Babies on the brain
Who doesn't love babies? Ok ok- I know a few people who nearly have an allergic reaction when the idea of babies comes up. I am not one of those people, though. I dream about the day I will have kids, and the idea gets me really excited. I know having kids isn't for everyone, though; I'm not saying every woman needs to be a mom or even wants to be a mom. In fact, doing
social work definitely showed me that many people should NOT be having
children (yet they KEEP having children! WHY?!) But, I just feel I was
meant to be a mom. One of the perks of working as a case worker for families was
getting to be around all of the babies and kids on a regular basis, and I
regularly had 3 car seats crammed into the backseat of my tiny compact
Elantra. And I loved it.
I mean, come on... Cuteness overload. BABIES!! For now, though, Sebastian is my baby.
My boyfriend really gives me a hard time about my baby obsession, but he has a great sense of humor about my obsessive quirks. I'd like to think I pretended to be a pretty normal person throughout the first couple years of our relationship, but now he knows how full out crazy I am. Thank God he loves me anyways, ha! So, to get to my point- he sent me a very interesting article today about why babies cry.
This new study suggests that one (obviously unconscious) reason babies may cry, beyond hunger, wanting to be held, etc, is to prevent their parents from having more kids. Huh! The study was published last week in the Evolution, Medicine and Public Health Journal, and, as I'm a sucker for Evolutionary Psychology, I kept reading. Here's the link to the article. (The link is to an article from vox.com, not the study itself)
So, why would this be an evolutionary advantage?
The author posits that the child will get more time and attention (and resources) devoted to it if the parents delay having another sibling, and thereby increasing the baby's chances of survival. The way crying may prevent pregnancy, then, is that, as long as the mother is nursing (usually in response to crying), the mother is not ovulating. This natural form of birth control while the mother is nursing may be giving the newborn an advantage of not having any competition (from siblings) for it's parents' time and attention. Interesting, huh?
So what do you think? A total crock? Or does it maybe have some truth to it? Check out the article!
PS. Anyone else have crazy baby fever? No? Just me??
Xoxo,
Kathryn
I mean, come on... Cuteness overload. BABIES!! For now, though, Sebastian is my baby.
My boyfriend really gives me a hard time about my baby obsession, but he has a great sense of humor about my obsessive quirks. I'd like to think I pretended to be a pretty normal person throughout the first couple years of our relationship, but now he knows how full out crazy I am. Thank God he loves me anyways, ha! So, to get to my point- he sent me a very interesting article today about why babies cry.
So, why would this be an evolutionary advantage?
The author posits that the child will get more time and attention (and resources) devoted to it if the parents delay having another sibling, and thereby increasing the baby's chances of survival. The way crying may prevent pregnancy, then, is that, as long as the mother is nursing (usually in response to crying), the mother is not ovulating. This natural form of birth control while the mother is nursing may be giving the newborn an advantage of not having any competition (from siblings) for it's parents' time and attention. Interesting, huh?
So what do you think? A total crock? Or does it maybe have some truth to it? Check out the article!
PS. Anyone else have crazy baby fever? No? Just me??
Xoxo,
Kathryn
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