Thoughts on Women and Emerging Adulthood

I am interested in emerging adulthood and this stage for women in the current society. I have a few girlfriends that are in their early 30's, want to have a family and kids, but have no prospective significant other in their lives. I also got married at age 30, and had my first baby at 31. I realize that this would be considered "later in life" to many women from the previous generation. I did not know what I wanted to be for the rest of my life when I was 18 years old as many kids do not, nor did I know how much it would actually cost to live. My path to find a career took much longer. And, I am still in school at 35! With the women's movement, we see many more women succeeding in jobs that we weren't traditionally doing. Being a "career woman" is often times seen as admirable. Might I add that I admire women for pursuing their dreams and climbing the career ladder.

On the other hand, in order to pursue a career, women often have to put having a family on hold for awhile. The only problem is, the biological clock keeps ticking.....
And, we can absolutely wait to have kids until later, however, I do not know of a single friend of mine that would not claim it gets harder as we get older. By this I mean, it feels physically harder. Also, once you hit 35, you must undergo more testing and are lumped into the "high risk pregnancy" category which is downright scary. After 35, women have a higher risk for pregnancy related illnesses such as gestational diabetes and high blood pressure. There is also an increased risk of having a baby with complications.

So, I really don't know how long we want to wait to begin a family as women. But, sometimes it feels like we have no choice because we need to "get on our feet" before we have babies. This seems like the responsible thing to do. While our parents tell stories of having multiple kids living in the same bedrooms, piling in cars with not enough seat belts, and wearing hand-me-downs from older siblings ALL the time, this doesn't seem like the way the American society is moving. It seems like we need bigger houses, monster SUV's, and designer clothes on our kids as a way to prove we have truly made it. And really, when have we "made it?" In the current society, I think it's hard for women to know what it actually is that will bring them happiness because we simply want to do it all.