More Than Half of Middle Aged Women Believe in "Emotional Infertility"

A new survey reveals that more than half of middle aged women believe in "emotional infertility" and nearly half of young women delay starting a family because they either don't want to give up their freedom or because they haven't met 'the one.'

Researchers said that many of these women are putting off having children because they would rather have more money, focus on their careers and spend more time with their partners. A 2012 Modern Motherhood Report for Red magazine revealed that 22 percent of respondents had disagreed with their husbands or partners about when to have a baby.

In a poll of 3,000 women, between the ages of 28 to 45, researchers reveal that 36 percent of women were not sure whether they ever wanted to start a family. Alarmingly, the survey found that more than half of the women believed that not being able to have babies because they haven't met Mr. Right was just as bad as being infertile.

The survey found that the majority of women, at 54 percent, said that being 'emotionally infertile' was defined as not being able to have children because they didn't have a partner was as emotionally painful as being diagnosed as being infertile, including one in six women who had broken up with their partner as a result.

About one in five women report that they would consider trying to conceive without a husband or partner by using donor sperm and another one out of five women have seriously thought about freezing their eggs so that they could have children later on.

"We have identified what we call emotional infertility, that is being childless not by choice, due to not having a partner or a partner not wanting to have children," Brigid Moss, health director at Red, said, according to Daily Mail. "We all know someone in this position. A doctor can't help with emotional infertility."

"It's become more acceptable to talk about medical infertility with your friends and family, so women can now be more open about that. But it must be very hard to confess that you're desperate for a baby, but haven't met anyone," she added. "Every few months, there's another warning from the medical profession that the best time to conceive is under 35. But this report has shown that often, at the right biological time, women are simply not in the right place emotionally or financially to start trying."

One woman who participated in the survey said that she decided to find a sperm donor after her 40^th birthday. Nicola, who did not give her full name, said that she used a website that specially matches women with donors and became pregnant just a few months later.

About 10 percent of women who took part in the survey said that they had IVF and they reported paying on average around $11,400 for treatment, and of those who had the fertility treatment, 77 percent paid for it privately.