These Random Facts About Moms & Motherhood Prove Raising Kids Is A Wild Ride

I mean yes, of course nursing moms are fierce, because they’ve dealt with the exquisite pain that is scabbed, bleeding nipples. But they are actually kind of fierce in another sense, too: Apparently women who nurse are more aggressive when it comes to protecting their child. Psychological Science says women who are breastfeeding have lower blood pressure, which can lower the body’s typical response to stress and fear. So mom feels braver, therefore making her more inclined to want to claw your eyes out should you look at her kid the wrong way. It’s called “maternal defense”, and I so wish I’d had this as an excuse back when I was nursing. It might have explained that time I full on screamed at my husband to just “get out” when he bought me the wrong Keurig pods. #itwasmaternaldefensehoney #isaidfrenchroast

It’s true, according to Vanity Fair: Leo’s mom was in the Uffizi Gallery in Italy, gazing up at a da Vinci painting when she felt the future Jack Dawson kick. So I suppose it’s good she wasn’t staring at Paul Gauguin’s “The Green Christ”. Not sure if Green Christ DiCaprio would have had as illustrious a film career? A career as a rocker, perhaps. Actually wouldn’t that be kind of rad if that was the way we selected names? If you had to christen your child after whatever you were staring at when you felt the first kick? My child would be little Dagstorp… after our IKEA sofa.

As reported by ScaryMommy, research has found that between 70-85 percent of moms hold their kids on the left. While you might think, “well, duh, because they’re right-handed,” that’s actually not the case, as left-handed women do this as well. (I’m a lefty and I heavily favored holding my kid on the left, even though it meant I had to wonkily do things with my right hand.) The reason? The right side of the brain receives signals from the left side of the body, and the right side of the brain is also the side that helps with emotional bonding and focus. So when you hold your bebe on the left, it’s believed that its actually helping you to bond. Even weirder? Apparently this instinct shows up really young, as even little girls have been shown to favor holding their dolls on the left.

While this sounds improbable (and has been disputed), the Guinness Book of World Records insists that it has the sources to back this insanity up. The woman was a Russian peasant who lived during the 1700s, and according to Guinness she gave birth to “sixteen pairs of twins, seven sets of triplets and four sets of quadruplets.” I’d tell you her name but it was “lost to history.” (I’d tell you her husband’s name, except who cares? He isn’t the one who pushed out sixty-nine children, is he?)

Again, it seems difficult to believe this could be true, given the infant mortality rates of the 18^th century. But it’s still kind of fun to think about, no? Like, what did bath time consist of? Just a firehose aimed at the house? And do you think numbers 43-69 just fell out whenever she bent to tie her shoes?

The journal Infant Behavior and Development showed how moms and babies actually sync their heartbeats within milliseconds of each other, simply by gazing into each other's eyes. In the study, moms and their babies had their hearts monitored during "face-to-face interactions." And the data showed that their heart rhythms coordinated "within lags of less than 1 second."

I'm guessing most moms will feel surprised by this, and also not surprised in the least. We all know those little guys have our hearts.