"A ticking time bomb for unhappiness"
On adventures, fertility, and taking life at your own pace.
At 31 years old, I’ve decided to have an adventure. I’ve wanted to do a PhD for some time, and even began applying for UK ones in the last application cycle. At some point the idea was planted: why not apply to some US universities? So that’s what I’m doing.
Recently, people’s opinions have started to feel like a big second hand, ticking and ticking, warning me that time is running out. Am I sure I want to make such a big move in my 30s? Do I know that I’ll be around 37 when I finish? Of course, the not-so-invisible subtext here is actually “are you not terrified of not being able to have children?”. And the answer: no, not really.
I’ve always been that neurodivergent juxtaposition of seeming older than my years to (older) adults and immensely babyish to my peers. Now I’ve hit my 30s, it seems the latter side has won out: I’m not married, I’m not having children and I’m planning on going back into education. In David Nicholl’s One Day there’s a period where Emma and Dexter go to weddings near constantly. They’re in their early 30s. Dexter bows to the societal pressure. Emma does not, focussing more on her career. Recently, I’ve started to get the wedding invitations, just as I’ve started to get enquiries about the future of my uterus.
I want children, or more realistically the one child, but not yet. For one thing, I am much too early into my relationship, for another, neither of us wants children yet. For another, for me, when I think about my life and I think about the next 10 years, I think about what I want to look back on. Do I want to have lived in the UK, working and trying to get pregnant, something which could not even happen for me? Or do I want to have moved to the US, followed my passion for research and social justice for disabled people, and then tried? For me, it feels like no choice at all. It’s obviously the latter.
People tell me I will feel different if I am in my late 30s and can’t get pregnant. And actually, I do worry, a bit, that this could come to be. But it doesn’t consume me, it doesn’t eclipse my dreams and my desires to do this thing I am so driven to do. I’ve always been open to the idea of adopting, and also, I feel that if a child didn’t happen for me, I’d probably be ok with that. I could move from “child free by choice” to “childless not through choice”, but it’s a risk I’m prepared to take. Even if I was in a position to be having a child in the next few years, I don’t yet feel old enough. I don’t think I’ll ever feel old enough.
I do think neurodiversity plays a role here. My social understanding has been delayed, and my executive function and mental health has meant that whilst I am in a stable job and a stable relationship, it has taken a long time to get here compared to neurotypical people. Of course, I am not speaking for or to the experiences of all neurodivergent people here, but my experience is that I do feel like things take me longer, everything is a little bit harder and relationships in particular have historically been a difficult area for me. And that’s fine. I do things in my own time. I will always do things in my own time.
Being in queer communities has actually been helpful in reaffirming my decision, as to be queer is to reject societal pressures and to live as oneself without fear of judgement (although others will certainly pass it). Knowing there are others living their lives in a non-linear fashion, having relationships and experiences which don’t fit the accepted reality that many subscribe to, is comforting. In fact, on a measure against a lot of queer lifestyles, mine is fairly usual, not least because I am in a heterosexual appearing relationship (although that’s a subject for another day).
I recently read Olive by Emma Gannon, a book which is about being in your early 30s and seeing everybody else choose what seems to be a very different life path to you. It rang very true: in my working life everybody has children, I very rarely meet anybody like me, in their early 30s, with no current plans to truly settle down to family life. Olive in the book decides she doesn’t want children at all, for me it is just a choice to wait. People get very concerned for my egg stocks when I talk about how I don’t plan to try any time soon, as if I’m 41 rather than 31, as if I am a ticking time bomb for future unhappiness.
As in the book, it’s important to remember we don’t all follow the same path in life. As women we have a societal pressure that men don’t have. If I was a man, nobody would be questioning my decision to start a PhD in my 30s. Whilst feminism has done a lot for women, society also still positions us as the main caregivers, as vessels for children, as people who had better hurry up and settle down before it’s too late. I resent this pressure. I resent it more than I can say. Not because I am “behind”, having only met somebody I see a healthy, long-term future with in my 30s, and who I don’t plan to marry yet. But because I don’t believe my role in society is simply to follow these arbitrary rules, held captive by my diminishing fertility.
I’ll probably be 37 by the time I finish my PhD. The thing is, I’ll be 37 whether I do a PhD or not, just I’ll be 37 without a doctorate. I want to have an adventure. I want to do something which I’m passionate about. I’m also only 31, I’m not actually that old.
Next time you are concerned about somebody’s fertility, and whether they have left enough time on the clock to have a baby, instead think to yourself whether this is something you would say to a man. Remember that not everybody wants or is ready for children, and that everybody takes a different path through life. You might not even realise that a person has been trying for a child and it hasn’t happened. Most of all though, realise it really is none of your business. Life is hard enough without judgement and naysaying from others. We all go at our own pace and society shouldn’t speed us along or slow us down. We should be ourselves and not fear judgement, but not having your judgement in the first place would make this much easier.