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Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

nationalgeographic.com

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Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#11

Post by xena »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #7
LesZedCB wrote: post #2

i was expecting to find something about society-wide chronic stress, lo and behold > And chronic stress has been found to deplete the body of the energy it needs to make milk. lets just say our profit and growth driven society is not structured to nurture humans, neither grown nor newborn.

I'm surprised we're more stressed now than humans from thousands of years ago who somehow managed to produce plenty of breast-milk. They didn't have as much safety from pillaging tribes, hungry animals, they didn't have antibiotics, anesthesia or life-saving surgeries. They didn't have access to a grocery store a short drive away, or a fire department. Can all of the advancements in human QoL above be undone by turni…

Our sense of fear is tuned for tigers being right around the corner. Modern society has a significant lack of tigers. The fear remains and social pressure is our new set of tigers around the corner.

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#12

Post by LesZedCB »

willcipriano wrote: post #9
8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm surprised we're more stressed now than humans from thousands of years ago who somehow managed to produce plenty of breast-milk. They didn't have as much safety from pillaging tribes, hungry animals, they didn't have antibiotics, anesthesia or life-saving surgeries. They didn't have access to a grocery store a short drive away, or a fire department. Can all of the advancements in human QoL above be undone by turni…

They didn't have a newscaster to inform them of any of that. The only threats they knew of were ones they personally witnessed. People today worry about the climate of the planet, back them you'd worry about if you had enough firewood for the night.

indeed there was no machine-driven bombardment of (mis)information tailor made to provoke a fear/anger response

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#13

Post by gaterin »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #7
LesZedCB wrote: post #2

i was expecting to find something about society-wide chronic stress, lo and behold > And chronic stress has been found to deplete the body of the energy it needs to make milk. lets just say our profit and growth driven society is not structured to nurture humans, neither grown nor newborn.

I'm surprised we're more stressed now than humans from thousands of years ago who somehow managed to produce plenty of breast-milk. They didn't have as much safety from pillaging tribes, hungry animals, they didn't have antibiotics, anesthesia or life-saving surgeries. They didn't have access to a grocery store a short drive away, or a fire department. Can all of the advancements in human QoL above be undone by turni…

Humans thousands of years ago had the support of their entire community. A modern human can maybe rely on their spouse. Life as a rugged individual is stressful.

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#14

Post by positr0n »

SQueeeeeL wrote: post #4

I think it's almost unfathomable for us to imagine how far we are from a "traditional" homosapien life. I read a book called "Hunt, Gather, Parent" where they describe the life of multiple 'less developed' societies, and how they spent a large portion of their life interacting with babies, adolescents, older children, pregnant relations. It's a miracle people are still able to reproduce at all given our isolation fro…

I read a comment here years ago saying that in ancient times the average woman would have only a few dozen menstrual cycles in her life. Most the time between puberty and menopause you were either pregnant or breastfeeding. Does the book discuss that too?

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#16

Post by mxkopy »

robertlagrant wrote: post #3
LesZedCB wrote: post #2

i was expecting to find something about society-wide chronic stress, lo and behold > And chronic stress has been found to deplete the body of the energy it needs to make milk. lets just say our profit and growth driven society is not structured to nurture humans, neither grown nor newborn.

How is society is profit and growth driven?

Presumably OP is talking about Western societies, in which the dominant form of getting sustenance involves making money, which in turn involves following business incentives.

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#17

Post by rebuilder »

SQueeeeeL wrote: post #4

I think it's almost unfathomable for us to imagine how far we are from a "traditional" homosapien life. I read a book called "Hunt, Gather, Parent" where they describe the life of multiple 'less developed' societies, and how they spent a large portion of their life interacting with babies, adolescents, older children, pregnant relations. It's a miracle people are still able to reproduce at all given our isolation fro…

It’s something I’ve been thinking about - between being a child and having kids of my own, there were practically no children in my life. I’m not unique by any means.

I don’t know what, if any, effect that kind of culture has in breastfeeding, but it sure does seem pretty remarkable.

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#19

Post by codekansas »

tstrimple wrote: post #8
robertlagrant wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is society is profit and growth driven?

It's the nature of a capitalist society. It's right in the definition. > an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit.

Defining an economic system as growth and profit driven is sort of tautological though, given the definition of "economics":

> The branch of knowledge concerned with the production, consumption, and transfer of wealth.

Original question was about "society" which is sort of nebulous, but I think (hope?) most people wouldn't define their relationships with their family and close friends, or with most of the world around them, through the lens of an economic system, be it capitalism, communism, mercantilism or feudalism.

Re: Many women struggle to breastfeed. Scientists are starting to ask why

#20

Post by yongjik »

8f2ab37a-ed6c wrote: post #7
LesZedCB wrote: post #2

i was expecting to find something about society-wide chronic stress, lo and behold > And chronic stress has been found to deplete the body of the energy it needs to make milk. lets just say our profit and growth driven society is not structured to nurture humans, neither grown nor newborn.

I'm surprised we're more stressed now than humans from thousands of years ago who somehow managed to produce plenty of breast-milk. They didn't have as much safety from pillaging tribes, hungry animals, they didn't have antibiotics, anesthesia or life-saving surgeries. They didn't have access to a grocery store a short drive away, or a fire department. Can all of the advancements in human QoL above be undone by turni…

Well, if the answer to "not enough food" is "throw away my baby," the answer to "get bit by a stray dog" is "guess I'll catch infection and die," and the answer to "Thag from the next cave is really rubbing me the wrong way" is "find a good stone and bash his head in before he does that to you," then... maybe... my life will be less stressful?

Whether I'd like to live like that is a different matter, of course. (Among other things, I'm convinced Thag will bash my head first, before I even notice something is wrong.)

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