With longer life spans and better health and education, many feel that giving birth to a baby a mere couple of decades after they themselves were in the cradle is a little premature.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Having a baby is one of the most wonderful things in your life, as well as the hardest thing in your life.
In my case, I was born to parents who were very young, and I don't think they were entirely ready to have a child. My dad was going to college and working two or three jobs at the same time, and my mum was working and going to school.
How come life is so important in the nine months before birth, but then we sort of forget about the importance, we're not worried about whether that baby lives in poverty once he or she is born.
I've run out of mates that haven't had a baby now. It does make me think of my parents having a family so young and the fact that I've been able to avoid it for so long. It does make me a feel a little bit selfish.
It was an odd coincidence that my career took off the same decade as having babies. I often wished it had been different, that I had my big career bump in my thirties and my babies in my forties or vice versa.
Having a child is sowing the seeds of your own obsolescence: birth is the fuse that leads to that other thing. You appear, you replace yourself, you die.
About 3 million IVF babies have been born since Louise Brown's birth in 1978. Bizarrely, when this life-giving treatment was first considered, it was massively controversial. A storm of vitriolic protest came from many religious leaders, journalists, politicians, regrettably even other scientists and doctors.
Having a baby is a life-changer. It gives you a whole other perspective on why you wake up every day.
Those who have lost an infant are never, in a way, without an infant.
To give birth is a fearsome thing; there is no hating the child one has borne even when injured by it.