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Have you ever heard the phrase, your biological clock is ticking?

It's often used to encourage women to have children before we reach a certain age,

but there's more to the story than a simple so-called biological clock.

It's Women's History Month and this week we're presenting an episode of Am I Normal that takes a look at the very gendered way we talk about reproduction and how we can have better conversations around fertility no matter our body parts. I hope you'll find it as eye-opening as we did.

You can check out Am I Normal wherever you get your podcasts and learn more about the Ted

audio collective at audio collective dot Ted.com. We'll get to the episode Ted mom was a stay-at-home mom and she taught Lamas classes and we couldn't afford

babysitter so I was her teacher's assistant. I can't tell you how many videos of

live birth I watched because you as part of Lamas classes you watch. Joe Osmanson is a microbiologist and writer and he vividly

remembers those Lamar's birthing classes. If the partner could it come, I'd be like rubbing the backs.

So ever since I was a little kid, I wanted to have a kid.

I used to dream as like a 12-year-old that I had like a pregnant belly.

Even as a kid he knew he'd never have one of those tummies,

but he did hope that eventually he might be a father.

But into adulthood, that wasn't how life seemed to be panning out and he

started to get increasingly worried about what each passing year might be

doing to his fertility. I first started to worry about infertility. I mean I never didn't worry

about whether or not I'd be able to have a kid. So at 37 years old Joe decided to

figure out if he was a candidate to freeze his

sperm. He didn't want to wait any longer. I was terrified of telling my family

...