If you have ever been pregnant or if you are now pregnant, you have probably noticed a change in your bra cup size. The physical changes like tender or swollen breasts are one of the earliest signs that you have conceived. Numerous experts believe that the coloration of the areola may also be helpful when it pertains to breastfeeding.

What’s Happening In Your Breasts

What’s even more extraordinary than the visible changes are the abundant changes occurring within your breasts. The growing placenta provokes the release of estrogen and progesterone, which stimulate the complicated biological system, making lactation possible.

Before you become pregnant, a combination of supportive tissue, milk glands, and fat comprise the greater portions of your breasts. In fact, your newly swollen breasts have been readying for your maternity since you were inside your mother’s womb!

When you were born, your main milk ducts were already developed. Your mammary glands remained calm until you progressed to puberty; when a deluge of the female hormone estrogen made them grow and swell. During pregnancy, those glands kick into high gear.

Before your babe is born, glandular tissue has replaced a majority of the fat cells which accounts for your larger breasts. Each breast may actually become one and a half times the size it was before pregnancy.

Nestled amongst the fatty cells and glandular tissue is a complex network of channels or canals known as the milk ducts. The gestation hormones stimulate these ducts to increase in both number and size, with the ducts branching off into smaller channels close to the chest wall called ductules.

The ending of each duct is a bundle of smaller sacs called alveoli. The clusters of alveoli are known as lobules, while a cluster of lobules is called a lobe. Each breast will hold about 15 – 20 lobes, with one milk duct for each lobe.

The milk is created inside of the alveoli, which are surrounded by tiny muscles which squeeze the glands and help push the milk out into the ductules. Those ductules lead to a larger duct that broadens into a milk pool directly beneath the areola.

The milk pools act as resevoirs; holding the milk until your baby suckles it through the small openings in your nipples.

Your milk duct system is fully developed by your second trimester, enabling you to properly breastfeed your child even if he or she arrives earlier than expected.

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