More power to her! 57 yo gives birth [Child death mentioned]

That’s not necessarily true. The mom is in really good shape and was going to the gym right up until she delivered. No one has any guarantees in this life. My dad died at 56. I have a friend whose DH died of an unexpected aortic rupture in his mid 40’s. Look at all the younger people who have passed away from Covid. You just never know. They do have another older child in addition to the daughter who passed away.

FWIW, my mom had me at 40 and she was very young at heart! She would happily chaperone stuff like school roller skating field trips when I was a kid (and actually skated with us!), and did lots of fun stuff with us. I had my kid at 43 and she thinks I’m pretty awesome. Once I asked her if she ever wished she had younger parents and she said, “Nope, because you said when you were younger you were broke!” 🤣😂🤣

ETA: My mom passed away when she was 84. Her grandkids ranged in age from 1 to 36, with my kid being the youngest and the oldest ones were born to teenage parents. I don’t think that option is all that awesome either. Personally, I’d rather have the parents who waited to have me until they had their shit together.

That's a HELL NO from me.

Of course I think it's nuts when someone who has kids in middle or high school decide to have a baby.

I love my kids. I loved when they were little. I also love not having to be "on" 24/7.

I wouldn’t have the energy.

I am 59 and was 57 when my granddaughter was born. No way I'd have wanted to be having a baby at that point in my life - not even the 'fun' of auntie and niece being the same age and growing up together would compensate. I am already tired all the time, and don't have the speed and mobility I had in my 30s.
I lost my mum when she was 48 and I was 25 - all of us expected many more years with her and the loss hit all of us kids (I am the eldest) really hard. It was a factor in me deciding I wanted to have my children earlier rather than later in life, so having a baby at 57 (even if I could) was never on my radar.

I was married at 22. It wasn't the best decision. But I will never regret having my first child just a hair before I turned 25. We were financially stable. I was able to be a stay at home mom for 6 years. I had my second child just 18 months later. I had the energy to parent toddlers back then.

I still had plenty of time to return to work and have a career. I was young enough to handle the challenges of parenting two special needs kids too. The thing that trips me up about this is that my kids at almost 21 and 19 still need me. They still need my guidance and leadership. They still apparently need my financial help. I cannot imagine having the energy at 80 years old to be dealing with the kind of things that I'm dealing with. My kids are going to need me around for years to come. Of course I could die today but that would be unusual.

And then there is that this year I'm turning 46 and I have (at least somewhat) my own life back now. I will have the freedom to travel and retire at 60 if I want. By that time I should be able to do so without the burden of a child being dependent on me.

The thing is these people don't know if that child is going to have autism or mental illness. And I feel it is rolling the dice to have a child at that age because anyone has the possibility of having a child whose parenting needs go way beyond 18 years old.

At this point in my life I feel I made the right choice to have my children when I did. And I hope I will be around for many years to come. It would be heartbreaking to me if I didn't have the chance to be a grandmother too. My kids are too young of course. But I assume likely within the next ten years I will have some grandkids. And I absolutely can't wait to be a grandmother. I am going to be a wonderful grandmother. Spoiling those grands rotten.

To each their own. But as a child of older parents (not nearly THAT old,though) ... there are some great consequences.

I lost my Dad when I was 20. My mom was younger than him, and lived to see my kids as babies, but she was older and could not travel easily.

There are some advantages to older parents, and I am sure it is different in every case, but I think older parents are a little more mellow. My parents retired when I was very young, so we got to go do really fun things. Money wasn't a huge issue.

But they need to have a backup plan in place for someone to raise this kid if something happens to them. That should be the case for every parent, because you just never know - but starting out as parents when you are less than 10 years from 'elderly' ... you need to have a good plan in place for guardians.

You are also probably going to be burden to a very young person also. Your going to be 75 when they are a senior in High School. Almost 80 when they graduate college, if your lucky enough to still be topside.

My husband died at 52.

There are no guarantees in life.  But my kid was 14 going on 15 when he died.  It has had a terrible, prolonged impact with her with anxiety, depression to have suffered a loss that significant at a tender age.  For that reason, my feelings on this are clouded.  I don't want to judge, but I also feel that this is a bit self-centered.  Hopefully the parents will live a nice long life, but it's more likely than not that their kid will deal with one or both their deaths at a much earlier point in life.  I just hope that the kid is out of teen years when it happens.  

I was ten when my dad passed away. I totally get it. I was 44 with a one year old when my 84 year old mom passed away. I have five older siblings and one younger one. Want to guess who took care of our mom in the last 5-10 years of her life when she was suffering from Alzheimer’s? It sure as hell wasn’t any of the oldest ones. They couldn’t be bothered. It was mostly my younger brother and me with a little help from my next older brother and we were happy to do it. If it wasn’t for us last three there’s no telling what would have happened because none of the others did anything to step up.

I have mixed feelings about this. My grandfather was 60 when my dad was born. He died at the age of sixty nine. Yet my grandma who had 16 kids lived to be 90. You just never know.

The parents aren't exactly the picture of health. The mom had a brain tumor removed while trying to get pregnant. A brain tumor is what killed her daughter. And the dad has been living with kidney disease and underwent a transplant. ETA: and the dad is 65. That feels like a lot of cards stacked against them seeing their child grow up and reach adulthood.

It's their choice and I wish them the best of luck. They are going to need it. But I would never do it.

And so is the child.

Besides the fact that the parents will probably die while the child is still young, there is also the problem of dealing with aging parents to consider. My dad is 81 and can't walk very well- he already uses a cane and just bought a walker. I think a lot about what the next step in life for him is going to be and what I'm going to do. It is a lot for me and I'm 55. My nephew is 18- I wouldn't want him to have to deal with an elderly dad issue at his age.

So disabled people shouldn't have children?  I mean reread so many of these comments from the lens of someone who's in a wheelchair or otherwise disabled - apparently they shouldn't have children as they can't throw a ball with them or walk very well. 

So sorry to hear about your dad.  And it sounds like you've stepped up and helped your mom.  Hugs!