Roughly 20 weeks into my pregnancy, my husband Thu came home really excited from work one day.

“Nat!” he says enthusiastically as he comes through the door. “I was reading up on breast feeding and it turns out males can lactate. Do you think it would be weird if I breastfeed Noah?”

I’m completely amused. “Um. How do you plan to make yourself lactate?”

He sits down on the couch opposite me and begins to explain: “So it turns out that you can activate male mammary glands through hormone enhancement, malnourishment or nipple stimulation. I don’t want to mess with taking hormones, and I love food too much to starve myself for this, but I can use the breast pump for a couple of months every day before Noah’s born.”

This is just getting better and better, I think. “Wow honey- if you can lactate, more power to you. But my family can’t find out though; I don’t want to have to explain it to them. And if you start growing boobs you have to stop. Those are my two conditions”.

A week later, our fancy electric breast pump arrives at our doorstep. Thu opens up the package like a 10-year-old kid opening a Christmas present. Five minutes later, he’s sitting in a rocking chair, bare-chested, with suction cups on his chest, cringing every time the pump yanked and pulled. I couldn’t stop laughing! High quality entertainment, I tell you!

The lactation experiment went on for three consecutive days, after which Thu looked up at me completely defeated. “This sucks. It takes a long time and I can’t type while I pump because I have to hold the things to my chest,” he says.

“Well honey, if you’d like, I’ll get you a pumping bra. That way you can pump hands free”, I offered.

He considers it for a moment, but refuses. “Nah. I think that’s taking it a little too far. Plus, my nipples feel really weird and raw. I don’t think I like this.” And just like that, the dad milk bank was shut down.