Hi everybody,

Elizabeth here, in the US.  I had my first child at 39 and adopted my second at 48. I  am having a great time as a later mom (now 51).  

I know lots of people working on a similar timeframe and since I'm an academic I started doing research on the trend to starting families later.  I published a book called Ready: Why Women Are Embracing the New Later Motherhood in December 2007 — looking at as many sides of the experience of having your first child at or after 35, by birth or adoption, as the people I interviewed talked about…which ended up being quite a lot.  Economics, life experience, fertility, career, relationships, adoption, health… The overwhelming majority found the experience very positive.

I found this group because I get requests from later moms looking for online support groups and I did a search just now.  If it's all right with you, I'll mention this group when I get queries in future and look forward to the discussion.   

Congrats to everyone, 

Elizabeth

http://www.readymoms.com (my blog)

Hi Elizabeth, welcome aboard! It's wonderful to have you here. Please do share with us how it's all going with the book- and the kids too of course!

Support for older moms does seem to be in scarce supply, doesn't it? Your blog's great -  I dropped in and waved. Elizabeth's my middle name actually.

Best of luck with it all!

Kay