Ice Ice Baby

As men in their 30s increasingly shun fatherhood for freedom, more women are finding themselves with little option but to freeze their eggs. A man and woman weigh in on the new problem facing parenthood

- Zoe Strimpel

“Women are freezing their eggs because there’s very little boyfriend – let alone father – material about”

Today is my birthday – I’m 36. I’m celebrating with champagne and pizza in the garden. So it was just over a year ago when I was heading for 35 that I asked my dad a favour. With his coolly quantitative analytical skills – he studied physics as a young man – could he please help me decide whether I should freeze my [reproductive] eggs before I turned 35? I felt overwhelmed by the data, and extremely stressed about the widespread idea that as soon as I hit 35 my fertility would fall offa cliff. The problem, however, was that at that moment in time I didn’t have a clear read on wanting children – I could easily go either way.

My father combed the research and a week or so later helped me decide not to do it. First, it seemed that 35 was not the cliff I had thought it was. I had a bit more time. Plus, in light of my ambivalence about having children, the exhausting intrusiveness and expense of the procedure (about $10,000) rendered it simply nonsensical for me. So I laid the question to rest, and said to myself that if I wanted to have a child in the next five years, then somehow it would happen.

I didn’t think too hard about whether the right man to do it with would appear. In fact, I have always thought the desire to be a mother must trump romantic uncertainty. If need be, I’d find a male friend or try to co-parent. If I really wanted a child and nothing else appeared, I could always go the sperm-bank route.