Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff mom never told you. From how supports
Speaker 1: dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Kristen
Speaker 1: and I'm Caroline, and today we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: side crying reservation. Egg freezing. Okay, Yeah, you just take
Speaker 1: your eggs and you put them in a little ice tray,
Speaker 1: you run some water under it that you put it
Speaker 1: in the freezer. Yep, and then yeah, you've got eggs
Speaker 1: to go. Just don't get it mixed up with your
Speaker 1: regular ice cube trays. Yeah, please, that could be That
Speaker 1: could be bad, f y. That's not how egg freezing
Speaker 1: works at all. Well, the reason why we're talking about
Speaker 1: it is because a little while back now in October,
Speaker 1: news broke that's starting in January, Facebook had begun offering
Speaker 1: up to twenty thousand dollars of egg freezing benefits for
Speaker 1: employees under its lifetime surge to see reimbursement benefit. And
Speaker 1: it's starting in Apple will begin offering the same deal.
Speaker 1: And just f y, I JP Morgan and City Group
Speaker 1: have already had this benefit. Why that hadn't made headlines?
Speaker 1: I don't know. UM, and Google will likely follow suit soon. Um.
Speaker 1: But for whatever reason, this Facebook related news, perhaps because
Speaker 1: of the Facebook connection to Cheryl Sandberg and leaning in
Speaker 1: and all of that. It generated so much conversation and
Speaker 1: a social media freak out. Essentially, Yeah, there are all
Speaker 1: sorts of voices that emerged on all sides of this
Speaker 1: argument over whether this benefit for women would really truly
Speaker 1: help them advance in the workplace, especially considering it's price tag,
Speaker 1: which is is nothing to sneeze at. But speaking of
Speaker 1: Cheryl Sandberg and Lenan, Jessica Bennett, who does a lot
Speaker 1: of work with the Lenin Foundation, wrote in Time, Maga
Speaker 1: seen that this whole egg freezing deal would be the
Speaker 1: great equalizer, and she said that it's a potential solution
Speaker 1: to the so called myth of opting out, essentially arguing
Speaker 1: that by allowing women to freeze their eggs and having
Speaker 1: it covered because it is super expensive, you're letting them
Speaker 1: choose when to have children and allowing them to choose
Speaker 1: to work harder, longer, and have kids when they're supposedly
Speaker 1: ready now. Not surprisingly, when it comes to pretty much
Speaker 1: anything dealing with women choosing whether and when to have children,
Speaker 1: it attracts a lot of controversy. Have a lot of
Speaker 1: people saying that's selfish, that's preposterous. This is technology gone
Speaker 1: too far. So they are all of these voices also
Speaker 1: being tossed in, lots of accusations of women just wanting
Speaker 1: to freeze away their eggs so that they can have
Speaker 1: casual dating lives and then become mothers on their own
Speaker 1: when they want to. What world that is? I really
Speaker 1: don't know. UM. So that was sort of all the
Speaker 1: background noise to it. But when it comes to its
Speaker 1: impact on women's workplace life, on the opposite side of um,
Speaker 1: Jessica Bennett talking about it being a great equalizer, we
Speaker 1: have Harriet Mentor, for instance at the Guardians saying that
Speaker 1: it's really just another sign of tech companies in particular
Speaker 1: being out of touch with what women really need. And
Speaker 1: also this is a new demand for women to give
Speaker 1: themselves fully to their jobs. And that was a question
Speaker 1: raised in my mind as well in terms of I
Speaker 1: saw the news and I was like, Oh, how progressive,
Speaker 1: and also oh wait are they what does? What is
Speaker 1: the mess the ultimate message that it's sending. I have
Speaker 1: a feeling the message was let's offer the richest benefits
Speaker 1: possible to attract the like strongest female employees we can possible.
Speaker 1: But of course when it comes again to women choice
Speaker 1: and child bearing, there's a lot of projection. Yeah, it's
Speaker 1: it's interesting to look at all of those different voices, um,
Speaker 1: because I think I think I fall somewhere in in
Speaker 1: the middle of those two of those two ladies as
Speaker 1: far as what they think it means. But um, we
Speaker 1: have to talk about the science of egg freezing and
Speaker 1: what it even is, because contrary to the top of
Speaker 1: the podcast, it is not popping your eggs in your
Speaker 1: own freezer at home next year stoffers or link cuisine. True,
Speaker 1: I have I don't think there are any hacks on
Speaker 1: the internet for how to retrieve your own eggs from
Speaker 1: your ovaries. Although one day, ladies, perhaps one day um
Speaker 1: in nineteen fifty three, the first human birth from thought
Speaker 1: sperm happened, and in so it's taken a while, the
Speaker 1: first birth from a frozen oo site or egg happened.
Speaker 1: And so that's also something to keep in mind, kind
Speaker 1: of in the back of your head as you listen
Speaker 1: to all of this, is that sperm preservation and freezing
Speaker 1: has been happening for a long time with far less
Speaker 1: fanfare and consternation than egg freezing. But also the technology
Speaker 1: of freezing egg successfully and then following those eggs and
Speaker 1: using them to successfully um to then successfully implant, which
Speaker 1: would then lead to hopefully a successful pregnancy, has been
Speaker 1: a lot more recent in coming because it's the largest
Speaker 1: cell in the body, and it's surrounded by a bunch
Speaker 1: of liquid that tends to crystallize during freezing. And when
Speaker 1: that liquid crystallizes, it breaks down the cell structure. And
Speaker 1: obviously if that starts happening, it's not going to be
Speaker 1: very it's not gonna have good outcomes, right, And so
Speaker 1: in two thousand and four we get a scientist in
Speaker 1: Japan who developed the process of vitrification or flash freezing,
Speaker 1: which has thus paved the way for more viable egg
Speaker 1: freezing today. And that's when you see a lot more
Speaker 1: women going to their doctor to ask about the possibility
Speaker 1: of not just preserving eggs in case of health problems
Speaker 1: or or things like that, but to actually look into
Speaker 1: elective egg freezing because they just want to delay childbirth. Yeah,
Speaker 1: an elective egg freezing is a really new conversation because
Speaker 1: up until the past few years, it was really only
Speaker 1: cancer patients facing chemotherapy induced infertility or other medical conditions
Speaker 1: that would adversely affect fertility, who were the most common
Speaker 1: egg freezing patients. A lot of the conversation was simply
Speaker 1: directed to them, but now with the trification, the focus
Speaker 1: is shifted to the elective egg freezing and elective use
Speaker 1: now in order to delay childbirth was the reason sided
Speaker 1: by sixty four percent of respondence in a two thousand
Speaker 1: ten study, and it was followed by egg freezing to
Speaker 1: then be used for in vitua fertilization and then for
Speaker 1: medical reasons at a distant second. So elective use has
Speaker 1: shot up in popularity totally. Yeah, And so how does
Speaker 1: it work? Do they Can you just go into the
Speaker 1: doctor one day and elect to have this done or
Speaker 1: is their lead up? Oh? Boy, is their lead up.
Speaker 1: You basically have to have somewhere between two and four
Speaker 1: weeks of self administered hormone injections plus birth control, which
Speaker 1: basically kind of shuts off your natural hormones, followed by
Speaker 1: ten to fourteen days of more hormone injections to stimulate
Speaker 1: mature egg production, and then these ripe and ready eggs
Speaker 1: are removed by an ultrasound guided needle and are immediately
Speaker 1: frozen at a temperature of negative one dred and ninety
Speaker 1: six degrees celsius or negative three degrees fahrenheit, and they
Speaker 1: can be stored by some estimates up to ten years.
Speaker 1: Then thought then usually injected with a sperm, which is
Speaker 1: called intra cytoplasmic sperm injection. And then hopefully that union
Speaker 1: of the thought o site and sperm will develop into
Speaker 1: an embryo which will then be implanted into a uterus,
Speaker 1: which will then hopefully lead to a successful pregnancy. Now
Speaker 1: that's a lot of steps to get to hopefully baby
Speaker 1: in your arms. Um. So the question then is viability.
Speaker 1: What is the success rate? Well, the exciting thing that
Speaker 1: has led up to this sparking interest around the elective
Speaker 1: use of egg freezing is that vitrification in particular has
Speaker 1: very much increased the success rate of falling viable eggs.
Speaker 1: So when you hear about plus success rates when it
Speaker 1: comes to egg freezing, that is not my friends, that
Speaker 1: is not frozen egg too. Baby in your arms success rate.
Speaker 1: That is success rate of following viable eggs, which is
Speaker 1: you know, hailed as a success marker for vitrification. But
Speaker 1: when it comes to using it for in the hopes
Speaker 1: of getting pregnant, one day as that being your go
Speaker 1: to in the case of, Okay, you got a job
Speaker 1: at Facebook, awesome, you want to really get in there,
Speaker 1: or just delay childbirth for whatever reason. Choose your choice.
Speaker 1: I don't care you get your eggs frozen. It doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily mean that you will be able to plan out
Speaker 1: that you won't necessarily be able to plan out becoming
Speaker 1: a mother, right exactly. And a major sticking point in
Speaker 1: elective egg freezing was the fact that it was classified
Speaker 1: as an experimental procedure by the American Society for Reproductive Medicine.
Speaker 1: A lot of their studies were like, yeah, um, the
Speaker 1: slow freezing method of egg freezing is okay, and people
Speaker 1: do it, and a lot of cancer patients do it.
Speaker 1: People who are about to undergo chemotherapy do it. Um.
Speaker 1: But this whole vitrification thing, it's experimental, and so insurance
Speaker 1: companies of course follow suit and they're not going to
Speaker 1: cover it. But in any twelve the American Society for
Speaker 1: Reproductive Medicine took vitrification off of its experimental list, which
Speaker 1: opened the door for a lot of women to then
Speaker 1: seek it out as an option for them in their lives. However,
Speaker 1: in their report, on this when they took it off
Speaker 1: of the Experimentalist. The American Society for Reproductive Medicine talks
Speaker 1: about how data on the safety, efficacy, cost effectiveness, and
Speaker 1: emotional risks of elective egg freezing are insufficient to recommend
Speaker 1: elective egg freezing for women, and they said making this
Speaker 1: technology for the purpose of just deferring childbirth may give
Speaker 1: women false hope and encourage women to delay childbearing. So basically,
Speaker 1: the A s r M is saying to women, don't
Speaker 1: put all your eggs in one basket. Pun pun. We
Speaker 1: can make puns, right, we can make some ocite crime
Speaker 1: preservation puns. That's right. And the reason we're getting into
Speaker 1: this level of detail and maybe offering these and in
Speaker 1: caveats is not to throw this new and exciting technology
Speaker 1: under the bus, but also to kind of highlight the
Speaker 1: fact that there was all of this controversy surrounding something
Speaker 1: that clearly a lot of people reacting to it didn't
Speaker 1: even understand the details of um. So let's get more
Speaker 1: in to those details. Let's talk about the age factor,
Speaker 1: because obviously, when it comes to delaying childbirth, a lot
Speaker 1: of a lot of the women that are profiled in
Speaker 1: articles about it, are in their early mid thirties even
Speaker 1: late thirties wanting to delay childbearing until their forties. And
Speaker 1: we did a whole podcast on age and fertility, the
Speaker 1: whole biological clock thing, and we talked about how egg
Speaker 1: quality does deteriorate with age, especially after age thirty eight.
Speaker 1: So when it comes to the prime time for getting
Speaker 1: your eggs frozen, doctors recomm and freezing by the early thirties.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you can freeze your eggs in your
Speaker 1: early twenties, doctors are like, absolutely freeze those primo eggs.
Speaker 1: But that doesn't happen as much because if you are
Speaker 1: thinking about having a kid at that time, chances are
Speaker 1: you might just have a kid at that time. Well,
Speaker 1: speaking more about the age factor, the average age of
Speaker 1: women who are freezing their eggs for non cancer related
Speaker 1: reasons is a little over age thirty seven. Um. But
Speaker 1: a story in Life Science they used an online fertility
Speaker 1: calculator and found that a woman who freezes fifteen eggs
Speaker 1: at age thirty two has about a twenty eight percent
Speaker 1: chance of becoming pregnant by using them, although that chance
Speaker 1: actually might be a high estimate. Yeah, the real world
Speaker 1: success rates are limited. And there still have been very
Speaker 1: few berths from thought eggs. So keep in mind that
Speaker 1: the research catching up to this technology, and a lot
Speaker 1: of this research to on live births from uh O
Speaker 1: cite cryo preservation are from women who have had fertility issues. So,
Speaker 1: as the A s r M mentioned, it will be
Speaker 1: interesting to see how these numbers would compare to women
Speaker 1: who are doing more elective um egg freezing. But we'll
Speaker 1: talk about what we know right now in terms of
Speaker 1: success rates when we come right back from a quick break.
Speaker 1: So on the upside, and one of the reasons why
Speaker 1: in two thousand twelve, the American Society for Reproductive Medicine
Speaker 1: or the a s r M took vitrification Office experimental
Speaker 1: list is because the research conducted so far suggests that
Speaker 1: I V f intro in vitro fratilization success rates are
Speaker 1: comparable for both frozen and fresh eggs, with no additional
Speaker 1: risk of congenital abnormalities, but the implantation and pregnancy rates
Speaker 1: aren't a statistically sure bet. But the A s r
Speaker 1: M did point out, for instance, that eggs from European
Speaker 1: downers under aged thirty resulted in pregnancy rates ranging from
Speaker 1: thirty six to sixty one percent, so more reason for
Speaker 1: starting younger. I guess possibly um because there was a
Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen study from the A s r M
Speaker 1: which is a meta analysis of the age specific probability
Speaker 1: of live birth with mature oocite cryo preservation, which is
Speaker 1: probably one of the most comprehensive studies we have on
Speaker 1: this subject to date, and it found quote, for example,
Speaker 1: the probability of live birth for a thirty year old
Speaker 1: woman who has two to six eggs thought is twenty
Speaker 1: four point four to twenty four point one percent. With vitrification.
Speaker 1: When it comes to the slow for using process, the
Speaker 1: probability of live birth drops too, between nine and ten percent.
Speaker 1: And in this meta analysis they determined age forty four
Speaker 1: to be the upper age limit to even offer vitrification
Speaker 1: implantation of in other words, having the thought eggs implanted
Speaker 1: into your well, the thought eggs then injected with sperm,
Speaker 1: then having that embryo implanted into your uterus. Although again
Speaker 1: this is still such preliminary data because a lot of
Speaker 1: it has been based on infertil patients, so the picture
Speaker 1: could change if you look at fertile patients freezing specifically
Speaker 1: to delay childbirth not because of outside health reasons. Well,
Speaker 1: so we just threw a lot of science and a
Speaker 1: lot of numbers at you. But let's get back to
Speaker 1: that point that we brought up at the top of
Speaker 1: the podcast, where uh, certain writers have addressed the issue
Speaker 1: of what this will mean for women in the world place.
Speaker 1: Will it be the great equalizer that for instance, Jessica
Speaker 1: Bennett thinks it will be um And it plays into
Speaker 1: a lot of the conversations that Kristen and I've had
Speaker 1: on the podcast as far as the idea just the
Speaker 1: idea of women having it all. That's right because almost
Speaker 1: as soon as vitrification was taken off of its experimental
Speaker 1: status in two thousand twelve, all of these trend stories
Speaker 1: popped up on women in their mid to late thirties
Speaker 1: freezing their eggs. And only as far back as two
Speaker 1: thousand and twelve, it was clear in the tone of
Speaker 1: a lot of these articles in response to it, that
Speaker 1: people were approaching it very cautiously, that it seemed strange
Speaker 1: that these women were doing it. There was an air
Speaker 1: of desperation about it. For instance, there was this New
Speaker 1: York Times trend piece on parents and this is again
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve, this piece on parents funding their older
Speaker 1: daughters egg freezing in the hopes that one day they
Speaker 1: would have grandchildren because she just had and on Mr Wright. Yet. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and not only do we have this piece on parents
Speaker 1: providing for their daughters to be able to have children
Speaker 1: at a later date, hopefully, we also have the trend
Speaker 1: stories about women who have shelled out thousands of dollars
Speaker 1: to go through this process and ending up having a
Speaker 1: more satisfying and relaxed dating life as a result. For instance,
Speaker 1: Sarah Elizabeth Richards wrote an op ed in The Wall
Speaker 1: Street Journal in which she discussed spending fifty thousand dollars
Speaker 1: on the whole egg freezing process and the fact that
Speaker 1: it revolutionized her dating life because suddenly she's not so
Speaker 1: worried about weighing every man's ability to be a father
Speaker 1: and a husband and all this stuff. She can just
Speaker 1: date to date and hopefully find love at her own
Speaker 1: pace because she knows that she has her eggs banked. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And what comes into a lot of these conversations are
Speaker 1: mentions of having it all, leaning in owning yourself and
Speaker 1: still finding Mr. Wright. And like all of these things,
Speaker 1: it's a lot of Times. These stories on it which
Speaker 1: profile these um women in their men to late thirties
Speaker 1: early forties, are very it's it fits a very particular
Speaker 1: mold of this um woman today who um we almost
Speaker 1: it's like it's not pity, but it's like this woman
Speaker 1: trying to have it all and yet she's sacrificed love
Speaker 1: for her career, but now she's found a way to
Speaker 1: get it back. And and in that Wall Street Journal piece,
Speaker 1: Richard's even tosses in a cheeky reference to leaning in
Speaker 1: you know. She says, well, this is this is the
Speaker 1: way that we can do it because we can legitimately
Speaker 1: plan everything out, and she cites a lot of other
Speaker 1: women saying that as soon as they freeze their eggs,
Speaker 1: everything ing, all the dominoes seemed to fall right into place.
Speaker 1: And then we have a story that features Bridget Adams,
Speaker 1: who launches the website egg surance dot com. Bridget was
Speaker 1: going through similar things to Richards and to the women
Speaker 1: featured in the New York Times piece on egg freezing,
Speaker 1: wanting to have children, not finding the right man um
Speaker 1: and so she created this online community where women like
Speaker 1: her could come together and trade tips and tricks and
Speaker 1: advice and basically just communicate to each other about the
Speaker 1: whole process. Yeah. And in the Time article featuring her
Speaker 1: and other women as well, the lead was she's already
Speaker 1: got a copy of Goodnight Moon to read to her
Speaker 1: unborn child. And so there is an air of that
Speaker 1: with a lot of these profiles in terms of these women.
Speaker 1: Look look at these women. They already have they already
Speaker 1: have these books booked picked out. Some women already have
Speaker 1: names picked out, and now they're freezing their eggs. And
Speaker 1: there's so little recognition that of actual science. And I'm
Speaker 1: not trying to um criticize these women's approach at all,
Speaker 1: it's more the portrayal, right, Yeah, And something that I
Speaker 1: was gonna say as far as Richard's leaning in on
Speaker 1: her reference and Bridget already having the books for her child, Like,
Speaker 1: that's all wonderful and you absolutely should plan. Um. But
Speaker 1: I mean, as we've kind of touched on earlier in
Speaker 1: this episode, the science and the numbers don't very strongly
Speaker 1: back up the assertion that you definitely will have a
Speaker 1: baby from this. And so while it is great any
Speaker 1: time a woman can have a say over her reproductive
Speaker 1: choices in life, that's wonderful and women should have more
Speaker 1: choices for everything and be able to choose the lives
Speaker 1: in the past that they want. However, a lot of
Speaker 1: people in these articles point out like, well, that's great,
Speaker 1: you might end up forty two, totally ready to go,
Speaker 1: have your eggs thought and create an embryo and be
Speaker 1: ready to go, but it's just might not happen too
Speaker 1: So there's always the the fear out there that while
Speaker 1: you've planned for this so carefully, things don't always go
Speaker 1: according to plan. But regardless, fertility clinics offering egg freezing
Speaker 1: have been reporting upticks and patients seeking the treatment. Clearly
Speaker 1: word has gotten out, but this is an issue again,
Speaker 1: which is great, especially for um couples who have been
Speaker 1: dealing with infertility or for women wanting to, you know,
Speaker 1: take more control over their reproductive cycles. But this question, though,
Speaker 1: this ultimate question that that really got me in Caroline
Speaker 1: thinking and talking about this, is this question of whether
Speaker 1: or not it is this great equalizer, particularly in the workplace,
Speaker 1: and when you look at the economics of egg freezing
Speaker 1: on top of the science and what we there's still
Speaker 1: a lot that we need to know in terms of
Speaker 1: viability and success rates. That might change in technology will
Speaker 1: probably improve, But when it just simply comes to who
Speaker 1: can access this service, it could be a great equalizer,
Speaker 1: but for very few women. Yeah, and I mean this
Speaker 1: goes back to a lot of the criticisms that we've
Speaker 1: heard about lean In, specifically in terms of, like, it's
Speaker 1: wonderful advice. It's fantastic advice for career women, women who
Speaker 1: are in a very specific segment of the working population.
Speaker 1: But for a lot of women, like say, shift workers, waitresses,
Speaker 1: things like that, the lean In advice doesn't apply to
Speaker 1: their working lives quite as well. And so it's kind
Speaker 1: of the same thing when you have companies like Google
Speaker 1: and Facebook offering egg freezing. That's wonderful, but it is
Speaker 1: so expensive, and so it's really only open to very
Speaker 1: specific segments of the population. Yeah. For instance, that Facebook
Speaker 1: benefit covers up to of this, which might sound very
Speaker 1: generous and it is very general us. However, that would
Speaker 1: have not even covered half of what Sarah Elizabeth Richards,
Speaker 1: who wrote that Wall Street Journal apot an entire book
Speaker 1: about this um. That would have covered less than half
Speaker 1: of the fifty thousand dollars that she spent on it.
Speaker 1: Because the cost for a single cycle of egg retrieval
Speaker 1: and freezing usually runs between five to eighteen thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: not including the cost of hormone injections, which can run
Speaker 1: a few grand, and egg storage which is typically five
Speaker 1: dollars per month, and the fact that it often requires
Speaker 1: more than one cycle to retrieve enough viable eggs, so
Speaker 1: at the end of the day, we're talking easily tens
Speaker 1: of thousands of dollars. There are some clinics that offer
Speaker 1: financial breaks, but it is highly, highly costly, right and
Speaker 1: Dr Beth Kennard, who is the director of the Division
Speaker 1: of Reproductive indo Chronology and Infertility at the Ohio State
Speaker 1: University Wexner Medical Center, points out something else about the price.
Speaker 1: She says that the first in vitro fertilization procedure was
Speaker 1: done back in nine but it's still not a technology
Speaker 1: and a procedure that every woman can afford to do,
Speaker 1: and it's been around for a while, and you take
Speaker 1: into account how new this vitrification processes, for instance, and
Speaker 1: the fact that it is so expensive, and it just
Speaker 1: makes sense that the price probably isn't going to come
Speaker 1: down a significant amount anytime soon. And speaking more on
Speaker 1: in vitro fertilization specifically UM. According to the CDC in twos,
Speaker 1: about one point five percent of US bursts we're through
Speaker 1: assisted reproductive technology, which includes IVF. So that's still that's
Speaker 1: still not a huge number. Yeah, I mean if if
Speaker 1: in Rebecca Mead made a great point about this at
Speaker 1: The New Yorker saying, fine, well, and good for you
Speaker 1: to offer this as part of a comprehensive surrogacy benefit
Speaker 1: package to your employees companies, go for it. However, if
Speaker 1: we really want to tackle that myth of opting out
Speaker 1: the whole motherhood versus career, all of these conversations that
Speaker 1: even as a woman who is not a mother, I
Speaker 1: think about a lot in terms of is this something?
Speaker 1: Can I handle this in my reproductive future? If we
Speaker 1: really want to tackle that, it's going to take a
Speaker 1: lot more than some egg freezing benefits. Because American women
Speaker 1: continue to evase issues such as the fact that we
Speaker 1: have limited availability to subsidize care for preschool children. There
Speaker 1: is quote the resistance of corporate culture, too flexible or
Speaker 1: reduced hours for the parents of young children, an a
Speaker 1: lack of federally mandated paid family leave. The US is
Speaker 1: far behind so many other countries when it comes to
Speaker 1: maternity and paternity leave as well. There there's a lot
Speaker 1: going on that egg freezing is not going to fix.
Speaker 1: And I think that something as hyperbolic as the Great
Speaker 1: Equalizer needs to be accessible to more than just the
Speaker 1: very top elite percent of women who are getting jobs
Speaker 1: at these top elite companies. Yeah, and I mean it
Speaker 1: is great. I mean we've established as you've said this, like,
Speaker 1: it is great that these companies are offering it, of course,
Speaker 1: but it it just seems like they're trying to fill
Speaker 1: in the gaps that they can, um, because we have
Speaker 1: I mean, we're in the dark ages in our country
Speaker 1: as far as providing these types of benefits to mothers
Speaker 1: and families who are looking to have children, take care
Speaker 1: of children, but also continue to work and have a
Speaker 1: full life that way. Um, I agree totally with Rebecca
Speaker 1: me that we have so many, just like society issues
Speaker 1: in our country that needs to be examined. It's great
Speaker 1: that this egg freezing thing is an option for people.
Speaker 1: That's wonderful that anytime you can, like I said, anytime
Speaker 1: you can have control every reproductive health. But the criticism
Speaker 1: comes in when it's only open to a very certain
Speaker 1: segment of people well, and even for that segment of
Speaker 1: people that the option might be financially available too, it's
Speaker 1: still crucial to understand the science behind it and understand
Speaker 1: that there are a lot of steps involved and it
Speaker 1: isn't necessarily locking down a guaranteed future, and perhaps so
Speaker 1: as the data continues to roll in on the success rates,
Speaker 1: particularly for um fertile women, taking advantage of elective vitrification
Speaker 1: is maybe taking a step back to and also addressing
Speaker 1: the social and cultural factors at work that create so
Speaker 1: much panic and freak out over the idea yet again
Speaker 1: of women having some potential, say over childbearing. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean we we haven't even gotten fully into that issue
Speaker 1: in this episode, because I feel like that could be
Speaker 1: its own episode. But I mean, Christen and I definitely
Speaker 1: were talking about the comments that we saw on a
Speaker 1: lot of these articles featuring these women who had made
Speaker 1: this life choice, and a lot of people again it
Speaker 1: was the the old refrain of how selfish. Um. It
Speaker 1: was the refrain of you know, you're going against nature
Speaker 1: or God, Um, you are breaking up what family should be,
Speaker 1: when in reality it's like, okay, first of all, just
Speaker 1: lay off these women for making their personal choices. But
Speaker 1: but second of all, a lot of these women that
Speaker 1: are featured in these stories, they do want a family.
Speaker 1: They do want a life partner to raise a child with.
Speaker 1: But because of just the way that things are structured
Speaker 1: and the way that things have shaken out, you know,
Speaker 1: their career has come first, or they just haven't found
Speaker 1: the right person. But I heard in a lot of
Speaker 1: those stories to the echoes of this to me tired
Speaker 1: and outdated and honestly us leading myth of having it all. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that it's time to get rid of that
Speaker 1: goal post because it is a complete mirage. But now
Speaker 1: we want to hear from you. I have a feeling
Speaker 1: there are a lot of thoughts running through listeners heads
Speaker 1: right now, and we want to hear from you on
Speaker 1: this issue. What do you think about it? And would
Speaker 1: you take advantage of this? Have you taken advantage of this?
Speaker 1: If you're a woman who has frozen her eggs, we
Speaker 1: absolutely want to hear from you too. Mom Stuff at
Speaker 1: how stuffworks dot com is our email address. You can
Speaker 1: also tweet us at mom stuff, podcasts and messages on Facebook,
Speaker 1: and we've got a couple of messages to share with
Speaker 1: you when we come right back from a quick break
Speaker 1: and now back to the show. Well, I've got a
Speaker 1: Facebook message here from Maddie about our episode on vegetarianism
Speaker 1: or being a Pythagorean if you're old school like that,
Speaker 1: he writes. My name is Matt from Sydney, Australia. I've
Speaker 1: been listening to the podcast for a while now and
Speaker 1: thoroughly enjoy it. I only just listened to the vegetarian
Speaker 1: episode and had some thoughts. I've been vigo now for
Speaker 1: two years. I grew up in a very neat centric
Speaker 1: family and circle of friends. I was even an apprentice
Speaker 1: butcher for a couple of years. I decided to stop
Speaker 1: eating meat, mostly for environmental reasons. I understand the ethical
Speaker 1: and health aspect of it too, but it was the
Speaker 1: waste resources and farmland that cattle needed that really got
Speaker 1: to me. I do have to admit that I'm still
Speaker 1: a little overweight, but try to keep it fairly healthy.
Speaker 1: It wasn't until I listened to the podcast I realized
Speaker 1: the vast majority of my friends who are vegetarian and
Speaker 1: are vegan are indeed female. When I first stopped eating meat,
Speaker 1: the most grief I got was definitely from my male
Speaker 1: meat eating friends. It also is still to have to
Speaker 1: be the only person at a very big family at
Speaker 1: Christmas who doesn't partake in the two turkeys and two
Speaker 1: hands we have every year. But my family is starting
Speaker 1: to get used to it. But it's when I go
Speaker 1: out with my guy friends that it's the toughest. I
Speaker 1: don't know if they're just curious or recognize that I'm
Speaker 1: an easy target, but I get a lot of slack
Speaker 1: from them, to the point to where I've actually lost
Speaker 1: friendships because of it. It's probably for the best, but
Speaker 1: it sucks that some people can still be so against
Speaker 1: the idea. It confuses me. It confuses me to matt Um.
Speaker 1: I have a letter here from Sarah about our Women
Speaker 1: in the Art of Dying episode where Kristen and I
Speaker 1: interviewed Kate Sweeney Um. Sarah shares a great story. She says,
Speaker 1: I don't know if this is necessarily a death ritual,
Speaker 1: but my aunt Roxanne, who passed about three years ago
Speaker 1: from breast cancer, requested that some of her ashes be
Speaker 1: left in Japan, where she was born. I happen to
Speaker 1: travel there about a year after her passing, and ended
Speaker 1: up taking a small bag of her ashes with me.
Speaker 1: I spread them in this beautiful snow covered canyon in
Speaker 1: a national park, but it wasn't easy. As I was
Speaker 1: pulling her ashes out from my coat pocket, a large
Speaker 1: male Japanese macaque monkey jumped out and charged me. I
Speaker 1: tried walking away for man, but he kept jumping up
Speaker 1: at my hands, grabbing for the crinkly bag that he
Speaker 1: thought had food. I ended up having to turn my
Speaker 1: back on the greedy monkey to quickly pass the ashes
Speaker 1: off to my boyfriend, who then walked one way down
Speaker 1: the path while I walked the other way with the
Speaker 1: snow monkey following me. The mccaque was eventually distracted by
Speaker 1: another group of tourists passing by with the crinkly items,
Speaker 1: and I was able to spread my aunt's ashes in peace.
Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure she was the one who sent the monkey,
Speaker 1: as she always had a mischievous sense of humor. So
Speaker 1: thank you so much for your story, Sarah, and I'm
Speaker 1: not laughing at you. I'm laughing with you, and thanks
Speaker 1: everybody who's written into us. Mom Stuff at house stutworks
Speaker 1: dot com is our email address. You can also find
Speaker 1: links to all of our social media, as well as
Speaker 1: all of our blogs, videos, and podcasts, including this one
Speaker 1: with links to our sources so you can follow along
Speaker 1: with us at stuff Mom Never Told You dot com
Speaker 1: For more on this and thousands of other topics, was
Speaker 1: it how Stuff Works dot com.