Age and Fertility: What You Should Know in Your 20s, 30s and 40s

A woman’s age is the most important factor affecting her fertility and chance of having a baby. As men and women age, their potential to have children naturally decreases, though the exact time this starts to happen varies.

All about fertility in your 20s

Whether you’re ready to start thinking about a family or not, there are some important things you should know about fertility while you’re in your 20s. This information could affect how you view your fertility and the idea of getting pregnant in the future. Here’s what you need to know:

  • Fertility
    Fertility declines at a different rate for every single woman and can happen as early as her late 20s.
  • Lifestyle Choices
    The lifestyle choices you make now could heavily affect your fertility in your thirties. If you love white rice, white sugar, smoking and/or adult beverages, it could make it more difficult to conceive down the road.

All about fertility in your 30s

A woman is born with all the eggs she will ever have. As she ages, so do her eggs—and their number and quality reduce over time. Here’s what you need to know about fertility on your 30s:

  • Fertility
    Between the ages of 33 and 42 (with an average age of 38), the loss of immature eggs accelerates. This marks the beginning of decline in a woman’s fertility, which eventually leads to menopause.
  • Preservation
    If you are a woman in your 30s and aren’t quite ready to start a family, it might be time to consider egg freezing (cryopreservation). Egg freezing allows women to use their young, healthy eggs to help them achieve pregnancy later in life, when they are ready. Frozen eggs are viable and may be used to achieve pregnancy for more than 10 years.

All about fertility in your 40s

Your chances of conceiving naturally in any given month lower significantly once you reach 40 years of age. In fact, the average 40-year-old woman has only a 8 percent chance of getting pregnant each month..

  • Fertility
    Women in their 40s are less likely to become pregnant naturally due to poor egg quality. As women age, more and more of their eggs have either too many or too few chromosomes, which can significantly lower the chance of pregnancy and increase the chance for miscarriage or birth defects.
  • Assisted Reproductive Technologies
    Whether you froze your eggs in your 20s or 30s or have decided to use an egg donor, assisted reproductive technologies (like in vitro fertilization) can help you achieve pregnancy in your 40s.

If you are a woman in your 20s or 30s and would like to learn more about preserving your fertility with egg freezing (Cryopreservation) in Columbus, Akron, Canton & Youngstown, Ohio, contact the skilled physicians at Reproductive Gynecology & Infertility.

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What an amazing and rewarding event to put on! It’s not often the the doctors and nurses get to see the end result. Seeing so many pictures of the families you’ve helped build is just amazing! So thankful for Dr. Jain and his staff for giving us our blessing!
RGI made our dreams come true! And Samantha’s gift of hope….there really aren’t words to express how they changed our lives. We won their grant in 2019 and it has continued to bless us several years later. Every time we make a financial decision I think of SGH and how I don’t know if it’d be possible if it wasn’t for them.
RGI and Samantha’s Gift of Hope has forever changed our lives in the best way possible because they have given us the greatest gift we could ever get—our sweet daughter. We have this joy of being parents we had previously only dreamed about, and honestly weren’t sure we would ever have. Now, everyday is filled with baby giggles and snuggles, cheering her on to her next milestone (which is currently crawling), and trying to be the best parents we can be. We will never be able to repay RGI and Samantha’s Gift of Hope, but we will forever be grateful to them and are daily reminded of it.
RGI made it possible for us to experience the joys of becoming parents. There is no greater feeling or love in this world that we’ve experienced than bringing Liam into this world. We truly understand the miracle and blessings babies are. SGOH we will forever feel grateful for. We cannot thank Lisa, Matt and Sam enough for their generosity and helping couples pay towards their IVF journeys. Honestly, SGOH really does provide HOPE. Winning the grant also helped us to feel like this is really happening, it’s meant to be.
Because of Samantha’s Gift of Hope, our dream of having a child came true. We could focus more on each step of the process and keep a positive attitude through it all instead of constantly worrying about what things cost and how we would make it work. Now, our sweet Tenley girl is 1 week old and I continue to be thankful each day for the opportunity Samantha’s Gift of Hope gave us. We are now living out our favorite roles as mom and dad and are filled with so much love for our little girl!
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“We had a wonderful experience with the RGI staff during our IVF cycle. All staff were kind, friendly and very informative! We felt comfortable at every visit and each procedure. The staff at RGI are wonderful and made our IVF journey a great experience. We are so thankful!”

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