Will I lose Weight While Breastfeeding?
This is one of those tricky questions that’s not easy to answer as every woman is different and each body react differently.
However, some women find that breastfeeding is most helpful with losing those extra baby pounds that are left on the body after childbirth. They think that it makes the body just shrink back into shape afterwards. They are partly right as it takes between 200-500 extra calories per day just to breastfeed.
Some women though, find it doesn’t make much difference at all, maybe they are the ones that are eating more than that 500 calories extra every day. It really depends on your body.
If you want to start losing weight after childbirth, you do need to be cautious. It takes your body up to 6 months to recover and during this time you need to be careful and take it very slowly. Losing more than a pound a week can be dangerous at this time.
The best way to approach weight loss as this time is to do very gentle exercise, like stretching, yoga and gentle walking. Making sure that you are eating lots of fresh organic vegetables and fruit, along with adequate amounts of protein will help a lot. Try to eat small and often to keep your metabolism up to speed.
Just the energy needed to wake at nights for feeds and looking after the needs of a new baby will use up a lot of extra energy and colories.
Most importantly, enjoy this time with your new baby and don’t be too obsessive about weight loss at this time.
August 17th, 2008 at 10:17 am
Your blog is interesting!
Keep up the good work!