Advice for Loosing Pregnancy Weight!

Loosing weight after childbirth is not an easy feat.  I can attest to this from my own experience.  I had gained a whopping 77 pounds before I had given birth to my son, and I can say I’ve lost 65 of those pounds give or take a few pounds on a given day if I were to weigh myself.

 

 

It hasn’t been an easy journey and I’m not down to my original weight yet.  I found this for more than a few reasons.

1. It took me 16 weeks to fully heal from the birthing experience.
2. I nursed until 17 months and found if I started to exercise and do endurance/aerobics exercises I’d have my milk supply go down.
3.  My habits that I developed from being pregnant, somewhat stuck with me, including some of my cravings.
4. The lack of sleep had played a huge role in keeping the weight on.
5. I had Diastasis Recti and you aren’t to do crunches with this condition until your stomach muscles come back together.  I was lucky I didn’t need surgery.  I know some moms who have had too.

 

From the above challenges I experienced as a new mom, and I know everyone’s own experience will be different.  Yet, from my own experiences, I can say…  Don’t be upset with yourself for not bouncing back into your skinny jeans right away.  I’ve still not gotten back to my old jeans, many postpartum new moms wear their pregnancy pants for their 4th trimester.  I can attest to this; those pants are just more comfortable.

When you are a new mom, your main concern is your new baby, and maintaining your balance so you and the baby are okay.  I recall how I found the first 6 months a challenge, as I never slept much.

From a health side of things, I also needed to heal, and my body needed to recover from the pregnancy and birth. I also knew how huge sleep was/is in helping my body to loose weight.  With such little sleep and inconsistent sleep I had to be kind to myself, and you should too.

Let’s chat nursing. I was able to go for 17 months and my son naturally weaned himself.  I was ready and he was too.  That being said, when I wanted to get him to the year mark for all of the health benefits, I realized that when I started to exercise and loose weight to quickly my milk supply went down.  My solution that worked?  I held off on the exercise bike and made a lot of oatmeal savoury cookies.  I can’t say this for everyone, but oatmeal was amazing at upping my milk supply, and those oatmeal cookies were a life savour.

So, what did I do to loose a large portion of the post pregnancy weight?  And, what am I doing now still 2 years later? 

Once done with nursing I took my leftover weight seriously and reassessed my eating habits.  I have shrunk my portion sizes, and I don’t need to eat food before bed or in the night after I’ve nursed now. Notably, before I stopped nursing, the weight was gradually coming off due to the excess calories I burning just by nursing.

These days, I have done tummy exercises and don’t have the Diastasis Recti to worry about either.  I still struggle with having a sweet tooth, but I find when I am exercising I am more diligent about what I place in my body.

I’m also going to be doing healthy dining reviews to get on the Healthy Eating train when eating-out again. This was a great way for me to make sure I didn’t eat deep fried foods when dining out in the past. My mentality, to be kind to myself.  I know I have my weight goals, and yet I also know what an effort it is and has been to be a mom.  I also ride my upright bike, and any time my son goes outside to play I bring my skipping rope to do intervals.  That has been a great way to get back into exercising!

Some other thoughts around food…

Just today, I saw a friend while visiting Bowen Island and she was at her wits end.  Her 14 month little daughter is at the ‘no’ to everything stage. Her friend took her daughter to say hi to her, and I saw my friend trying to eat her breakfast before she was given her daughter back.

It is amazing what a help just holding a friends kid is to let them eat a meal in peace.

I can say ‘us moms’ have all been there, and I still don’t finish a meal in a sitting. I either am having my food eaten by my toddler, or I am onto another chore.  I also know as a mom, normally everyone is eating before I am, and usually my family is half done by the time I’ve grabbed the bib, or glass of milk for my toddler.

We moms’ don’t eat with others like we used to, and truth be told I’m guessing we all eat faster when we do get to eat, as by the time we finally get our food everyone is almost done.

Or, we know time is limited when it comes to eating at the least; especially around dinner time.  I find breakfast one of the best meals of the day now, as this meal is my easy going meal.

Who knew eating was so pressure filled before being a mom?!  I used to be the last one at the table because I was a slow eater. Nowadays I’m there not only because of this ( and again, I’m sure I eat faster out of need), but because sometimes I don’t want my toddler to eat my food either… Or, I’ve gotten up so any times to make sure he has eaten enough.  For instance, if he is being a bit picky and won’t eat something, I’ll get something else made for him.  It is this complex dance of feeding your kid, and making sure to eat yourself, and not to frantically get the food down.

Gone are the days of candle light and slow savoury eating for a while, unless it is an anniversary !  As a new mom now, I’ve found eating food has changed.

Funny, just today I made my son a salmon lox bagel with cream cheese and darned if he didn’t eat all the salmon off and want more. My mom gave my son some of hers.  I knew if I sat down all of the lox on my bagel would have been gone too.  So…  I stood in the kitchen and ate my lunch! Reality: my reality as a mom.  Am I alone in this?  Or, does your child look to your plate for more delicious morsels of food?!

Another great option to lose weight is to join a post pregnancy workout program by a fitness specialist in postpartum recovery and wellness.  Click here, to check out this online 6 week Postpartum workout program that is seeing great results, or you can Click here too.

Now that I’m back from Maternity leave; you’ll be getting a ton of new content on Healthy Dine Out.

Thank you for your time!

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