Breastfeeding busts stress
August 15, 2005
Motherhood might seem fraught enough without cracked nipples, lactation anxiety and mean stares from people in cafés. But scientists have discovered one of Mother Nature’s little ironies — breast-feeding seems designed to calm mums down.
Canadian neuroscientists claim that breast-feeding mothers react more calmly
to stressful situations than mums who give their babies bottles. They made 50
mothers watch videotapes of harrowing scenes such as lost or injured children,
as well as tapes of maths puzzles and people giving speeches.
The scientists then measured the levels of the stress hormone cortisol in the
mothers’ saliva. The breast-feeding mums consistently had lower levels of
cortisol, and the more children a mother had breast-fed in the past, the lower
her levels of stress hormones.
The study also indicated that breast-feeding mothers are better able to distinguish potentially stressful situations from those that they do not need to be worried about.
The researcher Mai Tu, of Douglas Hospital Research Centre in Montreal, says the study indicates that breast-feeding may help women at risk of post-natal depression, which is frequently stress-related.
Source: Times Online, 13/08/2005