Archive | August 2014

Hee!

Aug30

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Women in my family take their time

Aug29

The farther I go back in history on both sides of the family, one weird fact seems constant. None of the women in our family seem to have had children before they were thirty. Even the newest find, my great-great grandmother was 32 when she had Hilda also called Halda in one document I found.

My mom was 32 when she had me. She got her college degree from Oxy first and met Dad at church after WWII. But then there is my mom’s mom, grandma was 32 when she had mom, her oldest child. Grandma got her degree in 1910 from what is now UCLA and had mom in 1922. So she was 32 also. Her mom was 27 when she had her and she didn’t want her when she had her and made my great grandfather name her. Hilda was 33 when she had Grandpa but he wasn’t the first to come along and there were at least two after him, my great aunt, Elsie and my great uncle, Bob. Aunt Elsie was mean and Uncle Bob was crazy or at least obsessed with things like guns, Porsches and knives. He was also one of the first LAFD paramedics and he smoked like a chimney.

Anyway, it doesn’t appear that women gave birth before at least 25 in my family which seems a bit unusual in the grand run of things. I always had the oldest parents growing up and poor Alison came along when mom was 42 and yes, she was planned not an accidental menopause baby.

Why did the women in my family take their time when most other women didn’t? And these were women from at least two different cultures since Hilda immigrated from Sweden and Mary Jane from Northern Ireland and then Canada to Los Angeles. And what were they using besides the word "No" for birth control?