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Does the mothers brain stay the same forever after being pregnant

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One question I have is during post pregnancy can birth negatively affect a mothers brain?

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I found it interesting that grey matter decreases during pregnancy which can help control your thought process.

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How can we know if its the same for every mom?

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Pregnancy has an enormous increase in sex steroid hormones such as progesterone and estrogen, these help a woman’s body prepare for carrying a child.

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I find it interesting that the "loss" of certain functions is actually beneficial to a parent In order to take care of our families.

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A woman’s brain may change more

quickly and more drastically during pregnancy and the postpartum period than at any other point in her life. And the brain changes its focus from other things to just the baby.

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One of the questions that I thought about while reading the article is are the women who are pregnant while getting the MRI in any risk or is the baby at risk.

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Are the brain changes during pregnancy permanent, or do they reverse postpartum?

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This makes me wonder which of these effects on the mother are maintained after the baby is born and which of these effects decrease in noticeability during the baby's childhood.

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what else could they discover???

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What other things can be found during pregnancy that we don't know about yet?

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I found interesting that there are treatments for postpartum depression

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I found it interesting that synaptic pruning, a brain phenomenon that removes specific connections between brain

cells in order to encourage the facilitation of new connections, could be the cause of “mommy brain" and could also help promote mother-baby bonding.

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A mothers brain changes and they lose gray matter as a result of pregnancy. They lose gray matter "because their brains are becoming more specialized in ways that will help them adapt to motherhood and respond to the needs of their babies."

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I find it interesting that while researching gray matter volume, by the 9th week they found that, "80 percent of 400 brains areas analyzed showed decreases in gray matter volume and cortical thickness that continued through pregnancy, with area shrinking by 4 percent on average.". This meant that the part of the brain with grey matter in pregnant women will shrink, which I didn't know before.

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There is a process known as "synaptic pruning" which woman undergo once they give birth. Researchers believe that this process helps people focus on specific behaviors or activities; in this case taking care of an infant. So their "loss" of brain material might seem like a bad thing but actually its beneficial to parenthood.

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I found it interesting how your ability to control your own thought processes decreases during pregnancy.

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As a mothers brain changes during pregnancy, certain brain networks, especially those involved in social and emotional processing, shrink during pregnancy, possibly undergoing a fine-tuning process in preparation for parenting. Such changes correspond with surges in pregnancy hormones, especially estrogen, and some last at least two years after childbirth, researchers have found.

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Scans of the brain before and after pregnancy have shown a reduction in gray matter volume.

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As a result of pregnancy, the total gray matter volume and cortical thickness decreased throughout pregnancy. Then partially came back after giving birth. "The team found that total gray matter volume and cortical thickness decreased throughout pregnancy. Both then partially rebounded after birth. Gray matter volume decreased across most of the cerebral cortex and in most large-scale brain networks."

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I found very interesting that gray matter decreases during pregnancy which helps control your thought process.

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Scans of the brain before and after pregnancy have shown a reduction in gray matter volume. Gray matter contains the bodies of neurons, synapses, and glial cells, and is found mainly in the brain’s surface layer, called the cortex.

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During pregnancy a mother's brain has a reduction in gray matter volume. "Gray matter contains the bodies of neurons, synapses, and glial cells, and is found mainly in the brain's surface layer, called the cortex."

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The white matter of pregnant women’s brains is not changed at all by pregnancy and new motherhood, while gray matter volume is reduced. These changes might partially occur because of a process known as “synaptic pruning,” a brain phenomenon that eliminates certain connections between brain cells to encourage the facilitation of new connections. Researchers believe that this process could "help people focus on specific behaviors or activities — in this case, taking care of an

infant." As well, instead of

focusing on relatively inconsequential tidbits of information, a pregnant or new-mom brain may reallocate resources to the parts of the brain that control “theory

of mind", which allows you to figure out what someone else wants and needs.

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The brain's grey matter processes memoirs, emotions, and decision making. While, the brain's white matter helps signal further and faster. Dr.Hoekzema studies, "that white matter in pregnant women's brains doesn't appear to change at all, while gray matter volume is reduced."

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A mothers brain changes during pregnancy by enhancing white matter in the brain "white matter fibers showed greater ability to efficiently transmit signals between brain cells, a change that evaporated once the baby was born."