May 13, 2010
Freezing Eggs and Making Choices
The "Work and Family" section of The Wall Street Journal recently had an essay describing why some single women choose to freeze their eggs.  Mind you - the essay was about single women.Evidently, only 2-4% of frozen eggs once thawed yield live births.  Also, it's not yet clear whether babies born from such eggs will face any long-term health problems.  So it would seem that many women risk making important life decisions (like staying with a career long in life) based on false assumptions that their fertility is secure.The procedure (which ranges from about $9,000 to $14,000) has been used as a way to preserve fertility for cancer patients facing treatments likely to render them sterile.  This is a benevolent use of this budding technology. However, most of the interest seems to come from women delaying marriage and child-bearing because they are ferociously career-oriented and/or can't find or keep a good man.  I would like to send them each a copy of my book, " The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands ," because it is cheaper and more to the point.These women want to "make a close family" (never mind that there would be no Daddy in this "close" family), or give their parents the "gift" of a grandchild (making a child a present).  Nowhere in the article did the notion of a single woman making a baby for herself point out that this may not be in the best interest of the child!  I guess that doesn't matter.

Posted by Staff at 12:59 AM