Every morning since around the fifth week of pregnancy, I’ve woken up to very sore breasts. The breast soreness as a pregnancy symptom is very, very real; even slightly bumping my breasts into something or getting hugged too hard causes them to hurt. They are sore and growing. Sometimes, I even poke or press against one of them to remind myself that I am, in fact, still pregnant. The anxiety of a potential pregnancy loss never seems to fully dissipate. I have no power over the unknown.

This morning, though, when I woke up, my breasts felt particularly heavy, as though they were full of something. Was it MILK? I thought to myself. It’s crazy to think how quickly your body registers that you are pregnant and then immediately signals to all your other body parts that it has X number of weeks to prepare for the baby’s arrival.

The reason that your breasts get sensitive and tender, even heavy during pregnancy, is that hormones in your body immediately start preparing your breasts for lactation as soon as the HCG hormone is detected. Milk ducts are growing and being stretched as they fill with milk very early in pregnancy.

I told Chris that my breasts felt super heavy when I woke up this morning, and he asked why. I explained the above to him, and he got super confused. “THIS early?” he said, astounded.

Yep, this early. Men clearly have no idea how the female body works to prepare, far far in advance, of a baby’s arrival. The female body prepares, and the female mind is on overdrive. I’ve read that many men don’t fully register that a baby is on the way / has arrived until the baby is literally in their arms.