let-down

• letdown

From the verb phrase let down.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈlɛtdaʊn/

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let-down (countable and uncountable, plural let-downs)

1. (countable) A disappointment or anticlimax.

   After seeing all the advertisements, the show itself was quite a let-down.

2. (countable, uncountable) The neurohormonal release of milk in dairy cows or in breastfeeding human mothers.
   • 1990, WJA Payne, An Introduction to Animal Husbandry in the Tropics:

     The majority of peasant farmers in the tropics allow the calf to suckle before milking in order to obtain a let-down of milk.

   • 2004, The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding (7th edition), Penguin 2004, p. 54:

     Occasionally a baby will be caught off-guard by mother's strong let-down and he will choke and sputter a bit.

   • 2010, Jan Riordan & Karen Wamback, Breastfeeding and Human Lactation (4th edition), Jones & Bartlett 2010, p. 91:

     Through oxytocin mediation, these afferent pathways become so well established that letdown can occur even when the mother merely thinks of her baby.

• let down (verb)