That Girl, the Continuing Story

The other day I had my hair done and came home with a bit of a flip–not my usual style. My elder daughter noticed and remarked that “you look like Ann Marie.” If that doesn’t ring a bell for you, maybe you’d recognize Ann as That Girl, the working girl heroine of the 60s TV show that made Marlo Thomas famous. Anna, who’s ten, knows Ann–and a raft of other characters from sitcoms past–courtesy of Netflix. At her age I watched it on primetime, Thursday nights.

So apropos! During the months when That Girl episodes were playing almost nonstop in our house two years ago it struck me that the show gives us the younger days of the first wave of new later moms. Ann wants a career before family, and the show is all about the confusion her ambition creates for her parents and even for her boyfriend Donald, though he supports her goal. But she’s clear about what she wants, and perseveres. When the show ended, Ann and Donald were engaged but not married.

It’s a story that’s been part of the TV sitcom world from its start: I Love Lucy was all about the 50s disconnect between a woman with career dreams and the family-pressures of the post-WWII decades when Rosie the Riveter suddenly became persona non grata. [I explore the Lucy paradox–at the same time that we’re told that Lucy’s incompetent, we know she’s making millions as the star of the show–in chapter one of Ready.]

Lucy (a pre-trend new later mom, whose second pregnancy at 41 was built into the plot of the show, though her age is not discussed) was the 50s response to the work/family balance question (maybe not so much an answer as another question), and That Girl moved the question along in the 60s and early 70s (Marlo was in her 30s for most of the show, but Ann seemed meant to be a bit younger). Their TV story continues through shows like Mary Tyler Moore and finally arrives at the motherhood moment in Murphy Brown in 1992. Murphy’s son Avery arrived in the arms of his 44-year-old single mom character to much public notice. Candice Bergen (2 years older than her character) had herself started her family 7 years earlier at 39. Since then? Judging Amy? Story-lines to do with family and work don’t jump to mind–what’s up with that? But the issues are certainly all around us. Birth timing, as I’ve noted before, is practically the only story in the tabloids. Is everybody watching Netflix?

While Ready provides a new look at the new later mom trend, the basic storyline is one we’ve all been following for years. Whether or not it’s been or might be your personal story, and whatever your hairstyle, the negotiation of birth timing, work and family issues means something to you–to all of us. At some level or another, all girls are that girl–persevering across the decades to figure it out together.

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Happy Mother’s Day #100

Though my friend Ignatzia (not her real name) has issues with Mother’s Day (“they do a bad job of breakfast and then feel proud of themselves while doing nothing for the rest of the year!”), I like it pretty well. I like the cut-out cards and the effort put into whatever gift they decide on this time, even if the gift itself languishes in the days thereafter (last year it was my fault because I asked for a camellia bush when I meant gardenia, and then wasn’t interested enough in the resulting red plant with no particular smell to take it out of the pot).

But it’s not a big deal. There’s too much going on with two kids and two jobs in the house for anything to be too big of a deal for long — minutes after it happens, we’re on to the next thing. Another baseball game, another music lesson, another camp-out, another standardized test, another ailment, another meal, another play date. The backfield is always in motion when they’re small.

My own mom will be getting flowers — as a small token of my esteem. I’m glad of the chance to tell her I appreciate her hard work and big love. It was the chance to re-create that bond and the good times I remember from my childhood that made me want to become a mom myself. Hoping to pass it on.

For a more political angle on the dynamics and history of Mother’s Day (this year is the centenary), see my recent Huffington Post piece: Mother’s Day Born Yesterday: A Quick Century of Big Change for Modern Moms

Cheers!

Mother’s Day Born Yesterday:
A Quick Century of Big Change for Modern Moms

What’s in a mom? On any other day she might smell as sweet, but we give her particular credit (and roses) on the second Sunday of May. It’s been this way for 100 years.

Our modern Mother’s Day was born a century ago (on May 10, 1908 — in Grafton, West Virginia), and it became a national holiday in 1914 by Congressional decree. This sentimental occasion — a chance to celebrate the essential contributions moms make to their families and to the nation while supporting our local florists and restauranteurs — carries with it a soothing association with tradition. But a hundred years are a mere twinkling compared to the millennia moms have been on the job. Interesting that the all-moms holiday popped up just when the business of mothering was morphing more radically than ever before.

Picture the turn-of-the-last-century gender ferment: suffragists marching, women’s colleges proliferating, typewriters pounding out new career options, modes of contraception multiplying, birth rates falling (where the average mother had 7 kids in 1800, she had 3.6 in 1900). For the first time, motherhood couldn’t be taken for granted as the default option for girls. Suddenly motherhood had to be sold to women – not just within individual families, but across the nation as a whole. With a lot at stake from the national perspective, a special day of appreciation might make the option more attractive. Politics and sentiment have always gone hand in hand.

Fast forward 100 years, and the ferment, like the holiday, continues. Women now make up half of the national workplace talent pool, and though the pace is slower than many would prefer, women are rising to positions of power in business and in the political realm. The birth rate is nearly half what it was in 1900 — for lots of reasons (partly to do with the leap in infant survival rates). The wide availability of reliable birth control and our expanded longevity have transformed the landscape in which families form today — revising the life scripts of moms, dads and all family members so that we have lives radically different from those of all our ancestors.

Some things haven’t changed — among them the warm connection between moms and their kids. Though it costs a bundle to raise a child, most women today still say they want to be moms, and sooner or later, most of them are. But where in the past motherhood was thrust upon most moms willy-nilly and often meant limited opportunity for both mom and kids (cue the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe), these days millions of American women come to motherhood by choice in a context that allows them to invest abundantly in both their own and their kids’ educations (less emphasis on “whipping them all soundly” before bed). Many combine career building with child rearing, doubling their contributions to the common wealth.

But not everybody likes the new order, and birth control and the positives it offers for families and the nation have become less available to many young Americans today than even a decade prior — either through restriction of access or through lack of education. Unplanned births to teenagers were up for the first time in 14 years in 2006. As we celebrate the Mother’s Day centenary (and the 48th birthday of the birth control pill, also on May 11th!), those of us whose families have benefited from access to birth control (dads as well as moms) can commit to guaranteeing it to the next generation, by passing legislation that makes birth control affordable and available to all who seek it (as in the Prevention through Affordable Access bill), and that offers kids real information about all their options (through repeal of abstinence-only education laws).

Just as essentially, the centennial Mother’s Day offers us an occasion to look back at the transformations the world of motherhood has undergone since the holiday’s start, and to reposition for the next century to best serve our dovetailing national and personal interests. Here’s the moment to reassess the way we as a nation support those who do the basic job of raising the citizenry — time to recognize that all our nation’s kids are essential to our common future and to move beyond the view that “it’s your family, it’s your problem.” We’re already farther down that road than ever before, and though there’s still a ways to go, the path is clear.

Love your mom? For the 21st century, show her you care with the gifts that keep on giving: Pay equity (starting with the Paycheck Fairness Act)! Good and affordable childcare! Flexible work schedules! Paid sick days (the Healthy Families Act)! Paid family leave (the Family Leave Insurance Act)! And of course roses and the occasional breakfast in bed. In the long run, the whole national family celebrates.

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Movies and Stars

Later moms are taking to the big screen this month and drawing a big crowd: even my mama has seen Baby Mama already. Nice to see Philadelphia (my home town) in the background there. I expect she’ll be off to see Then She Found Me shortly.

The Hollywood news continues to feature birth timing — see this recent Huffington Post piece on Cate and Halle and company for my take.

Halle, Baby! Cate, Baby!: Scripting the New Later Motherhood

Congratulations to Cate, to Halle, and to all the new Hollywood moms and their families! At 38 Cate is the latest in a long line of later Hollywood moms. Last month it was Halle at 41, before that J.Lo with twins at 38, Salma at 41, Marcia – 44, Tina – 35, Helen – 40, Holly, Geena, Julia, Julianne, and on through quite a roster. Amy Poehler at 36 announced yesterday that she’s in a family way, just days after hitting the big screen as a pregnant surrogate.

Birth timing is THE big tabloid story, in tense dialogue with the constant news flashes that fertility drops precipitously after 35. Weirdly, we’re asked to think simultaneously that nobody can get pregnant after 35 and that everybody (at least all celebs) can.

Of course the truth lies in between, and a glance around tells us that later motherhood is not just a celebrity thing. In 2006, 611,000 babies were born to women 35 and over (one in seven US babies). About 4.4% of those births involved IVF (1.4% with donor eggs, 3% with the woman’s own); the rest were standard issue. Cate’s new son is her third, having started her family at 32. Among first-time moms like Halle, one in twelve gave birth at 35+ (up from one in 100 in 1970).

Lots of women are fertile in their late 30s and early 40s. A recent study indicates that the great majority can become pregnant without aid through 40, though it may take longer than it would have earlier. Some outwait their fertility and then adopt or employ donor eggs. That all adds up to quite a few later families. And though the media don’t report it, later families are thriving.

Why the disconnect between the news stories and life on the street? Partly because problems sell papers, but also maybe because the scene is changing so quickly and hugely that it seems easier to refer to old scripts than to track the new ones.

Later families are generating new pages for everybody’s life scripts daily — their stories differ radically from those of all our ancestral generations. The back story includes two fundamental transformations in human experience: widely available reliable birth control and the new longevity that allows us to reasonably expect to live to 80 or more in good health.

Among the ripple effects: the expansion of women’s education. Average age at first birth among female college grads is 30. Educated women have doubled our national workforce talent pool. And they are more likely to marry than women without degrees.

Some other effects: Later moms have transformed the marital scene by marrying peers, who share in their children’s lives much more than their dads did. They’ve altered the workplace: the trickle up of skilled women with work histories (and Oscars!) as well as young children has pushed the implementation of family friendliness for all workers. There’s plenty more to do, but big changes have begun.

Delay of kids is a classed phenomenon, but not in the pejorative way that term is often understood. The progress made by educated women in getting women’s voices a hearing means changing options for all women and their kids (example: the word illegitimate has left the building). Education often serves as a class elevator, so though most new later moms end up raising middle-class children, the women did not all start out middle-class.

The new later motherhood serves as a kind of shadow benefits system in an often family-hostile business environment: waiting leads to higher long-term wages for moms and to more clout for negotiating flexible schedules. Later families are not everybody’s preference, however. If businesses become truly family friendly and women can have full careers without delaying family, the later motherhood trend may turn. Though likely not entirely: lots of moms delay because they want to see the world or find a partner for the long term before having kids, while others feel ready for family earlier.

The good news is that many women and their partners can now write their own story lines, instead of having other people’s scripts thrust upon them. And then, as Helen has just done, the directors among them can turn around and put variations on the new stories on the big screen. Next steps: to expand the group of those with these options, and to increase support for all parents, whenever we decide to start our families, and whether we be stars like Cate and Halle or regular Janes.

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The Fertility Effect (1)

Lately, fertility anxieties haunt the dreams–waking and sleeping–of every adult woman who hopes to someday be a mom. We hear from all directions that fertility wanes fast, especially for women over 35. The dystopian film The Children of Men picked up on the apprehensions bred by those stories to fuel visions of global apocalypse! Though we don’t hear much else on the topic, fertility is the side of the later motherhood story that we’ve all heard about in the media.

Odd that against this background of unease, so many post-35 women who want kids end up having them (like the film’s star Julianne Moore, at 37 and 42). In 2006, 611,000 babies were born to women 35 and over. That’s one in seven babies. Only roughly 4.4% (some 27,000) of those births involved IVF. Among first time moms, one in twelve had that first baby at or after 35 (up from one in 100 in 1970). Add in the adoptive moms and you’ve got a substantial portion of the population starting families later.

Clearly, many people are fertile in their late 30s and early 40s–and egg donation makes it possible for some women to bear kids using another woman’s eggs (and at some expense) much beyond the age at which their own eggs go past due. I go into what we know about the particulars at great length in chapter 6.

Through 39 chances with your own genetic material are good (very good if you don’t already have a known endocrinal disorder that suggests you’ll have fertility issues), then they go down quickly to roughly 50/50 at 41, and much lower at 43. I spoke with women who had no problem getting pregnant in their mid 40s, and with women who had problems in their early 30s but then had no problem later–and all over the in-between.

The complexity, as one woman I interviewed pointed out, is that the statistics don’t talk about you personally. At whatever point you are, there are no guarantees. Everybody has to weigh the factors (are you with the right partner for the long haul? does that matter? what about finances? career? sense of maturity? desire to stay home for a while with a baby and to be there for a kid long term? etc.) and decide for herself what makes most sense for her and her family.

These are huge issues with lots of radiating effects, and there’s no one right answer. Ready explores things from the perspective of women who waited and then started families–some intentionally, some by default. Some out-waited their fertility and went on to adopt or employ donor eggs. For these moms waiting for family made sense and worked out well. The good news is that there’s more than one road to a happy family. But family isn’t guaranteed–and some women do end up childless when that would not have been their choice.

The fertility scene is evolving. . . and as a group we get to work on spreading a balanced perspective on the topic; on sharing real information about new options as they emerge (I’ll post on that soon); and on determining what kind of public policy we want to enact in order to give all families the support they need to raise happy, productive kids.

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The Wage Effect

A few posts back (New Plots and Ripples) I promised to continue exploring the effects of starting family later in the wider world. But then I got side tracked by STUFF. Dear Reader, please pardon. Maybe you know how that goes.

But back to the list:
Effect # 5: Higher wages. This is a way big effect–and it puts the trend in a downright anthropological light: If delay of kids means you’re better able to support those kids (given the shortsighted lack of social support for families in our current system), then the new later motherhood gives moms a means of better provisioning young for the long term. A form of species response to environment. Even if not planned in advance, it is something that women become aware of as they work their way up the employment ladders.

In my analysis of census data (see Ready chapter 3), comparing full-time working moms with equivalent degrees — it turns out that moms who have their first child later end up making higher salaries long term than moms with the same kinds of degree who start earlier. That’s because they’re likely to have gotten their degrees earlier and spent more total time in the workforce, working up the ladders of experience and position, and establishing themselves as trusted and skilled before kids arrive.

Another study, by Kasey Buckles (forthcoming American Economic Review May 2008) looking at the effects of delay for women having their first kids up to age 36, finds a three percent annual return to delay (and that’s compounded across those years of course). My findings echo those, and see a continuation through to first kids at 40 (and it may go further, but the data ends there).

While on the one hand these data suggest a that later moms are being canny in their delay, they also point to major failings in the current work system. More on that later!

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Later Moms Online and in Your Neighborhood

Last fall, Ready was featured in a pre-publication piece in TimeOutNYfor Kids –and I learned there about a great community of later moms, also featured in the issue .

Motherhoodlater.com offers online information and experience sharing for women who had kids at 35 or over, whether it be a first child or later in the birth order. It also sponsors individual chapters around the country, which offer members chances to meet up for playdates, lunches/dinners for moms, and weekend family outings (just the kind of resource many of the moms I’ve spoken with have said they’d love to have).

A great way to connect with moms with related interests and in similar situations.
If there’s no chapter in your area, go to the website and start your own!

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