It’s All About the Exit Strategy
Why I tell women not to wait to have kids
Over the past few years, I have given this advice to founders who are in their late 20’s and early 30’s:
If you have been in a serious relationship for a long time, or are married, think about having kids now.
Then I drive home the message by saying, “Having children is not about the start-up phase. It is about the exit strategy. You do not want to be 75 when your kids go off to college.” Generally, the lightbulb turns on.
Fast-forward a few years, and more than a few of them have taken my advice. Then I have female founders come to me and say, “I have something I need to tell you.” There is a pause before the announcement that they are pregnant. My answer is always full of excitement. The next thing I say is, “When you tell the rest of your investors, I do not want you to apologize, and I do not want you to come up with a list of how you are going to manage it. I just want you to state the facts and move on with the conversation. Women have children; men can’t. You are the founder of this company, and you will figure it out, just like you figure everything else out.”
I wanted to have our first kid by the time I was 30. I guess I thought that 30 was the right milestone. My husband and I had been together since college, we were married at 25, and it just seemed like the right time in our careers. We were ready for the next phase of our lives.
The reality is, there is never a perfect time to have children. Women wonder if they should be farther along in their careers, or perhaps that they won’t get any farther in their careers if they have kids too early. Yet the longer you wait, the harder it is to have kids.
The data is pretty clear. Yes, you can freeze your eggs and have children later, when you believe that you are ready, or if you believe it is the perfect moment. But there is a reason you can get pregnant at 16. It’s because you are young and full of energy to run after a 2-year-old.
We had gone to visit friends in Toronto who had a 9-month-old. We were enamored with their kid. On the way home from Toronto we asked each other, What are we waiting for? I believe I got pregnant that night. We had our first child at 29. It was one of the most incredible moments of my life, the other two being when our two other children were born. It is an indescribable feeling of pure love and joy when you hold that baby for the first time in your arms. It changed our lives. We went from two people having zero restrictions, to two people who were responsible for another human being. The first year is exhausting, and when it is over, you look back and can’t believe how much has changed.
Then we had our second one, which is a lot easier than the first because you are comfortable being a parent. You don’t react to every small thing. My guess is that the younger you are when you have kids, the less you react. I was 31 when we had our second. I was working full-time. We had an incredible woman who worked for us full-time, and that made all the difference in the world. Two working parents with two kids in New York City, balancing their lives, is hard.
Someone actually has to keep the refrigerator filled with food, put the kids to bed, bathe them, dress them, read to them, teach them manners — and all of the above while attempting to work and keep your head above water, continue a relationship with your spouse, and a relationship with yourself. Nobody mentions that part.
Fast-forward a few years, and we moved out of the city to the suburbs because we really could not afford to stay in the city with two children. I stopped working when we moved (and that is a whole separate story). It was a lot to have two people commuting into the city full-time, with two kids at home. Then we had a third. I was 34. We just went from man-to-man to zone defense. I was walking into walls at night when our son woke up for a feeding. I was absolutely exhausted. And because I had stopped working, I loved being a mom, but I also felt as if I had lost my sense of identity. A few months after he was born, I figured out a way to return to the working world in a way that made sense for me and the family.
Now we have two kids who have graduated college and one still in college. We’re essentially empty-nesters. It is our next phase. If I had to do it all over again, I would have had our first kid a few years earlier. I realize it is different now, but our bodies are not different; when people go to college is not different; when kids are teenagers is not different. Much has changed, but much has stayed the same.
My advice to everyone is, don’t wait to have children. People have been having them for years and managing to go back and run the farm, churn the butter, close a deal, or run the store afterwards.
It is all about how you want your life to look after you have children. There were years when I worked full-time and others that I didn’t. I am glad I got both, because they worked for me and my family. Nothing is standard. Life is not a movie script. And children are the most rewarding thing in our lives.
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