The Philippines marketed its first US-currency Islamic note, aiming to expand its funding base and capitalizing on a

Joël Guerriau was detained after the MP complained of feeling unwell after a drink.

Seven years ago, I was at my local antenatal class preparing for the birth of my firstborn. In my forties and armed with a coloured birthing ball, I looked around and gasped. All the other soon-to-be-mums were at least a decade younger than me. Some were nearly half my age. It briefly panicked me. Would I make any friends? Why did I leave it so late to have kids? Was I doing something wrong? In hindsight, though, I had no reason to worry: your forties is absolutely the best decade in which to have your first child. According to data published last week in The Daily Telegraph, the number of women becoming first-time mothers in their forties has increased in recent years: today, one in 25 UK births is to a woman aged 40-plus. That’s a lot of women just like me, despite the fact that getting pregnant over 35 gets you labelled as someone of “advanced maternal age”. That might sound harsh until you remember that older pregnancies used to be termed “geriatric” – thank God that’s been phased out. I’ve never regretted waiting until my forties, even if I had been trying for children for years by that point. My story is undeniably unique: my partner Alex took his own life while we were doing IVF, but that didn’t stop me from continuing to try to get pregnant. The maternal call was strong, so I decided to carry on with the process using Alex’s frozen sperm. Today I have two beautiful daughters with him: Lola, seven, and Liberty, five. It is an understatement to say I was ready for a baby at 40. I was grounded. Confident. Unlike when I was in my twenties or thirties, I knew exactly who I was and what made me tick. I had life experience. I no longer got FOMO. I didn’t even drink, having been through hell and back to become sober 20 years earlier. My career was fully off the ground, and therapy had helped me identify the family dysfunction I knew to ditch for the sake of my kids. I also wasn’t worried about my body bouncing back after the birth. I just desperately wanted to be a mum. Of course, there are all sorts of advantages to having children in your twenties and thirties. A huge bonus is that you’re simply more fertile. According to research, 31 is the magic age to have a baby – you’re still as fertile as in your twenties, but you also have more money. I’m sure motherhood in your fifties is great, too – although using your own eggs is highly unlikely, unless you froze them at some point before you turned 35. It means that some older mums often turn to donor eggs. Thinking back on my twenties and thirties, I don’t know how I would have managed motherhood. I don’t think I was ready to put my own needs on hold. I can’t imagine how hard it would have been to juggle work and my children, especially with the spiralling costs of childcare. I do accept that there are greater risks inherent in waiting to have kids. Both the quantity and quality of eggs dwindle. The rates of failed fertilisation, miscarriage and birth defects rise with age. There’s also the social pressure that comes with not having children early – you’re forced into endless conversations about the “ticking timebomb” of your fertility, and expected to fend off probing inquiries about your biological clock. The British Fertility Society advises women to start trying for a baby by the age of 32 at the latest, for a 90 per cent guarantee of having a child without resorting to IVF. But this advice simply wouldn’t have worked for me – I was determined to find the right person to have children with, and that didn’t happen until I was 35. When mine and Alex’s attempts to naturally conceive failed, and then Alex died, only at that point did I know I had the maturity to go it alone. I do have some regrets – I wish I’d frozen my eggs at the peak of my fertility in my mid-twenties, for instance (this process costs between £4,000 and £7,000 in the UK). But otherwise, having children in my forties was the right thing to do. Yes, I had my wobbles. I remember sobbing on the bathroom floor after yet another failed pregnancy test. I would berate myself for leaving it so late. I had to force myself to remember that many women experience fertility struggles in their twenties and thirties, too. All of those anxious feelings, though, flew out the window once I had my first child. When I left the hospital to begin parenthood alone, a new bag of nappies in hand, I didn’t have a meltdown. I was just so grateful that I’d had a baby, especially when the odds seemed so stacked against me. Sleepless nights trying to coax my child back to sleep were what I had most desired. It was all so good, in fact, that I went on to have a second child in my forties. I had a spare embryo in a freezer in St Petersburg. Now I call her Liberty. Every day since becoming a mum, I have embraced the mess and chaos, and appreciate every minute. I’m sure my younger self would cringe at the thought of me spending my evenings helping my children with their homework. But I’m proud to say that I’m living my best life. Read More Vanessa Hudgens addresses pregnancy speculation amid Cole Tucker engagement Rachel Bilson reveals she’s suffered multiple miscarriages Pregnant woman has maternity photo shoot in hospital before giving birth Hailey Bieber responds to ‘disheartening’ pregnancy rumours Like Rebecca Adlington, I also lost my baby at 20 weeks Britney Spears reveals she had an abortion while dating Justin Timberlake

By Luc Cohen NEW YORK A top U.S. regulator said on Tuesday there is no way to police

Imagination trumps obedience when it comes to what the public thinks are important qualities in children, according to new research. But while British attitudes have changed in the past three decades, children being taught good manners at home is still highly rated among the majority of people, the wide-ranging survey found. Some 85% of people in 2022 saw good manners as especially important for children, down only slightly on the 89% who said so in 1990, research by the Policy Institute at King’s College London (KCL) showed. Good manners are still the quality we want to see most, there has been an increasing emphasis on the importance of hard work, and we’re also among the very most likely to value unselfishness Professor Bobby Duffy Obedience is now far less valued, the analysis of the long-running World Values Survey (WVS) found, with just 11% of those asked last year citing it as being an especially important quality for children to be taught, down from a peak of 50% who felt that way in 1998. More people now think qualities including independence and hard work are important things for a child to be taught, with the former up to 53% last year from 43% in 1990, and the latter having risen from 29% to 48%. Around four in 10 (41%) people said determination and perseverance were important, up from 31% three decades earlier, while more than a third (37%) felt imagination was important, up from less than a fifth (18%) in 1990. Tolerance and respect for others are still among the qualities seen as very important, coming just behind good manners at the top of the list, but it is now seen as less important that a child is taught to be unselfish, the research found. More than half (56%) of people thought it was especially important for a child to be taught not to be selfish back in 1990, but that fell to 43% last year. Of the 24 countries surveyed, the UK is among the most likely to value unselfishness in children and among the least likely to value responsibility and obedience, researchers said. More people in Japan, Norway, Sweden and South Korea felt imagination was very important for children to have, while only five countries (Egypt, Philippines, Morocco, Nigeria and Mexico) were above the UK in valuing good manners in children. Professor Bobby Duffy, director of the Policy Institute at KCL, said: “The qualities we’d like to see instilled in our children are important signals of what we value as a society – and the very clear message from these long-term trends is the increased importance of imagination and decline in how much we prize straightforward obedience. “But this doesn’t mean we want a society of self-centred children – good manners are still the quality we want to see most, there has been an increasing emphasis on the importance of hard work, and we’re also among the very most likely to value unselfishness. “Instead, this is likely to reflect a more general shift towards valuing self-expression, while still wanting our children to be positive and productive contributors to society.” The 2022 data comes from a sample of 3,056 adults across the UK interviewed by Ipsos through a mix on face-to-face and online survey methods, but for the analysis of trends over time, data is nationally representative for Great Britain only due to a lack of available trend data from Northern Ireland, and is based on surveys of 1,000 or more adults. Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live 7 ways you could be damaging your eye health without even realising Celebrities mingle with royals at glam Vogue World party in London Sienna Miller bares baby bump at celebrity and royal-studded Vogue event

Volodymyr Zelensky’s top aide has slammed SpaceX CEO Elon Musk for shutting off Starlink’s satellite network over Crimea to aid Russia by thwarting a Ukrainian attack. A new biography claims Elon Musk ordered SpaceX engineers to cut off Ukrainian access to Starlink satellites near the Crimean coast to prevent a surprise drone attack on Russian warships. The billionaire told the author that he feared a strike on occupied Crimea would amount to a “mini-Pearl Harbour” and lead to a Russian nuclear retaliation, Mr Isaacson writes. “Sometimes a mistake is much more than just a mistake. By not allowing Ukrainian drones to destroy part of the Russian military fleet via Starlink interference, Elon Musk allowed this fleet to fire Kalibr missiles at Ukrainian cities,” Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Mr Zelensky’s office said. “As a result, civilians, children are being killed. This is the price of a cocktail of ignorance and big ego.” Meanwhile yesterday Russia warned of “very sad consequences” after the Pentagon announced Ukraine will be armed with depleted uranium anti-tank rounds that can aid its troops in piercing Russian tanks. Read More From Challenger to Leopard: How Ukraine’s tanks compare to Russia’s A look at the uranium-based ammo the US is sending to Ukraine NATO member Romania says it has found drone pieces from Russian attacks in Ukraine on its territory Russian commander ‘used two military helicopters to transport his pet cat’

Holiday firms are operating flights from the Greek island to help those evacuated after wildfires.

President Joe Biden on Thursday visits a shipyard symbolizing the industrial boom he hopes will put wind in his re-election campaign's sails, even if polls show most Americans cool on...

The Supreme Court is adopting its first code of ethics, in the face of sustained criticism over undisclosed trips and gifts from wealthy benefactors to some justices

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One of three active-duty Marines who stormed the U.S. Capitol together has been sentenced to probation instead of prison time

One of Europe’s longest-standing grudges is ripe to be mended. This time last year, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos