Is There Really a Biological Clock?
Author: Laura Carroll
Published: October 27, 2010 at 4:40 pm
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We have all heard of the “biological clock” or “urge” – that deep rooted feeling women are supposed to get that calls them to have children. But is there evidence that it truly exists?
Research tells us that women lose their eggs as they get older, but not all experts agree as to how much and when. Some say women lose about 90% of their eggs by the age of 30. Others refute the mathematical model this prediction is based on.
And for men, as men age, research tells us that the percentage of damaged sperm they carry tends to increase, thus the possibility of babies being born with problems, including things like schizophrenia, dwarfism, bipolar disorder, autism, and Down syndrome. Whole books are out there on the subject of men’s ability to have children as they get older, like The Male Biological Clock.
While we know about egg reduction and sperm quality with age, how does it relate to that deep inner longing, that intense feeling of “I have to have a kid and now”?
Many women talk about it, but there is no scientific evidence of where this “urge” comes from or even that it exists. Maybe the longing arises when women know they are coming to the end of their reproductive prime—that the option to reproduce may be about to pass them by. However, this origin of longing does not apply to all women, given the growing number of women who are not having children by choice.
The same goes for guys. Childfree men don’t talk about experiencing anything like this. And while fathers may talk about the desire to have kids, they don’t talk about the kind of deep longing mothers often speak of.
We may not have the answer to where this deep urge to have a child comes from, but we do know that it's not a given for all humans--not everyone experiences it. There is one urge we all have in common, though. As a childfree woman in Families of Two says, the urge is not to procreate; the urge is to have sex!
Read more:
http://technorati.com/lifestyle/article/...z13x9DoaBr
Our benighted culture wants us to have this so-called "urge" and does everything it can to promote the idea from advertising to peer pressure. People who know anything about themselves are going to recognize it as a total fraud.
Yes, I agree. I don't think there's a TRUE biological clock. I think there's general idea in our culture that certain things happen on a certain schedule. And when all your friends seem to be "on schedule" and you're not, suddenly you feel the "urges".
Also, there are those human beings who believe all of life should be scheduled (they call it "goal-setting"), and put intense pressure on themselves to make the goals. "Get the big promotion by 25", "buy house by age 30", etc. Some of those things you CAN control -- you can work super-hard so that as you approach 25, you look good for that big promotion. That gives people the feeling that they can control all aspects of their lives. Hence if they haven't married on time, or had kids on time, they think they can control that -- men will marry the first woman who fits the "marry on time/kids on time" bill, women start to cry that the right guy isn't showing up and start shopping for sperm banks.
I once dated a guy -- a really great guy, and we had a wonderful time. The friends who fixed us up thought we were perfect for each other, and had great joy in seeing us together. I thought we were perfect. HE thought we were perfect. But I didn't fit his plan -- he wanted to be on a certain career track, and wanted to have purchased a home, before he married. So, he held me at arm's length, and finally he asked if we could break up, but wait for each other. I told him we could break up, but I wasn't waiting for him, and that I thought the idea of a schedule -- a schedule, specifically, for marriage! -- was ludicrous. It was the only amicable break-up I ever had. A year later he brought me a print he had in his house that he bought because it reminded him of me. I still have it. I also never saw him again -- a few years later, I went to graduate school halfway across the country, and a few years after that, I met DH.
(I tried to Facebook him today, but didn't find him. Oh well. No loss to me. But yanno, one always hopes that the other person feels the loss tremendously!)
My theory that the "biological clock" has pretty much just become a socially acceptable way for women to express their all-consuming desire to concieve before they run out of viable eggs
So much better to say its due to nature/biology rather than emotional desires because then the breeder looks selfish-just like a CFer.
I think that some women get baby rabies so they explain it as a bio-clock.
I don't get the "scheduling" either - how boring, there's no room for adventure or anything new. You miss out by only allowing certain things to happen.
(10-31-2010 01:04 PM)NKBurlington Wrote: [ -> ]Is There Really a Biological Clock?
Author: Laura Carroll
Published: October 27, 2010 at 4:40 pm
Share
3
0digg
We have all heard of the “biological clock” or “urge” – that deep rooted feeling women are supposed to get that calls them to have children. But is there evidence that it truly exists?
Research tells us that women lose their eggs as they get older, but not all experts agree as to how much and when. Some say women lose about 90% of their eggs by the age of 30. Others refute the mathematical model this prediction is based on.
And for men, as men age, research tells us that the percentage of damaged sperm they carry tends to increase, thus the possibility of babies being born with problems, including things like schizophrenia, dwarfism, bipolar disorder, autism, and Down syndrome. Whole books are out there on the subject of men’s ability to have children as they get older, like The Male Biological Clock.
While we know about egg reduction and sperm quality with age, how does it relate to that deep inner longing, that intense feeling of “I have to have a kid and now”?
Many women talk about it, but there is no scientific evidence of where this “urge” comes from or even that it exists. Maybe the longing arises when women know they are coming to the end of their reproductive prime—that the option to reproduce may be about to pass them by. However, this origin of longing does not apply to all women, given the growing number of women who are not having children by choice.
The same goes for guys. Childfree men don’t talk about experiencing anything like this. And while fathers may talk about the desire to have kids, they don’t talk about the kind of deep longing mothers often speak of.
We may not have the answer to where this deep urge to have a child comes from, but we do know that it's not a given for all humans--not everyone experiences it. There is one urge we all have in common, though. As a childfree woman in Families of Two says, the urge is not to procreate; the urge is to have sex!
Read more: http://technorati.com/lifestyle/article/...z13x9DoaBr
In my book, Complete without Kids: An Insider's guide to childfree living by choice or by chance, I asked a number of women about this very issue. My conclusion is that a certain percentage of women, and perhaps men as well, feel an actual emotional pressure to procreate. For most of us, however, it's a culturally driven phenomenon. If we don't have children, we're left out of the mainstream, and this often does not feel good. For example, what do you talk about when you're in a group of women who all have kids just heading off to school, and you're not a parent? Or if everyone starts to talk about the best childbearing method? I've found myself sitting quietly feeling both bored and like a complete misfit, and at times I've wondered if I made a huge mistake.
Check out completewithoutkids.com
Ellen
Welcome, Ellen. Thank you for your link. Your dogs are cute!
I don't care what other people think. If they are talking about something of no interest to me, I just excuse myself. I don't sit around questioning my judgement.
Agree with Eslbee. Usually if after a couple of minutes the topic hasn't changed I'll just excuse myself and find someone else to talk to, or something else to do. Sure, having kids is the mainstream option, but there are other things that connect us to others.
Just to tag onto Koi, it would be unusual for me to find myself in a situation where everyone is talking about babies. kids and families. I've kind of filtered those people out of my life, as they have filtered me. It would be as bizarre as going to church for an atheist (unless they were doing an ethnography or something!).
When I hear the term Biological Clock, the image that pops into my head is a woman with a clock about a foot in diameter that she wears as a necklace, and it's loudly ticking down to DUE (dried up eggs) day.
Sounds like Flavo-Flav, not my favorite image!
I think one of the reasons the biological clock exists is that society says women are supposed to be mothers and by god, you're approaching 30 or 40 or even 50 and you'd better get started before it's too late. The more sinister implication of this is that having kids sabotages a career, the one way to have financial independence.
(11-08-2010 04:22 AM)Eddy Wrote: [ -> ]I think one of the reasons the biological clock exists is that society says women are supposed to be mothers and by god, you're approaching 30 or 40 or even 50 and you'd better get started before it's too late. The more sinister implication of this is that having kids sabotages a career, the one way to have financial independence.
I can slightly agree with this. I think it's a bit more awkward than this, though.
First of all, we spent the last 50 years telling women to quit having babies in their teens and college years, because childcare interferes with becoming a whole person. Or even an interesting person. This, despite the fact that women's bodies are significantly more flexible for childbearing than even the mid-20s, and they recover from childbirth faster, with less physical damage.
Second, we upped the bar on what it means to be a "whole person", to include college PLUS either a graduate degree or time spend building one's career (or both). We also created no-fault divorce. Without fault-divorce, and the financial punishments made to men who want to leave a marriage, women have no safety net in case their marriages fail. So, they now MUST have decent, financially viable careers, or else they will fall into poverty when (not if) their husbands leave them for younger women. This pushes child-rearing to at least the late 20s, and more likely the early 30s.
Third, we made it harder to meet men good enough to marry and have babies with. Fifty years ago, you met your guy in high school or college. Sometimes, you met him in church or you were set up by your respective parents. Now, if you meet a "right enough" guy in high school or college, you dismiss him because it's entirely too early for you to be thinking about it. You're not supposed to be dating men at work. You don't have time for church. And we have been taught to scorn our parents' input in our relationships as "interfering", so if Mom tries to fix you up with "the perfect boy", you roll your eyes. At the same time, because we now have educated ourselves beyond the point where we would take any ol' high school boy or set-up from Mom, we demand perfection -- he has to have THESE qualities, and he must not have THOSE qualities, and we will not budge. All these things push child-rearing squarely into the 30s.
Since fertility peaks by 26-29, the chances of conceiving are already on the downhill slope by the time you get around to thinking about it. Meanwhile, the chances of having a disabled child increases by the mid- to late-30s. Hence the social pressure of the so-called "biological clock" -- if you don't push these women to HURRY UP AND PROCREATE, then they won't be able to at all. The window is narrow for those who want kids.