At What Age Should I Freeze My Eggs?

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How should I decide if (and when) to freeze my eggs? Is there generally an age you recommend people freeze them by if you are still not ready to get pregnant but know you may want kids later on?

—Feeling Frozen

This question, in many ways, is the central challenge and tension of egg freezing: When does it make sense to do it? Unfortunately, there’s not enough data to give a conclusive answer.

Despite all of the advances in fertility treatment, our biology has not budged: by a woman’s mid-40s, the chances of conceiving, even with the help of IVF, are very low. Reproductive medicine does not yet have a solution to this particular issue.

Ideally, you want to freeze eggs at a young enough age that the chances that those eggs can go on to become healthy pregnancies are relatively high. At the same time, you want to be old enough that you’re likely to use them. As I mentioned, there really isn’t a consensus on when that is. This is partly because egg freezing is relatively new, and many studies looking at outcomes after egg freezing come out of large fertility practices. This means the data often include patients freezing their eggs for other reasons, including before cancer treatment, and there isn’t a good control group to compare outcomes to. All of this makes it difficult to generalize the results of these studies. With that being said, most studies agree that the ideal time is probably sometime before the age of 38 or 39.

So is it the right choice for you? When I am counseling patients about egg freezing, I try to get them to start with the questions behind the question, so to speak. That means asking yourself how sure you are that you want to have kids and how upset you would be if you are unable to have them (I know both of these can feel like impossible questions), what things would have to be in place for you to feel ready to have kids (and when do you expect to get there), and how important it is that your kids are genetically related to you (and your partner if that applies). It’s okay not to have all of the answers, and of course, the answers may change over time.

From there, it can be helpful to start with ovarian reserve testing because having a lower egg count, though not predictive of your ability to get pregnant, does predict response to IVF/egg freezing medications. The results from these tests may sway your decision.

Finally, egg freezing, though completely doable, is a relatively intense two-week process that requires a lot of flexibility, and it is often considered an “elective” procedure, meaning that it is not covered by insurance. You’ll need to decide whether, and when, to go forward with egg freezing based on these factors as well.