She devoted years to caring for her mother, who died at age 101. Then Maria del Carmen Bousada embarked on a quest to become a mom herself. She lied to a California fertility clinic to skirt its age limit, and later pointed to her mother's longevity as a reason to expect she'd be around to care for her kids.
At age 66 she had twins, becoming the world's oldest new mom – and raising questions about maternity so late in life. Now she is dead at age 69, leaving behind boys not yet 3.
. . .
"I think everyone should become a mother at the right time for them," she told the British tabloid News of the World, which showed her beaming as she cradled her 1-month-old infants, both dressed in pale blue pajamas.
"Often circumstances put you between a rock and a hard place, and maybe things shouldn't have been done in the way they were done, but that was the only way to achieve the thing I had always dreamed of, and I did it," she said.
Was this really about them, or about her? Did she really have a "right" to motherhood that disregarded their right to a mother and a father who could care for them? In order to do this, she had to lie to the fertility clinic. She had to trick her body to reverse almost 20 years of menopause. And she had to use the donated egg and sperm from total strangers.
Why couldn't she just adopt?
When she revealed last November she had stomach cancer, Bousada said she did not regret having children late in life and that her sons would be well-cared for no matter what happened to their mother.
Addressing her mortality and her children's tender age, she told Spanish television station Antena 3: "I hope God does not ... I want to hang on at least until they are 18."
But, she added, the boys would always have "their godfather, their custodian."
What a strange life these boys will lead. Their biological parents are unknown and out of the picture. The woman who carried them and bore them was only with them for three years or so. And now they'll be sent to their godfather. She fulfilled her dream of becoming a mother, but seemingly at their expense. Sure, accidents and such happen to younger people, but this seems like a tragedy just waiting to happen.
Allan Pacey, secretary of the British Fertility Society, said the organization recommends that assisted conception generally not be provided to women beyond the natural age of menopause at about 50.
"The rationale ... is that nature didn't design women to have assisted conception beyond the age of the natural menopause, he said. "Once you get into the mid-50s, I think nature is trying to tell us something."
I agree wholeheartedly. I know some people who are great-grandparents in their 60s. They can't imagine trying to be parents at that same age. The generation gap would be enormous. The energy reserves would be small. I can't imagine a person dealing successfully with teenagers in their late 70s or early 80s. If this woman had lived until they turned 18, she would have been 84 at their high school graduation.
A family I am very close to had a large age gap between the wife and husband; he was 17 years older. They had their last child when he was in his 50s. When he died in his early seventies, he left behind two teenage children who were devastated by the loss. It's not an easy road to haul.
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