Why I Froze My Eggs | Hacker News Reader

Why I Froze My Eggs

online.wsj.com

26 pointsmurtali49 comments

This line from the article is what stood out most to me "And it's a buzz kill on dates when you feel compelled to ask the guy sitting across from you, clutching his craft beer, "So do you think you might want kids someday?""

Is that really the case? I mean if your intention of dating is to meet someone that may eventually turn into a lifelong partner, knowing if their stance on children is congruent with your own definitely seems like something you'd want to hash out pretty darn early.

your intention of dating is to meet someone that may eventually turn into a lifelong partner

That's not really typical.

I think it's pretty common in certain crowds, for example geeky grad students. And if you're looking for something serious, wouldn't you want to filter out people who just want to use you for a fling?

It also depends on age and gender. The "biological clock" is not a myth. Women entirely unconcerned about long-term prospects at 22 often do a 180 by 27.

The first time I met my now-wife (24), she said in no uncertain terms she didn't want kids. After two years of dating, kids suddenly became super important to her and panic started to set in about possibly not being able to have them.

It should be though, shouldn't it?

I agree that it's not typical. And given that it's not typical, people aren't really serious about starting families and having children. If someone was serious about this sort of thing and actually wanted this, they'd start asking very soon if not right away.

Can you back up that assertion?

On a per-capita basis (not per date, as casual dating may be more common), I'd guess that many (>60%, to put a number on it) of those in the dating market have at least some notion of a 5+ year future in potential dates.

My friends and I have generally looked for partners, not flings. A great long term match can be really worthwhile.

Can you back up that assertion?

Those who look for flings date more. Most men who date are looking for flings. Thus, it becomes more likely that most who date are looking for flings.

See Jaynes's book "Probability Theory: The Logic of Science"

Hence asking about per-capita, not per date, numbers. :).

Well, most men are looking for flings (biologically). Some women are looking for flings. Whether or not most people are looking for flings depends on whether (A + B) / dating_population is > 0.5. I would suspect it is, but statistics to the contrary would be an interesting discovery.

"Those who look for flings date more. Most men who date are looking for flings."

Most dates don't turn into anything serious, but I doubt most men who bother to date are looking for a "fling", your definition of "date" may just be overbroad.

It should be noted that the author is in Manhattan, which has a totally ridiculous dating/marriage scene.

A small overall disparity in gender ratio can be magnified into a large disparity in the dating population when you bear in mind that most people are paired up at any given moment. So take NYC's overall gender ratio (53% female, 47% male). If you assume 80% of people are in a relationship at any given instant, the actively single pool is actually 1.5 females per 1 male.

Women basically have zero leverage in the Manhattan dating scene, which means that it really is difficult to bring up things like kids, because most men here seem to think of kids as something that they'll get around to in their 40's if ever. Hence an article on egg freezing.*

*) Which I think is great--I think we need more "home grown" kids in the U.S. and if egg freezing gives people a way to do that, then great.

She could move to Silicon Valley and take her pick...

The reality of the NYC dating scene might be more complicated, as documented by Jonathan Soma (you can just read the findings if you don't like enabling Java):

"The switchover from extra men to extra women starts at 35-39 for most big East Coast cities, but doesn't hit New York until 40-44"

http://www.xoxosoma.com/singles/

One thing I've never gotten is that there are more women than men (USA), but men have much higher rates of being unattached. Is this a case of men having multiple partners, or am I misunderstanding the math?

The main reason there are more women is that women live longer. This also means that most of the "extra" women are over 70.

If you break the population down into age groups (e.g. 0-10, 10-20, etc.) most younger groups have more men than women. Combine this with the fact that younger women tend to pair up with older men, and you get more unattached men in the younger groups (but more unattached women in the older groups).

Her point seems to be that by doing it, she isn't burdened by that question.

The idea of freezing your eggs is still way too cost prohibitive for most women. This is unfortunate because it leaves only the "Sheryl Sandberg"s of world- wealthy and educated to take advantage of this opportunity.

Perhaps it could be advantageous for men to freeze their sperm at a young age, too. There is some evidence that the older the father is at conception, the more likely his child is to have autism. There's also at least one study that suggests that the link can skip a generation: if a man is relatively old when he has a son, then his grandson is more likely to have autism. (That said, conflicting studies exist, and more research is required.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paternal_age_effect

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/29/grandfathers-age-li...

I would tend to take most knowledge on what causes autism with a shaker or two of salt at this point in time.

It should be noted that the success rate of frozen eggs is not great. The data is all over the place, but generally, implantation and pregnancy rates are substantially less than a coin flip.

Embarrassingly enough I expected this to be an article about chicken's eggs.

What's really impressive are the comments. If you ever wondered about readers of the wsj, this should cinch it.

There is a better option that allows you to have as many children as you want whenever you want: adoption. Why bring in more children into the world when there are already so many that are unwanted?

We're mammals. Do you really think that's a satisfying answer?

I will certainly acknowledge that there is a biological imperative to reproduce. However, I think we should work together to promote adoption of children. I don't see any logical reason to think of adoption of an infant any differently than spawning your own. Its safer for the adoptive mother's health and most certainly an improvement for the infant. Other than the pregnancy and birth process being replaced with lots of paperwork and interviews, it is a very similar experience. In both cases you end up with a child of your own to love and care for.

Yeah, I think adoption is much better, too. Unfortunately most people aren't wired that way.

'so many'? Demand for adoption children is currently higher than the supply.

Demand for babies is much higher than supply. Once they're toddlers or older, that trend quickly reverses.

The demand for toddlers might be lower than supply, but the whole market of older children is a small fraction of the overall adoption market, which is a small fraction of the overall child market. Each year, only about 20,000 kids age out of foster care without being adopted, versus about 70-80,000 babies who get adopted, versus about 4,000,000+ births.

In any case, adopting an older child is a huge undertaking and not something someone should do just because she wants a child. These kids often already manifest issues resulting from parents who are drug users, etc. They need much more support than your typical child.

I see adoption suggested often in response to any article describing fertility treatments. I would like the suggesters to elaborate on their experience with adoption process. From what I understand it is long, tricky, expensive and emotionally draining. More so than fertility treatments.

At least in the U.S., there really isn't a surplus of children to adopt. Adoption is actually supply-constrained. There are about 130,000 or so adoptions per year in the U.S. as compared to 4 million live births.

As population growth stabilizes in the developing world, and contraception and abortion become more widespread, adoption is going to become even less of a practical alternative to having ones' own children.

I wonder what a woman that spends $50,000 to freeze her eggs in her mid thirties would say about a man who spends $50,000 in his mid thirties on a sports car.

Because having and raising children, which creates a huge positive externalize in society, is the same thing as a sports car, which is a luxury good for personal consumption?

A luxury sports car could be a signal used to attract mates, like colorful plumage on a bird. So he might also be spending that 50k on having children (albeit indirectly).

Men buy them for themselves, not to "haul in the babes."

In the same way that women put on makeup for themselves. However, the desire to be attractive "for ourselves" is baked into our genes precisely because it helped our ancestors attract members of the opposite sex too.

For all the midlife crises, it doesn't really help someone who's not already confident/sexy/rich, though. It's an expensive accessory, like a watch. Makeup is a fair analogy, in that men like to impress other men with their cars and (most) women don't bother being made-up everyday for men.

The point is that she spent $50k because she spent too much time not focusing on starting a family and instead was doing something else which was probably a self-centered lifestyle. She would have nothing to say to the man who bought the car.

A man can father children and buy a extravagant car in his 20s or his 50s. A woman freezing her eggs is doing so in response to a biological constraint that men don't face; they aren't comparable situations.

We can't assume someone raised by that sort of parent will be a positive addition to society.

By what sort of parent?

She doesn’t have or raise children. She freezes some eggs, which, with some luck, could later provide her with the possibility to have and raise children.

Did someone take into account the kids? My dad turned 60 recently, and the mere thought that he will be a pensioner before I make any considerable amount of money and likely senile/needing full-time care by the time I turn 35 is…weird.

I don't understand your comment. How old are you? Would you rather take care of your aging dad (assuming that's necessary, which is a big "if") between 35-45 or between 50-60? Does it even matter? Why is that thought weird? Would you rather not exist?

I’m 22 now and I would rather prefer to deal with all the problems caused by old age when I’m 50 or 60. More importantly, I wouldn’t mind having more than about ten to 15 years left with him.

My dad died last year at 71. I never had to take care of him, he was a relatively healthy guy and his death was unexpected. I enjoyed my time with my dad, and I have no regrets. Seize the day, and don't waste time worrying about things that may never happen.

Lifestyle and genetics have a lot to do with things, but people are living longer and healthier lives these days... I don't consider 75 to be that old anymore. I have an uncle who's 80 who gave up scuba diving not long ago, one in his 70s who's president of his local school board, another who's over 70 and still lifting weights at the gym.

At age 36, with no kids and no marriage, she had to obliterate her savings to fund 50k? I feel like some part of her "big life plan" went south.

It's rather troubling she mentions having insurance cover this procedure...

From what I've read, fertility starts declining at 35, so if you're going to freeze eggs, probably best to do it before then.

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