Embrace Your 'Lactational Aggression'

Rage is a feature, not a bug.

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You know the noise.

That metallic-pitched CLANK, BONK, CLANK of your husband sloshing (hurtling??) dishes around the sink right after you nursed your infant to sleep.

Why does it sound like there’s a goddamn Greek wedding happening in your kitchen?

What will wake the baby first? The ceramic demolition derby or the police sirens coming to drag you away on a domestic?

Yet despite the exploding furnace in your chest, if someone took your blood pressure your vitals would likely be calm as a Hindu cow’s.

That’s because exclusively breastfeeding moms have higher levels of aggression than formula-feeding moms while still keeping their cool.

In a study conducted at UCLA, breastfeeding moms, formula-feeding moms, and childless women competed in a war-simulator computer game to see which group, was the most, um, ruthless. Each player was paired up with a ‘confederate’ (an undercover researcher) and they had to sit together in a waiting room before the computer match up started. The confederate was purposefully rude and obnoxious to study participants—talking loudly on her phone during their meeting, being dismissive, chewing gum, etc. When the women squared off it was the breastfeeding moms who hit the HARDEST against the annoying confederate!

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Breastfeeding moms launched more bombs, issued gun fire more rapidly and for longer periods all while their blood pressure stayed level during the confrontations. On average, researches found that breastfeeding moms were twice as aggressive as formula feeding moms.

“bring me a little treat on your way home from work!!!!”

So it’s lactation—not motherhood—that increases rage in women. Mama bears are born from mama’s milk!

The going theory is that mothers evolved the ability to act aggressively without inhibition in order to better protect their babies. It’s easier to rip out the throat of a rampaging warthog if you’re not all anxious and stressed about it.

Just another way nature backs the dyad.