Mother Brain

Health and science journalist Chelsea Conaboy explodes the concept of “maternal instinct” and tells a new story about what it means to become a parent. Conaboy expected things to change with the birth of her child. What she didn’t expect was how different she would feel. But she would soon discover what was behind this: her changing brain. Though Conaboy was prepared for the endless dirty diapers, the sleepless nights, and the joy of holding her newborn, she did not anticipate this shift in self, as deep as it was disorienting. Mother Brain is a groundbreaking exploration of the parental brain that untangles insidious myths from complicated realities. New parents undergo major structural and functional brain changes, driven by hormones and the deluge of stimuli a baby provides. These neurobiological changes help all parents—birthing or otherwise—adapt in those intense first days and prepare for a long period of learning how to meet their child’s needs. Pregnancy produces such significant changes in brain anatomy that researchers can easily sort those who have had one from those who haven't. And all highly involved parents, no matter their path to parenthood, develop similar caregiving circuitry. Yet this emerging science, which provides key insights into the wide-ranging experience of parenthood, from its larger role in shaping human nature to the intensity of our individual emotions, is mostly absent from the public conversation about parenthood. The story that exists in the science today is far more meaningful than the idea that mothers spring into being by instinct. Weaving the latest neuroscience and social psychology together with new reporting, Conaboy reveals unexpected upsides, generations of scientific neglect, and a powerful new narrative of parenthood.

Health and science journalist Chelsea Conaboy explodes the concept of “maternal instinct” and tells a new story about what it means to become a parent. Conaboy expected things to change with the birth of her child. What she didn’t expect was how different she would feel. But she would soon discover what was behind this: her changing brain. Though Conaboy was prepared for the endless dirty diapers, the sleepless nights, and the joy of holding her newborn, she did not anticipate this shift in self, as deep as it was disorienting. Mother Brain is a groundbreaking exploration of the parental brain that untangles insidious myths from complicated realities. New parents undergo major structural and functional brain changes, driven by hormones and the deluge of stimuli a baby provides. These neurobiological changes help all parents—birthing or otherwise—adapt in those intense first days and prepare for a long period of learning how to meet their child’s needs. Pregnancy produces such significant changes in brain anatomy that researchers can easily sort those who have had one from those who haven't. And all highly involved parents, no matter their path to parenthood, develop similar caregiving circuitry. Yet this emerging science, which provides key insights into the wide-ranging experience of parenthood, from its larger role in shaping human nature to the intensity of our individual emotions, is mostly absent from the public conversation about parenthood. The story that exists in the science today is far more meaningful than the idea that mothers spring into being by instinct. Weaving the latest neuroscience and social psychology together with new reporting, Conaboy reveals unexpected upsides, generations of scientific neglect, and a powerful new narrative of parenthood.

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book. Sample Book Insights: #1 The first time I tried to answer the question What does it mean to become a mother. it involved pumping two or so ounces of breast milk that would become just one of the two bottles I needed to feed my infant at day care the following day. I sat in that closet and pumped and pumped, and when the milk didn’t come, I sat in that closet and pumped some more, until I was so frustrated that my back hurt and my breasts felt like they were going to explode. And still the milk wouldn’t come. I was desperate. I wanted to know what it means to become a mother, but I couldn’t get an answer. Still unable to produce enough milk for my baby, I went back to work. I needed more information, but more information was not coming. I was four months postpartum—the time of most intense lactation—and this still wasn’t enough milk. How long would this take. -> What does it mean to become a mother. For many women, the answer is scary because it means examining how they are different from nonmothers, and from a male perspective, how much less interesting they are. #2 This is not a parenting book. I have two kids, and I have written a book describing my experience as a new parent. I am not a parenting expert. #3 This book will not give you advice on how to raise your child or how to be a parent. It will instead explore the biological changes and lived experience that makes parenthood so profound. #4 The idea that we are the dedicated mother bird, guided by a maternal instinct that has been perfected through the ages, is bullshit. We are not naturally caring for our children. We are not born with the ability to do so.

Becoming a mother is a joyful rite of passage, but it can also bring overwhelming emotional upheaval, exhaustion, and self-doubt. And is it any wonder? Motherhood changes everything, right down to a woman's brain chemistry. No one understands "mom brain" better than psychologist Ilyse Dobrow DiMarco, a mother of two herself who specializes in treating women with young children. In this compassionate guide, Dr. Dobrow DiMarco shares science-based psychological strategies to help moms cope with common challenges and make peace with their transformed identity. Candid, witty stories from her own life and the lives of women she has worked with illustrate ways to tame self-critical thoughts; navigate the "new normal" of work, marriage, and friendships; and mindfully accept the highs and lows of parenting--even in the toughest moments.

While postpartum depression has become a recognizable condition, this is the first book to treat root causes of mommy brain, baby blues, and other symptoms that leave mothers feeling exhausted. Any woman who has read What to Expect When You're Expecting needs a copy of The Postnatal Depletion Cure. Filled with trustworthy advice, protocols for successful recovery, and written by a compassionate expert in women's health, this book is a guide to help any mother restore her energy, replenish her body, and reclaim her sense of self. Most mothers have experienced pain, forgetfulness, indecision, low energy levels, moodiness, or some form of baby brain. And it's no wonder: The process of growing a baby depletes a mother's body in substantial ways--on average, a mother's brain shrinks 5% during pregnancy, and the placenta saps her of essential nutrients that she needs to be healthy and contented. But with postnatal care ending after 6 weeks, most women never learn how to rebuild their strength and care for their bodies after childbirth. As a result, they can suffer from the effects of depletion for many years, without knowing what's wrong as well as getting the support and treatments that they need.

Generations of mothers have been told -- and believed -- that having a baby means checking their own brains at the delivery room door. "The Mommy Brain" usually refers to a head full of feeding times, soccer schedules, and nursery rhymes, at the expense of creative or challenging ideas. But recent scientific research paints a dramatically different and far rosier picture. Journalist Katherine Ellison draws on cutting-edge neuroscience research to demonstrate that, contrary to long-established wisdom that having children dumbs you down, raising children may make moms smarter . From enhanced senses in pregnancy and early motherhood to the alertness and memory skills necessary to manage like a pro, to a greater aptitude for risk-taking and a talent for empathy and negotiation, these advantages not only help mothers in raising their children, but in their work and social lives as well. Filled with lively (and often hilarious) stories of multitasking moms at home and on the job, The Mommy Brain encourages all of us to cast aside conventional thinking and discover the positive ways in which having children changes mothers' brains for the better.

Before time is even a named concept, a war among beings of infinite power, fury, and ambition rages. After seemingly endless conflict, a victor is named. The ultimate being enforces the ultimate punishment upon its archrival: the utter obliteration of anything resembling form, consciousness, memory, or self. But despite the intense and thorough acts of banishment and dismemberment among twelve separate realms of dimension, a grain of the archrivals consciousness has remained intact. It has been patient but it has not been forgiving. In this dimension, it reforms, and it is first known as the Pharaoh Cheops. But the archrivals deception does not go unnoticed, and the Formless, its ancient guard, appears. To prevent the transfer of the ancient spirit into the pharaohs infant son, the child is murdered and his brain is placed in a canopic jar. The archrival is contained once again or so the Formless believes. But consciousness remains and, once again, is patient. It sees an opportunity, a gate, in an unexpected host Daemonorops Draco, a palm tree. In more modern times, Misty, a college student, and her friends enact a necromancy ritual. Misty and her friends drift in an out of a dreamlike state so intense they are no longer sure of reality. Misty is transformed into a real necromancer able to travel the twelve dimensions of existences. Her new found power is soon challenged by a great cosmic struggle. Misty has good intentions for all life, but the source of her power has its own agenda.

This book examines psycho-physical dualism as developed by the Nyāya school of Indian philosophy. Dualism is important to many world religions which promote personal immortality and to morality which promotes free will. For the Nyāya, the self is a permanent, immaterial substance to which non-physical internal states like cognition belong. This view is challenged by other Indian schools, especially the Buddhist and Cārvāka schools. Chakrabarti brings out the connections between the Indian and the Western debates over the mind-body problem and shows that the Nyāya position is well developed, well articulated, and defensible. He shows that Nyāya dualism differs from Cartesian dualism and is not vulnerable to some traditional objections against the latter. A brief discussion of the Sāṃkhya and the Advaita theories of the self and the critique of these views from the Nyāya standpoint are included, as well as a discussion of a classical Nyāya causal argument for the existence of God. The appendix contains an annotated translation of selected portions of Udayana's masterpiece, Ātmatattvaviveka (Discerning the Nature of the Self.)