``Though old enough to be grandmas, there's no medical reason healthy women in their 50s should be prevented from having babies with donated eggs, according to the largest study of motherhood after menopause.''

- The Associated Press, Nov. 13

With all due respect, the researchers were studying the wrong thing. No medical reason not to have a baby? Big deal. As a mother myself (and no spring chicken either), I can report that older moms face larger challenges than gestational diabetes and high blood pressure .

And I'm don't mean the ethical concerns over not living long enough to see your child grow up.

I'm referring to the day-to-day issues: an older woman requires more makeup than a younger one, particularly when she's tired, and a 55-year-old with a newborn might not have time to exfoliate or moisturize sufficiently.

You know babies - cute as they are - won't understand the simple sentence, ``Mommy needs to put on her face now.''

Ladies, it's something to think about it before scoring that donated egg.

And here's another: If older moms have one thing going for them, the rap goes, it's that they're likely to be more settled and affluent than their younger counterparts. Great, right? Not when you've got some sticky-fingered toddler climbing all over your new Domain couch (in celadon velvet), it isn't.

Another hazard facing the older mom is the play date. Hanging out with the mothers of your children's friends can be a wonderful way to pass the time, except when they're, oh, 30 years younger than you are, and are more interested in Justin Timberlake than true hunks, like NPR's Daniel Schorr, or Cary Grant.

Here's another reason not to have your kids too late in life: If you work and raise your children at the same time, you are, to borrow a term from the legal world, serving your sentences concurrently.

But if you have your child just as you're getting the gold watch, that means you're serving your sentences consecutively. And as every lawyer knows, that's not a good thing. (I say this with no disrespect to the children or the workplace.)

As all mothers know, no matter what their age, it's best not to measure who's giving more in the relationship at the moment: you or the baby. It's better for everyone if you think of yourself as a pro athlete with a ``back-loaded'' contract - i.e. one who will come into the biggest payoff at the end of the term.

This logic works fine for younger moms - they'll be around and alert for the Harvard Med graduation. But a word of advice to the older moms: Don't do the math.

Older moms have it harder coming and going: Unlike the 25-year-olds who have the confidence to sit back at the playground and watch their children play from a distance, while enjoying a (fully caffeinated) latte, the older mom has to prove she's not too old to have kids by actually - perish the thought - playing with her child at the park.

And finally, you know that saying ``Children say the darndest things''? Well, it's true, and it won't be long until your little baby grows into a sentient being who can rat you out when you have ``work'' done on your face.

Work, I might add, that needs to be done so you don't look too old to be a mom.

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