Ever Fallen in Love with Someone that You Shouldn't Have Fallen in Love with?

With all the crap that is heaped upon women (in our supposedly advanced and compassionate society) for not breastfeading or for being a working mom or [insert your sexist, patriarchal gripe here] and all of the supposed damage inflicted on their children as a result, I can't help but point with some glee in a culture wars type of way at the following headline from the Washington Post: Autism Risk Tied to Older Fathers.

"With every decade of advancing age starting with men in their teens and twenties, the new study found, older fathers pose a growing risk to their children when it comes to autism -- unhappy evidence that the medical risks associated with late parenthood are not just the province of older mothers, as much previous research has suggested.

Of special concern is the finding that the risk for autism not only increases with paternal age but also appears to accelerate.

When fathers are in their thirties, children have about 1 1/2 times the risk of developing autism of children of fathers in their teens and twenties. Compared with the offspring of the youngest fathers, children of fathers in their forties have more than five times the risk of developing autism, and children of fathers in their fifties have more than nine times the risk."

Trophy wives, you've been forewarned!

(And my apologies to anyone affected by autism, which I know is no laughing matter.)