Help me decide whether to have a baby or study medicine first.

October 18, 2006 5:54 PM

My partner and I really want to procreate. I also want to go to medical school. I've spoken to friends about this, to gather several schools-of-thought that might be useful in making some kind of decision as to the timing of these two things. Now I'm turning to you. Which should we do first?

I am 23 and I'm an undergrad; I want to go to med school eventually. My partner is 30. I would say that we want a child more than I want to go to med school. i.e., If I had a child first, and found that it became impossible to study medicine because of this commitment, I think I would learn to accept that and feel content with my life. However if I pursue medicine, and put off having a child, and something happened such as the death of my partner, or becoming infertile, etc., I would be devastated and would not be satisfied with my career/life at all.

The way I see it, here are my options.

1.) Have a child now. I am currently studying biomedical science externally. I'm still in first year. I could have a baby and cut back to part-time study until my baby is a certain age, then go to med school. By the way, I am not concerned with becoming a doctor ASAP. I could easily see myself waiting until my child was a teenager before I pursued this. Life is long. But the problem with this plan (as some of my friends tell me), is that once I have a child I probably won't want to go to med school. I feel that there is a flaw in this argument. It is conceivable however that I may very well want to study medicine, but find myself strapped for time/energy. Possibly until the child is an adult.

-Are there any mefites who managed to go to med school (or undertake similar study) with a small child? Or do you know anyone who did?

2.) Work really hard, finish med school before having a child. This option bothers me. I can't imagine waiting ten years to have a baby. After all, I won't be able to give birth straight out of med school. It will be a few years at least until the work load decreases somewhat. (I want to be a GP, by the way.)

I am willing to do this, but my partner and I do feel strongly about having a child as soon as possible. If I were to decide to finish med school first, what do you guys think of freezing sperm/ova, in case something disastrous were to happen in the meantime?

3.) Have a baby now, work in pathology or research with my undergrad degree, and just see what happens with my feelings toward medicine?




Basically, I may be naive, but I feel that having a child doesn't have to change your life. Of course, it DOES, but I feel that with careful scheduling you should be able to achieve things and have a family.
On the other hand I am aware medical school is very intensive and very draining and many students do not come out with their spirituality/humanity/personality intact, let alone their relationships. I would hate it if I found myself getting so involved in medicine that I drifted away from my partner, and we never had a chance to have children.

Help me decide, hive mind!

posted by mjao to human relations (49 comments total)

Oh dear lord number two. You are only 23 years old. Pursue your dream.

I can't imagine waiting ten years to have a baby.

You are only 23!

Though I am sure the world is rife with stories of medical school + baby. It certainly would be a challenge, but not impossible.
posted by xmutex at 6:00 PM on October 18, 2006

Edit: It is worth mentioning that my partner does want to have a child very soon, if possible. However, he is happy to wait ten years if that is my decision.
posted by mjao at 6:00 PM on October 18, 2006

How does your partner feel about contributing as much as you do -- if not more -- to your child's upbringing? Maybe I'm reading something that's not there, but it sounds like you're assuming you'll have to be the primary caregiver during the child's early years. That doesn't seem fair.
posted by croutonsupafreak at 6:05 PM on October 18, 2006

mjao: It's the woman's body that defines the window for childhood. You are only 23. Your partner can easily wait 5-10-15 years, and so can you. You're lucky - go to medical school. You'll be able to satisfy your passion and provide a hell of a life for your family as a MD.
posted by xmutex at 6:07 PM on October 18, 2006

If you and your partner are certain you want to have children, just do it. It's a cliché, but it's also true that there is never a good time to have children. There are benefits and disadvantages to doing it at any time of life versus some other time. The main deciding factor is knowing you want to do it.

My sister-in-law decided at age thirty-six that she wanted to change professions and go to medical school. She already had a masters degree. She went to medical school and got pregnant in her second year, had twins, took a year off, and then went back to med school. She now has five-year-old twins and is about a year away from starting her own practice as a dermatologist. She is a compulsive over-acheiver, and it has been very difficult, but I admire her resolve and pretty soon she will have a satisfying, very well paid profession in the field she loves, along with the family she wanted. So it is possible.

As far as "I feel that having a child doesn't have to change your life" goes...

bwaaaahhaahhahahahahahahaha!
posted by blakeleyh at 6:09 PM on October 18, 2006

Thanks for your response xmutex. I am leaning towards finishing med school first, because it seems the most rational thing to do. Family is more important to me though, and medicine is not so much a dream as a plan, hence my dilemma!

croutonsupafreak: My partner is very supportive. He can easily see himself being the primary caregiver, and I can see him doing a very good job of it. But if I sounded like I assumed I was going to be the primary caregiver, it is only because I don't want to go into this lightly, or "depend" on my partner to do most of the work. I have to assume that the child is 100% my responsibility, at the same time that he assumes the child is 100% his responsibility. Does that make sense?

I apologise, because I don't feel like I am being very clear this morning! My excuse is that I just woke up.
posted by mjao at 6:13 PM on October 18, 2006

I'd do med school first, then have a kid. I think the rigors of training to be a doctor might be the only thing more shocking to the system than having a newborn baby (full disclosure though, I've only done the having a newborn thing, and my knowledge of medical school is purely from observation).

You mention that you'd worry that your relationship would fail in the face of med school--this could also happen if you had children first, then went to med school. It might be less traumatic if it were to happen without children involved.
posted by padraigin at 6:16 PM on October 18, 2006

Medical school is a pain in the ass--how badly do you want to be a medical doctor as opposed to working in some other health sciences field?
posted by mandymanwasregistered at 6:17 PM on October 18, 2006

blakeleyh, when I said "I don't feel like having a child has to change your life", I pretty much meant what you said in your first paragraph! I mean of course it is probably the most life-changing endeavour you can undertake, but I don't think it has to change your life in such a way that you are suddenly incapable of pursuing dreams. They may be harder to pursue of course, but definitely not impossible.

I guess I just said that in response to the view a few of my friends hold: that if I have a child, that's it for me; my life, my career is over. I don't think that's true.
posted by mjao at 6:19 PM on October 18, 2006

My mother is a physician (a neonatologist). While I'm somewhat fuzzy on the exact chronology, and had me (her firstborn) at the age of 34 toward the end of her residency.

She certainly worked like hell, all hours of the day and night. However, for the early years of my life, she carried me around at the hospital, or pawned me off on my grandparents. And, of course, nights, my father took care of me. (After my brother was born, he quit work to take care of us kids fulltime.)

It seemed to have worked out just fine for her.
posted by Netzapper at 6:24 PM on October 18, 2006

I can't give you any answers, but here are some more things to consider:

People who say you can have a baby any time you want are misguided. Women's fertility starts to decline around age 27. If you have a baby later than your mid-30s, the chances of birth defects and other medical problems will be higher. Plenty of women in their mid-30s and later have successful pregnancies resulting in beautiful, wonderful babies, but you're right not to count on it.

I'm not sure how med school in Australia is different from med school here, but in the US it's extremely time consuming, as are the first few years out of school. Students spend countless hours in class, learning from case studies and studying. Once they're through with the academics, they can expect 80-plus hours of work per week. They spend the night at the hospital. They're often on call. It's only until they're fairly well into their careers that they start having time again.

I have a friend who just got out of med school and knew several classmates who had kids while in school. They all had partners who were able to be primary caregivers, however, and without that commitment I don't think it would have been possible to make it through.

I also know two women who became doctors later in life. One was in her 40s, and it just took her a while to discover the right career path. The other was in her 50s, and she didn't start medical school until after her children were grown and moved out.

In your situation, I would probably attempt to have a baby while in med school or even before, because med school and the demands of early doctoring become progressively more difficult, but while those demands grow your partner's ability to take over parenting will also grow.

I don't think I'd have a baby with someone in your situation if I weren't married to him, however. Marriage brings with it some emotional weight that may give you added psychological protections, and it will also provide you with legal protections.
posted by croutonsupafreak at 6:24 PM on October 18, 2006

Hmm. From these comments I am tending to think that while I have the luxury of choice, and time on my side, it is best to take advantage of that and do things in the easiest way: i.e. option 2.

I'm acutely aware of the fact that it's likely my youth and lack of experience that is making me want to have a baby sooner rather than later.

It will be a huge sacrifice for me though, but I suppose that's what these things are all about.

mandymanwasregistered, it's a good point. I could see myself working in some other health sciences field, but eventually, even if I wait until I am 40 or 50, I still want to go to med school.
posted by mjao at 6:25 PM on October 18, 2006

Thanks, croutonsupafreak. An immensely helpful response.

By the way, my partner and I consider ourselves "married", we're just not too big on the ritual of marriage. It's a long story; his father and his mother were a priest and a nun, who left the church when they were 50 to have a family, and they were ostracised and they are now atheists. My partner carries a lot of this religiouslessness with him and he sees marriage as a religious convention. He has said if I want to get married, we will! But I don't have any great desire, probably because where I grew up, people weren't really big on "paper marriage" either. I've never been to a wedding!

We have kind of thought that we may have a wedding after we a have a child, so that he or she can enjoy it. If the mood strikes.
posted by mjao at 6:32 PM on October 18, 2006

I can't imagine going to medical school unless you're completely devoted to it. The workload is immense, and you already sound somewhat less than thrilled about that aspect of it.

I'm not a med student, but I am in nursing school right now. It's a profession that's famous for its "non-traditional" students and I still see them struggling twice as much as those of us that don't have kids. I can't imagine how med school would be possible if you're also expecting to be 100% responsible for a child. It will take a village to raise that kid, I promise you.

If you want kids, have them. If you think you'll spend the rest of your life regretting not going to med school, then wait. I don't know many people who have truly regretted waiting a little while to have kids, especially at your age.
posted by makonan at 6:33 PM on October 18, 2006

makonan, I certainly didn't mean to give the impression that I am less than thrilled about the workload of med school. I'm a hard worker; I study 7 days a week, eight to twelve hours a day. The workload actually excites me.
posted by mjao at 6:38 PM on October 18, 2006

Having a kid or two during residency is about the wisest decision a woman can make; you can get out of 12 weeks of call scot-free.

Of course, your co-residents will end up taking all that extra call for you, but what do you care?

If you don't know what call is, you need to learn a lot more about medical training before you even start thinking about the question you're asking.
posted by ikkyu2 at 6:40 PM on October 18, 2006

I've seen 3 mothers having/raising children during undergraduate and graduate engineering programs.

My undergraduate program was very intense, and the single-mother I knew in it must have had a very hard time juggling things. Nonetheless she was awesome, and her son was awesome, and I think it worked for them.

The other two mothers were doing Phds, which means they had certain hours of obligation - lecture hours or TAing - but otherwise could set their own schedule. It seemed to me that this was quite ideal.

Neither of those examples is med school..
posted by Chuckles at 6:40 PM on October 18, 2006

I know what call is.
posted by mjao at 6:41 PM on October 18, 2006

The fertility argument is a good one, if you wait, things will be more difficult. But in all other ways, waiting is the logical option.

So why not adopt kids later in life? This would seem to be the best of all worlds! Just because you can procreate doesn't mean you should - there are (and will continue to be) many many children out there who need parents. Give it a thought.
posted by phrontist at 6:55 PM on October 18, 2006

Very true, phrontist. I never even considered that, strangely enough! But I would be open to it.
posted by mjao at 6:57 PM on October 18, 2006

Just a personal anecdote: My mother had a two year nursing degree, worked for about 14 years (starting at your age), having me and my brother in that period, and then went back to school for a BA/MA in nurse practitionership when we were about 9 and 6, respectively. While it's not med school, it did have lab classes, long horrible shifts, and some similarities. I suppose it's closest to your option #3 there.

It worked out well, since she waited until we were older to spend all her time doing all the crazy crap. In the meantime she worked night shift (medicine is great for that, you can always work night shifts in almost any lab-type department), which basically meant we got to see her wake up when we got home from school, which she really liked.
posted by cobaltnine at 7:01 PM on October 18, 2006

mjao, I work with a number of post-docs who are getting PhDs in various biological fields, and a really high number of them are having children mid-schooling. I'd always thought of children and intensive schooling as a one-or-the-other kind of thing, but I can think of five PhD students I know who are doing them simultaneously. But as Chuckles points out, that's not quite the same as med school, so I'm not sure how the experiences would compare.
posted by Greg Nog at 7:21 PM on October 18, 2006

I'm in law school, and I think its analogous to some degree although probably easier (I don't know, I've never been to med school, obviously.) While I couldn't imagine having any other major responsibility and being able to do all that's required of me, I know a few people who have young children and seem to be doing just fine. These people are those who just seem to, pardon my french, have their shit together in general. If you think you are one of these types of people, I think you'll probably be ok, if you're one of us normal types I would advise choosing one or the other.
posted by wuzandfuzz at 7:22 PM on October 18, 2006

My mom's a Family Practioner and she had me when she was 40. She definitely waited until after medical school. She said if she could do it again, she would choose to be a specialist (like a dermatologist), because the hours are much better and she could be home more. Of course, being a specialist means that you'll spend more time in school.
posted by hooray at 7:38 PM on October 18, 2006

My wife and I had a baby recently and talked with a doctor about Down Syndrome, among other things.

You may know the statistics already, but just for the sake of the exercise ... you're 25. Your chance of having a Down Syndrome child, if you get pregnant today, is one in 1,100 .

Do you know what the odds will be when you're 35?

I don't want to play Pop Quiz with such a serious subject, but, would you guess the odds have gone down to one in a thousand? One in eight hundred? Five hundred?

The answer is, none of the above -- the odds are down to only one in 350.

Say it takes you a couple of years to get pregnant what with one thing and another. At 37, the odds are already down to one in 225. These are not comforting numbers.

Not that having a child with Down Syndrome is the worst thing in the world, but it's a big thing to have to think about: the risk itself, the tests you have to undergo, and the decisions you have to make around 20 weeks if it turns out the child is likely to be born with Down Syndrome.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 7:48 PM on October 18, 2006

Even if you're only 23, that doesn't mean that you'll get pregnant right away. You can start the schooling but postpone as it becomes necessary. Education and careers are easier to launch than babies; starting later doesn't mean never. My mother* raised us while she was in her twenties, started a business in her 30s, earned a Masters in her 50s, and is now lecturing at the University on top of everything else she does.

*who was also a Sister first! We should start a club.
posted by mimi at 7:59 PM on October 18, 2006

I think it all depends on your support system you have in place. If your partner is solid, and will really help shoulder the load. If you've got grandparents nearby, you might want to have the children earlier. Start school now, get a few years into it, and then have the child while you're part way through school.

I've got 2 small children right now, and I'm finishing up my computer science degree. Although the workload is pretty hard, the children taught me discipline. I get more done in less time because I just don't have the time to procrastinate.

I don't think I'd do as well as I'm doing at school if I didn't have the kids. It seems counter intuitive, I know.
posted by fcain at 8:02 PM on October 18, 2006

Firstly, let me direct you to the Student Doctor forums. There's a ton of pre-med, med, and doctors there who can give you a lot of perspective.

I could not have imagined doing med school with kids, and I'm a man. There certainly were people at my school who had kids (many guys, 2 girls) and frankly I'm not sure how they did it.

After med school would be the best time to have kids, depending on what you went into. There are certainly plenty of women who do medicine and peds who have children, even some female surgeons. They make it work, though I don't know at what cost.

I'm a pathologist. It is generally considered one of the 'lifestyle' specialties (along with radiology, dermatology, and a few others). It is probably has the best hours during residency, and is one of the easier ones to work 9-5 (I work 6-5 six days a week... but I'm pretty high volume). In my residency, it seems like everyone who was married procreated like crazy. It's a good choice for moms because residents work 8-10 hours 5 days a week most of the time (with rare exceptions depending on the malignancy of your program). Call is taken at home, on your pager. There are no real 'emergencies' in pathology. I never slept in the hospital overnight during my residency.

So my point is, everybody busts their ass in medical school; but some of us can slack during residency and after and still pull down some great money (especially compared to peds and medicine).
posted by i_am_a_Jedi at 8:29 PM on October 18, 2006

Some medical schools have an upper age limit for admissions, especially those in the UK and other countries where universities are primarily government funded. If I recall correctly, it's generally somewhere between 40 and 50. My understanding is that this is to maximize the benefit the state puts into training doctors (because, even though students pay tuition fees, medical education is still primarily funded by the state). This may be something to keep in mind, although I'm not sure if this is the case elsewhere in the world.
posted by lumiere at 9:52 PM on October 18, 2006

FYI - I haven't read any of the responses yet.

I'm 33 and just in the last few years have I felt ready for a baby in my life. I spent most of my life building up a very successful career to the detriment (for the most part) of my personal and social life.

I can't possibly imagine attempting all those things at 23, although you sound as if you've a decent head on your shoulders.
posted by prodevel at 9:59 PM on October 18, 2006

Could you finish your bachelors and then re-evaluate? If you take a heavy courseload now, perhaps you can finish in 2.5 years. Then you could work for a year, so that you have some work experience. If you double-majored in something like nursing, you would be able to get work experience in a medical field and work casual shifts after your baby is born. That way, if your partner ever falls ill, loses his job or is otherwise unavailable to provide financial support, you will still be able to work to support your family.

In 2.5 years, you'll be about 26 and your partner will be around 33. If you wait three months, then get pregnant, you'll be about 27 and 34. You could then have two children before you're 30. You'd still be young enough to attempt medical school, if it interests you, and pay it off before you retire!

If you wait 10 years, you'll be 33. Your partner will be 40. That means he'll be 58 when the first child finishes high school and older still when the second child finishes. There's nothing wrong with that, of course. But it is something to think about.

So, I'm suggesting you finish off your current degree, get a year of work experience, and then have a family. Of course, you could start a family now, but I'm one of those people who thinks it's important for women to have back-up options.

I didn't do med school, but I do have a professional graduate degree. I can't imagine having attempted that with children. I currently teach and consult while staying at home with my child -- and it's a constant juggling act, albeit much more flexible than med school.
posted by acoutu at 10:26 PM on October 18, 2006

mjao: If I had a child first, and found that it became impossible to study medicine because of this commitment, I think I would learn to accept that and feel content with my life. However if I pursue medicine, and put off having a child, and something happened such as the death of my partner, or becoming infertile, etc., I would be devastated and would not be satisfied with my career/life at all.

Given your priorities, and recalling the big rocks story--basically, do the really important things first--I'd suggest that you should lean towards having children earlier rather than later. Not necessarily now, but maybe in a couple years, as acoutu suggests.
posted by russilwvong at 11:02 PM on October 18, 2006 [1 favorite]

Children have a way of planning your life for you. Being a parent means, at root, being willing to sacrifice your own welfare, to that of your child, should circumstances warrant. And while no one really thinks such things will happen to them, some children are always born, whose demands will be greater than you can plan, or forsee, or even share. So, if you take that fork in life, it's "in for a penny, in for a pound," as the old saying goes.

You say you'd be all right with having a child, and foregoing medical school, if it came to that. I think you mean that, but I wonder if you've extended that scenario in your own mind to the case where you'd be doing that to mother, indefinitely, a developmentally challenged child, who might grow up physically, but would never be independent mentally? Or, to any number of other situations which could pose a significant cost burden to you, such that you'd never be able to afford medical school, and see your life poured into caring for a child who might never meaningfully return your love and care? Because that is a real risk of taking the motherhood fork, too.

Not that the medical school route would be guaranteed happiness, either. A significant number of people start medical school, and even graduate, only to find medicine is not their cup of tea. If you'd asked them, or their admission committees, they'd have been shocked to think they'd be in that result postion 5 years hence, but there they are. Sometimes, you have to walk the path, to see the garden.

So, I'm just saying your post goes a little way down each fork to negative consequences, but your choices might be clearer, if you had the courage to imagine the worst more clearly, and take stock of those cases too. Because a big part of careful planning is risk avoidance, and outcome mitigation. As an example, your future child is at greater genetic risk if you wait to become a mother, but potentially, that is offset by the greater resources you'd have as a doctor at that stage of life.

Your burden is really to keep thinking through cases, with your child's situation in mind, until you find those that best balance what you have to offer the future.
posted by paulsc at 12:01 AM on October 19, 2006 [1 favorite]

Speaking as someone who watched his girlfriend, and any number of acquaintences, just finish med in Queensland very recently -- it's possible to do both.There were a surprising number of people at Ms Dave's graduation that had newborns / toddlers under their arms. So it's definitely possible.

I do get the impression that doing med here is (whilst far from easy!) not the absolute hell-ride that it seems to be in the USA. Certainly, in the two years that she's been out, my partner has worked pretty reasonable hours. A fair bit of shift-style work (graveyard shifts are painful for everyone!) and handfuls over (very nicely paid, thankyouverymuch) overtime. But none of it was forced upon her, and more often than not she's home on time.

All anecdotal, of course, and we very definitely don't have kids*. Email in profile if you want to ask me anything ;)

(Also: we're starting to get enough people up here for a meetup.. huzzah!)


*Unless an exceptionally whingey cat counts
posted by coriolisdave at 12:34 AM on October 19, 2006

Well, since you know what call is, I will just point out that 4 years of taking regular call really changes things. It changes your neurochemistry, your IQ, your personality, and it often changes peoples' priorities in life. I've seen it end dozens of good relationships - the odds suggest your current relationship will not last through med school and residency. Does being a doc mean that much to you?

I've also seen relationships survive it, and I've known several people who had kids as residents, including the two women whose maternity leaves forced an extra 20 calls on me during my neurology residency. (Having a kid in med school seems much tougher; the fellow students I knew who had to deal with med school plus kid(s) were perpetually frazzled and unhappy.)

It appears to me that having lots of money, for things like dry cleaning, housekeeping service, child care and babysitting and so on, makes things much easier. Is your husband wealthy? If so, that simplifies things.

So my take on it, which is that of a still-single man who's a doctor now, is that you can't know whether it's going to work before you start. I think the best you can do is a little soul searching about what your priorities are. Do you want to take care of sick people as your first goal in life? If the answer to this question isn't a resounding "yes," I would urge you to think twice, because you will be walking uphill the whole way.

However if I pursue medicine, and put off having a child, and something happened such as the death of my partner, or becoming infertile, etc., I would be devastated and would not be satisfied with my career/life at all.

I don't think that this helps very much. Yes, you'd be devastated and deeply dissatisfied with life. The reason why is that those things that you mentioned are devastating.

I think that a warning sign is that you might not be devastated if you didn't become a doctor. Why do you want to do it then? It's a long haul; it's very difficult and stressful work; and there are easier ways to make money. If your core reasons for doing it aren't solid, you won't make it, and boy oh boy will you feel like you wasted a lot of time, money and effort in that case.

I should mention that one of the best neurologists I know waited until the eldest of her 4 kids was in high school to start med school. She brought emotional stability, life experience, solid family supports, a stable financial situation, and a great deal of wisdom about life and crises to her training, and she succeeded at the highest level. Food for thought.
posted by ikkyu2 at 1:56 AM on October 19, 2006

ikkyu2, I really appreciate your input on this one. I have noticed your presence on countless other threads, and have found your ability to cut through a lot of shit impressive. While I didn't particularly like hearing what you had to say, it certainly forces me to stay grounded on this issue. Which is much needed -- it's very easy to get carried away with ideals whilst trying to forecast my future like this. My gut reaction to your post is that I do very much wish for all the things, even the bad things you have mentioned that are par for the course with medicine. On the other hand, I realise that this in itself could be considered tantamount to insanity! (From what I've come to understand!) So I do attempt to stay somewhat removed from my career aspirations, because I know I need to tread carefully when it comes to embarking on such an all-encompassing path. I realise that people can and do wake up one day wondering why they chose medicine and realising there's not much room in their life for anything else.

For the past four months I have done nil but study. Thankfully it seems that this does not adversely affect my relationship. My partner is very proud of me and we both manage to be independent and still feel like we're spending a lot of time together. I finished my exams yesterday, so with my newfound mental freedom, it became a priority to pose this query to ask mefi. A few things I have noticed: Overall I probably gave myself a total of about seven days break from study. I became (just barely) underweight. I have attained a much higher GPA than I anticipated. And I am still doing google searches and ordering books on medically related literature. It is not that I'm a workaholic, or that I find my identity in my study, it is just that I adore the material. Basically, I can picture this changing my neurochemistry and my personality drastically, just like you suggested. And so I really want to take stock of things at this point before I get too carried away. If you noticed, throughout most of this thread it is as though I am trying to convince myself to have a baby... I did say that it was more important to me than medicine. In retrospect I see this as my fear of getting too involved and forgetting what else is ultimately important to me.

They are both somewhere around equally important. At least in their intensity. I am definitely going to have to do some soul-searching this summer to discover what my priorities are as a woman, versus what my priorities are as a "mind", versus what my priorities are as a human being.

In the end, the best way I can see to reconcile these two dreams is the compromise that acoutu suggested (thanks acoutu!). I've showed this thread to my partner and he thinks it is sound advice to finish my undergrad degree and re-evaluate. I do want to thank everybody for allowing me to realise that there is a part of me that ignorantly believes I will be "too old" another ten-fifteen years. It's part of youth I think, to believe that most things are better done young. But what a fallacy.

At this stage I do acknowledge that it would be folly to try and convince myself that I am strong enough/hardworking enough to attempt med school and childbearing at around the same time. It's a tempting idea, but I think if that outcome were to materialise it would be because my mother and my mother-in-law found themselves in a position where they wanted to help out. (We'd all have to be living pretty close by.) I have no aspiration to be a "SuperMom!", and upon reflection today I realise that to do two very important, time-consuming things at once is to do them both (to some extent) halfheartedly. I'd like to devote as much attention to each of these things as they deserve (as far as possible.)

Well, I've gotten this far, and I still have a lot to say actually. But I won't clog up this webspace! Any further thoughts on this are probably better suited to my journal. I am sorry if I have written too much! Thanks particularly to I_am_a_Jedi for the information on suitable specialties, and also to paulsc for the point you made about variables, e.g., the possibility of a child with special needs, or simply a child with a personality that requires much more from me than I can possibly predict from this vantage point! Very important to keep in mind. FWIW, I have a younger half-sister with a disability, so I could easily find such a scenario meaningful, but it would definitely be better for me to at least obtain some qualification first to be able to find contentment rather than stress in such a commitment.
posted by mjao at 5:13 AM on October 19, 2006

Family is more important to me though, and medicine is not so much a dream as a plan

How old are your parents, and how old are your partner's parents? Because, medical complications aside, one upshot of having kids at 23 instead of 33 is spending 10 additional years with your children in your life. My parents were young when they had me -- as much as 15 or even 20 years younger than the parents of some of my good friends -- and it was hard going for my dad to complete his undergrad with a son, but I've loved having such young parents, and knowing that average life expectancy indicates that I'm going to have them in my life for a good long time. My wife and I will have had our third and final kid before I turn 30. Both my kids have met, on multiple occasions, all eight of their great-grandparents. Now, I've never thought about such extensive postgrad education, and certainly it's been financially rocky for my wife and me, but they're good kids and I look forward to knowing them for a long time.
posted by blueshammer at 5:46 AM on October 19, 2006

I had children with the belief that they would be a spoke on the wheel of my life and not the other way around. They are now 20 and 21 and are wonderful but if I had it to do over again I would plan my life so that they were always the focus and priority. The problem is that time is limited and children are flexible, so when you have outside demands, often the kids needs are deferred. I don't mean dinner and clothes, but each day that a story doesn't get read or a trip taken because something else needed doing. Medical school will not be flexible at all and the stolen time will likely come from your kids share.
posted by InkaLomax at 6:22 AM on October 19, 2006

Just in case no-one has referred to this, some interesting views on the question in this previous askme
posted by Wilder at 6:50 AM on October 19, 2006

A little bit off-topic, but good on you for choosing GP! Good luck with the baby.
posted by Mister_A at 7:11 AM on October 19, 2006

I have to assume that the child is 100% my responsibility, at the same time that he assumes the child is 100% his responsibility. Does that make sense?

Please, oh, please. Make sure you raise some kids. How refreshing to hear from a wannabe parent who gets this bit, so well.

Medical school: I have a cousin-in-law (who also happens to be the most beautiful woman I've ever seen) who hatched a couple rugrats while doing her training. They're doing great. Her husband has been mostly the house-husband sort, but that had more to do with her taking some training in Canada (they are Belgian), and he had to leave his job.
posted by Goofyy at 7:51 AM on October 19, 2006

On the flip side of the benefits of having kids young, of course, is the stability and life experience you can gain and your children can benefit from, if you do wait.

My parents were married at 21 and had me at 36 and my sister was adopted at 40 (not bc they couldn't have more bio kids, but bc they wanted to adopt). Besides the opportunities we benefited from (bc of the financial stability, settled life) one of the greatest things about them as parents, has been the fact that they had all kinds of fun adventures long before we came along. Their relationship was solid, and based on years together. They had traveled the world, lived overseas. When we came along they continued to bring us overseas, and those adventures have shaped my life more than almost anything else. My first memory, at 2, is looking off the back of a boat in the Aegean. And my second at 3, is walking on a beach in Mexico. My parents always seem youthful (although less now, at 65), and they never seem to regret wasted opportunities, because they did so much before they settled down with kids.

This is not to discount the drawbacks - they're older, my grandparents are all dead now (I'm 29), my parents will be older still when my kids are born, and my kids won't get to enjoy them as much as would have been possible if I'd been born a decade earlier. And that does make me sad. This is just to give you an anecdotal viewpoint of the benefits of parents who have lived and loved quite a bit before the kids come along.
posted by Amizu at 8:47 AM on October 19, 2006

dear mjao because you and your partner want to have a child soon and because there are health risks to children born to older parents, I would suggest you not wait many years to start your family. I also would suggest freezing semen for later if you might want children many years from now. Good Luck, you sound like you would make great parents and a fine doctor.
posted by leyna howe at 10:01 AM on October 19, 2006

Perri Klass wrote a grat book about her experiences as an Intern while pregnant: A Not Entirely Benign Procedure. She talks a lot about her decision-making process and how being the parent of an infant and toddler affected her medical education.
posted by AuntLisa at 4:13 PM on October 19, 2006

I think people are making too big a deal about the potential risks to delaying childbirth for a few years. The poster is only 23, and she’s considering delaying maybe 10 years at the most, until she’s 33. In general, the health counseling materials I’ve seen make 35 the cutoff date for when pregnancies become considerably riskier. Pregnancy risks and fertility rates in the early 30s are substantially the same as in the 20s. Fertility has dropped off some by then, but again, most women seeking to conceive in their early 30s are successful. It may take you a little longer to get pregnant than when you were 23, but it's not impossible.

The risk of Downs doesn’t start to grow expontentially until the mid-30s. And not to be callous, but if you’re really worried about birth defects you can have prenatal testing done. Birth defects are a possibility in any pregnancy at any age, if they’re a “dealbreaker” to becoming a parent you're going to have to keep the test & abort possibility in mind no matter what your age.

None of this is to say that I think you have to wait -- it seems to me that many successful professional women of our grandmothers' generation (in their 70s now) managed to have it all by raising children in their early 20s, then going back to school or resuming their careers in their 30s. Plus, a child is really only going to occupy you full-time for 3 or 4 years. After that, you're going to have hours every day to resume your studies and work. You seem to be a very motivated person; no matter how fascinating your child is, I can't imagine that you're going to want to be a stay-at-home mommy beyond a couple of years. Just make sure you only have 1 kid; kids 2 and 3 would be what throws you off.
posted by footnote at 6:29 AM on October 20, 2006

Footnote, It is her partner's age of thirty that is the problem. Advanced paternal age is related to very serious outcomes for children. In men older than 35 there is more DNA damage in sperm than in the younger group. In addition the older men's bodies are less efficient in eliminating damage sperm cells. Autism, Schizophrenia,some cancers, and many other problems are much more frequent in children of older fathers. All the research points to the wisdom of having children in your 20s and 30s. Everyone should now focus on the risk to the child due to older fathers at the time of birth.
posted by leyna howe at 11:39 AM on October 20, 2006 [1 favorite]

All the research points to the wisdom of having children in your 20s and 30s.

It's only "wise" if you're ready to have them then.
posted by footnote at 12:31 PM on October 20, 2006

But is is unwise to father in your 40s and beyond for the sake of the child.
posted by leyna howe at 12:46 PM on October 20, 2006

ikkyu2, I really appreciate your input on this one. I have noticed your presence on countless other threads, and have found your ability to cut through a lot of shit impressive.

Thank you for your kind comment.

I would point out my own perspective: I don't have kids. Also, I don't believe that medicine is a part-time job, nor is it appropriate as a hobby. I believe that holding the job is something closer to a sacred trust, and that people who do it ought to be fully dedicated, because the people who come to a doctor, sick and vulnerable, deserve that.

This perspective is hardly unique, but I would point out that it is not ubiquitous. There is a significant trend towards the part-time practice of medicine.
posted by ikkyu2 at 1:01 PM on October 20, 2006