Annelies:  Your description of babies locating the nipple sounds like
orienteering on mom's body.  I wonder if it's anything like geese flying
south/north and whales migrating along the same path every year for
centuries.  Could it be that unless we muck with the process by washing,
drugging, separating, etc. that babies are wired to do this (picture their
own private litte compass with a breast at the N. marker)?  I think so.
Remember that in general olfactory or sense of smell in humans is the
strongest sense and taste is very closely related to this.

This brings up a very difficult dilemma about those having hospital
births...we obviously have some serious staph and strep, as well as other
nasties, floating around our hospitals, but it is in m-b dyad's interest not
to have her scent destroyed.

Chris Hafner-Eaton, PhD, MPH, CHES, IBCLC    [log in to unmask]
mom, wife, educator, lactation consultant, researcher, scientist, author,
organic gardener, photographer, lapidary creator, lousy cleaner.

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