My eldest sister and I were born just a week under one year apart. I'm sure there was a cost to that, both physically on her and economically on the family.
But there are worse things, like having a child late in life (after 35). Women aren't made for that and her remaining eggs taper off in quality quickly after 30. That's what IVF is about: by 40 there is diminished fertility and quality. The older the mother the higher the risk of many kinds of birth defects due to genetic damage. This seems to be due to how egg cells are created and then selected for ovulation.
oogenesis in the human female reproductive system: growth process in which the primary egg cell (or ovum) becomes a mature ovum.
In any one human generation, the egg’s development starts before the female that carries it is even born; 8 to 20 weeks after the fetus has started to grow, cells that are to become mature ova have been multiplying, and by the time that the female is born, all of the egg cells that the ovaries will release during the active reproductive years of the female are already present in the ovaries. These cells, known as the primary ova, number around 400,000. The primary ova remain dormant until just prior to ovulation, when an egg is released from the ovary. Some egg cells may not mature for 40 years; others degenerate and never mature.
The egg cell remains as a primary ovum until the time for its release from the ovary arrives. The egg then undergoes a cell division. The nucleus splits so that half of its chromosomes go to one cell and half to another. One of these two new cells is usually larger than the other and is known as the secondary ovum; the smaller cell is known as a polar body. The secondary ovum grows in the ovary until it reaches maturation; it then breaks loose and is carried into the fallopian tubes. Once in the fallopian tubes, the secondary egg cell is suitable for fertilization by the male sperm cells.
