however, Dr. Sherman Silber is touting the procedure as a way for career women to delay motherhood:

Dr Silber has previously claimed ovary transplants could be a solution to the increase in fertility problems caused by career women putting off having children.

In 2008 he predicted women who had an ovary frozen in their 20s could look forward to the best of all worlds.

‘A young ovary can be transplanted back at any time and it will extend fertility and delay the menopause. You could even wait until you were 47,’ he said.

The best of all worlds, huh? Does the “best” include health and comfort for the mother? Women discuss pregnancies and deliveries often. The typical consensus: those of us delivering in our 30s had a much harder time than our 20-something counterparts and usually required a c-section. We had it far easier, however, than our friends who tried for children around 40. They typically had difficulty conceiving, had more miscarriages, and had the most sluggish recoveries of all of us. (A woman’s body snaps back from delivery at 25 in a way that is uncommon for a 35 year old and lost to a 40 year old without surgical intervention.)

After delivery, of course, come the sleepless nights, which we did for fun in our early 20s. Functioning on four hours sleep is less fun later on.

And that’s just the mothers. Does the “best” count children who are more likely to have older, less active, and more over-protective mothers Additionally what about the grandparent math? If a mom waits until she is 40 to have a child, and that child waits until 40 to have a child, then the mom will not be a grandmother until she is 80. Both grandmother and grandchild — and society — could miss the benefits of an important relationship.

Society would be wise to consider this another lesson in “just because you can doesn’t mean you should.”

Adele: I’m Having a Baby

via ADELE: I’ve got some news….

Im delighted to announce that Simon and I are expecting our first child together. I wanted you to hear the news direct from me, obviously we’re over the moon and very excited but please respect our privacy at this precious time. Yours always, Adele xx