Observations placeholder
Pregnancy and endorphins
Identifier
000427
Type of Spiritual Experience
None
Background
The following paper could only have been written by men, - ‘make their mothers endorphin dependent?!’ – give me strength - but it does contain some important findings, supported by other papers on pubmed, the principal one of which is that pregnancy produces endorphins. Thus one mechanism by which spiritual experiences are being obtained is via these natural neurotransmitters – the opium of the natural world.
Other papers contradict some of their findings that breast feeding produces endorphins – the neurotransmitter produced is oxytocin, so they should have concluded that breast feeding helps reduce post natal depression via oxytocin. Post natal depression may partly be the result of endorphin withdrawal after birth, where nothing is naturally released to take its place. So breast feeding your baby makes sense from your point of view as well.
A description of the experience
Deal in the womb: Fetal opiates, parent-offspring, conflict, and the future of midwifery - Peter Apari and Lajos Ro´zsa ; Department of Animal Taxonomy and Ecology, Eotvos University, Budapest, Hungary and Institute for Advanced Study, Collegium Budapest, Hungary 2006
This paper argues that parent-offspring conflict is mediated by placental b-endorphins in placental mammals, i.e., foetuses make their mothers endorphin-dependent then manipulate them to increase nutrient allocation to the placenta. This hypothesis predicts that:
(1) anatomic position of endorphin production should mirror its presumed role in fetal-maternal conflict;
(2) endorphin levels should co-vary positively with nutrient carrying capacity of maternal blood system;
(3) postpartum psychological symptoms (postpartum blues, depression and psychosis) in humans are side-effects of this mechanism that can be interpreted as endorphin-deprivation symptoms;
(4) shortly after parturition, placentophagia could play an adaptive role in decreasing the negative side-effects of fetal manipulation;
(5) later, breast-feeding induced endorphin excretion of the maternal pituitary saves mother from further deprivation symptoms.
Finally, whatever the molecular mechanism of fetal manipulation is, widespread and intense medical care (such as caesarean section and use of antidepressants) affects the present and future evolution of mother-foetus conflict in the human species (and also in domestic animals) to increase ‘fetal aggressiveness’ and thus technology-dependency of reproduction.