The question is: Can a once-obscure hormone, synthesized and squirted up my nose, make me a more loving, generous and trusting person? Or will it just make me lactate? I'll keep you posted as the possibly disastrous, possibly hilarious Oxytocin Chronicles unfold.
Several years ago, I was watching one of those wonderful "Nature" programs on PBS. This one was about elephants, which I have come to regard as some of the most poignant animals on Earth, although I have become quite emotionally attached to most animals, thanks to public broadcasting.
An elephant was giving birth, and as the big little baby came slopping out of her massive behind, she turned her head to see what she had wrought. It was at this moment, the narrator said, that a hormone called oxytocin flooded the mother's bloodstream, and forged in her a strong maternal bond with her perky, adorably clumsy newborn.
That was my introduction to oxytocin. I learned that in the animal kingdom it not only instigates maternal behavior but also can create "pair bonding" among monogamous species and cooperative relationships among tribes of animals.
What was interesting to me was that just as the narrator was describing the hormonal surge in the mother, I felt a surge in myself, and I felt that I was falling in love with the baby right along with her.
