TV personality Kirstie Allsop has
criticized the culture of women waiting until their late 30s to try to
have a baby, urging women to have children at a younger age as after 35,
it starts to go downhill
"Women are being let down by the system. We should speak honestly and frankly about fertility and the fact it falls off a cliff when you’re 35. We should talk openly about university and whether going when you’re young, when we live so much longer, is really the way forward.
‘At the moment, women have 15 years to go to university, get their career on track, try and buy a home and have a baby. That is a hell of a lot to ask someone.
As a passionate feminist, I feel we have not been honest enough with women about this issue.
I don’t have a girl, but if I did I’d be saying “Darling, do you know what? Don’t go to university. Start work straight after school, stay at home, save up your deposit – I’ll help you, let’s get you into a flat. And then we can find you a nice boyfriend and you can have a baby by the time you’re 27."
Don’t think “my youth should be longer”. Don’t go to university because it’s an “experience”. No, it’s where you’re supposed to learn something! Do it when you’re 50!’
It might sound wholly unrealistic. But we have all this time at the end. You can do your career afterwards. We have to readjust. And men can have fun after they have kids. If everyone started having children when they were 20, they’d be free as a bird by the time they were 45.’
I don’t want the next generation of women to go through the heartache that my generation has. At the moment we are changing the natural order of things, with grandparents being much older and everyone squeezed in the middle." She told The TelegraphKirstie is 42 and has two sons, a 5 year old and a 7 year old. Who agrees with her?
