So, tonight I learned that I will never specialize in endocrinology. It’s a combination of both Fucking Cool and … jesus christ, how the hell do you pronounce THAT?
I was super tired for the first half of the class. No idea why, but had a hard time staying awake. Grabbed a drink at the break which perked me up a bit, thank god. I’ve got a mid-term next week, I can’t afford to nap through class.
That said, I did learn something super awesome cool that I knew bits & pieces of, but it’s neat to put it all together. The trailmix/granola moms out there probably know this shit already, but I’m just catching up.
So, oxytocin. It’s basically a hormone from the … er, anterior pituitary gland? (maybe posterior, that’s part of what I need to study) triggered by a few things. One of which is nipple stimulation. So, stimulate the nipples, and oxytocin causes milk to let down. Funky-doo, but it doesn’t end there: It also causes uterine contractions. Like during labour. Convenient for that whole pushing-out-the-baby thing. Afterward, it’s also good for helping to shrink your uterus back to normal size. So there you go, selfish moms who don’t want to breastfeed for their babies health: It’ll help you get back into your pre-pregnancy jeans faster, and who doesn’t love that?
Interesting side note: Midwives have known for a long time that in a twin birth where the second one isn’t coming right away, getting the first one to nurse will stimulate your uterus into pushing the next one out. How’s THAT for cool?
Ok, I find this sort of thing bloody fascinating. I still don’t want to be an endocrinology expert by any stretch of the imagination, but at least it’s cool stuff to learn.
In other news: If I didn’t have a super high metabolism, I’d think I had thyroid problem. As if being a google diagnostician wasn’t bad enough, now I’m a first year biology diagnostian…
I read something once about how some mothers experience orgasm when nursing, but the article also said something about how people were really grossed out by that and wouldn’t discuss it. I guess it’s related to this stuff you’re learning?
-Only took one bio course, think I learned about photosynthesis
Possibly, oxytocin is thought to have something to do with orgasms, too. But sadly, it’s a pretty basic class (3 hours for each topic isn’t a lot) so we don’t get to go into too much detail.
I will continue to be fascinated and amused by the fact that I understand about half of what wikipedia is talking about these days. :D
From what I understand of my friend in med school, they all diagnose each other (and themselves) with the diseases and such as they learn them. Heh.
It drives Nick nuts when I start doing that. I liken it to a psych student diagnosing all their friends mental illnesses. But that’s silly, he’s obviously suffering from a hormone deficiency. He wouldn’t think such things otherwise. :D
It’s also the love hormone and helps mums and babies bond – another benefit of nursing. And, along with the uterine contractions, it can help clear the uterus of any additional clots or pieces of tissue left over from the birth … like what happened to me during Iain’s four week growth spurt (i.e. endless nursing) – I passed a huge mofo of a clot that could have gone septic had it stayed. Cool, eh?
Ya, I’m weird to. ;-P
Oh, also, nursing can also help women with PPD because the love hormone makes women feel better.
Right. I’ll stop now. :-)
Hmm to add to that, the presence of oxytocin somehow also triggers the production of endorphins for pain relief. However, though they have managed to create a synthetic oxytocin that will create uterine contractions, they’re missing the part of the formula that triggers endorphin production. So if you’re pregnant and you get induced with oxytocin, you’re in for a rough ride because you’re not getting as much of the good juice as your body would normally provide.
In my experience, the oxytocin that produced uterine contractions also produced enough endorphins to give me the best damn bloody high I’ve ever experienced and probably ever will experience. But as for nursing – nope, never felt even the slightest bit orgasmic in the 18+ months I was bf’ing the little dude; and nursing didn’t really help my PPD either. Shame, really.
YMMV.