By the time Mark Remple’s wife gives birth in February, the Edmonton business owner will be nearly 45 years old.
He says he didn’t plan to have a baby in his mid-40s, “it just sort of happened that way.”
READ MORE: When is the best age for women to have children?
“Both my wife and I run our own businesses and we spent quite a few years starting the businesses, getting them… to a position where everything was comfortable,” Remple said.
“It wasn’t a conscious choice to wait this long.”
Across North America, paternal age is rising. Researchers from the University of Stanford’s School of Medicine analyzed the average age of fathers in 168 million births over four decades. It increased from 27.4 years old in 1972 to 30.9 years old in 2015.
READ MORE: Childbirth economics: What older moms and teenage pregnancy are telling us
Data from Statistics Canada mirrors that trend, with the average father’s age moving from 28.7 years old in 1974 to 32.8 years old in 2013.
“I think the reason for these is probably the same for women: better contraceptives, sort of more reliable, and people want to be more established in their careers, further along in their education before they feel like they are ready to have kids,” said Dr. Michael Eisenberg, researcher and assistant professor at the Stanford University School of Medicine.
Scroll down to read the full study on paternal age.
Eisenberg and his team determined the trend was universal.
“I thought this was really going to touch specific groups and not others perhaps, but really, when we looked at race, ethnicity, all levels of educational attainment and all regions of the country, we saw the same trend.”
Remple says his friends tell him he is “crazy” to take on fatherhood in his mid-40s, but it doesn’t phase him. He feels he is better prepared — mentally, physically and financially — to take on fatherhood than he would have been 10 or 12 years ago.
WATCH: 3 things couples can do to transition to parenthood smoothly
“I still have my parents around right now. But when my child is in their 40s, I am going to be well into my 80s, so there is that,” Remple said. “But, you know what? If you’re a good parent it doesn’t matter how long you are in their life; it’s quality not quantity.”
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