In light of AOC freezing her eggs at 36, someone on X commented:

That might be so, but in absence of getting knocked up by the closest Chad ASAP, I figured I, like AOC, had no great options.

Well, maybe AOC has more options than me:

Anyway, I think the men hating on AOC are missing an obvious point when they imply women should just have babies sooner. No matter how much some of us want kids, the modern constraints of career and, more importantly, meeting the right person remain bottlenecks.

Even though I'm only 26, it was something I thought about, having not met the right person yet myself.

So in my own quest to be neurotic about fertility, I attended the Reproductive Frontiers conference earlier this year in June. I ended up learning a lot of things about fertility and embryo selection that felt personally relevant to my personal planning (mid-twenties, healthy, single). I hope this post can be helpful to you if embryo-selection is something you’ve also been considering!

If you work in the field, please feel free to add nuance or corrections! Also, since science is always evolving, please consider this [...]

---

Outline:

(02:46) Should I freeze my eggs?

(04:09) When should I have kids?

(05:11) What is polygenic embryo scoring?

(05:46) What are some of the risks of the IVF process?

(06:26) Should I freeze eggs or embryos?

(09:00) How much alpha is there in polygenic embryo selection?

(09:30) Should I do embryo selection to minimize disease risk?

(11:19) How much does IVF/embyro selection cost?

(11:42) Is embryo selection for positive traits "worth it"?

(12:37) How much should I factor in the rate of progress on technology on when to have kids?

(13:19) Should I use a surrogate?

(13:58) How would embryo selection affect my relationship with my kid?

(14:40) Some more information I am interested in but don't have:

The original text contained 10 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

---

First published:
August 26th, 2026

Source:
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/wLBQesu5Aai3pksP8/being-neurotic-about-fertility-notes-from-the-2026

---

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

---

Images from the article:

Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

“Being Neurotic about Fertility: Notes from the 2026 Reproductive Frontiers Conference” by boba_girl

LessWrong (30+ Karma)

“Being Neurotic about Fertility: Notes from the 2026 Reproductive Frontiers Conference” by boba_girl