Am I old or young?

I’m roughly 6 months from my 34^th birthday.  In the grand scheme of things this really isn’t all that old.  I’m too young for health conditions that traditionally affect the older set.  Things like heart disease, high blood pressure, strokes, type 2 diabetes, and certain cancers.

But when it comes to having children, the age issue becomes murky, especially for women.  Biologically, women are born with all the eggs they’ll ever have in their reproductive lifetime.  When the eggs run out, the show’s over and menopause starts.  Men on the other hand make sperm until they die.

For women it’s even more interesting.  Our eggs age and once you’re a certain age, you start to worry about things like egg quality (which isn’t stamped somewhere – there’s no set Use by Date); and terms like Advanced Maternal age start being thrown around.

My official diagnosis is Diminished Ovarian Reserve.  It was explained to me that this meant I was aging reproductively faster than the norm.  My egg quality, the Use by Date, was approaching faster than it should.  I still have questions of my own about this condition.  I’ve yet to get clarity on whether or not this means I’ll hit menopause earlier.

But it definitely means time is against me.  Since my last cycle I am now a little more than 3 years older.  Health wise I am 35 pounds lighter and relatively fit.  But will it be enough?  I hope so and for my sake (as well as my husband’s) I hope my Use by Date is still many years away.