42 and Pregnant - the grim statistics

The_Ang

My mom got pregnant when she was 42 and I was 17 at that time. It was unpredicted pregnancy. Unfortunately, it was a miscarriage. It was 22 years ago. She just followed the pregnancy without being worried too much. I remember what she said, "Just follow the fate. It will say something to us. It will teach us something about life."
Recently, there are several friends of mine that get pregnant on 40s and they are fine. The technology has made great influence on health. So, don't be too worry about it!

Congratulations!

fred246

jamesperrett wrote: »

Right from an early stage we decided that we wanted a home birth and, like olgadapolga, we encountered resistance from some midwives but good support from others in the profession who guided us through the process of changing midwife to one who was more supportive.

For us the health of my wife and my children was more important than having a homebirth. If you tell the midwife that homebirth is more important than their health your midwife should support your decision. If I was a midwife I would probably want that agreement in writing. When things go wrong people then realise that their health is the most important thing. But then it is too late.

Elliesmum

Congratulations NoNoDrama... All will be well. I had my 2nd child at 41 and even though there is a slightly higher risk - all was well and he came out fine.

The problem you've got is 9 years later, when DS hops onto a very well known auction site and buys a fidget spinner, that he was told he couldn't have :rotfl:

EM x

jamesperrett

fred246 wrote: »

For us the health of my wife and my children was more important than having a homebirth.

We didn't take this decision lightly - we talked to plenty of midwives about this before making it. If you have a baby in hospital the birth is often more stressful, and medical intervention is more likely. We made a great effort to create a relaxed, stress free environment for the birth and we made sure that any anxiety was kept away. It paid off as the birth was quicker than many (7 hours for a first time) with no complications. If there had been complications the hospital was less than 15 minutes drive away.

The mental preparedness of the people involved is just as important as the physical. Birth is very medicalised in our culture whereas it should really be a natural joyous occasion - women were giving birth long before hospitals existed. I would agree that there are circumstances where a hospital birth is essential but the vast majority of people don't need to go to hospital to give birth - it is simply a cultural norm at the moment.