by muneera1978 | Jan 26, 2015 | babies, birth, hormones
So, I have been taking some A-mazing classes about birth…really I don’t know where to begin with all the new knowledge that I have acquired on the things that happen to us as women giving birth. We studied the endocrine system this weekend in relation to what happens when a women is pregnant. One of the hormones that is increased is melanin. You now, that stuff that makes brown people, brown :). Well, let’s think about what turns dark in a pregnant women. Typically, she develops a linea negra down the midline of her stomach, her areolas around her nipples darken and sometimes the area around her cheeks and mouth darken into what is commonly referred to as “pregnancy mask” or “the mask of pregnancy”. Let’s now stop for a minute and think about the newborn baby. What do we know about their sight at birth? We know that they can only see bright contrasts. Not really any color. Their most prominent sense, is the sense of smell. Smell is the only one of our senses that is connected directly to the brain, in fact it is directly connected to the limbic system in our brain. The limbic system is one of the oldest parts of our brains and is often referred to as the emotional seat of our brain. In fact, our body will have a physiological response to smell before we even register it on a conscious level! But I digress… So we have this amazing little newborn (not as helpless as we think!) hardwired when they come out and when they are put on mom’s abdomen...
