We talked about losing pregnancy weight yesterday. Today I want to take a look at what a woman should look into as she prepares to lose her pregnancy weight post-partum. While I can’t endorse any one single plan as the best plan for losing weight, I do have some good ideas of how to do your planning. First and foremost, give yourself that six to ten weeks after the baby is born to recover. You may find yourself shedding excess weight through breast-feeding. When a woman breast-feeds, her uterus will tighten up and that helps to reduce the levels of bloat and water retention in the body.
Set Realistic Goals
When you are ready to begin tackling exercise again, usually six or seven weeks after the baby is born – then you can begin to set realistic goals based on realistic expectations. One excellent rule of thumb is to plan to lose only 1 to 2 pounds per week. If you gained about 30 or 40 pounds during your pregnancy and that’s the weight you need to lose – then you are looking at a four to six month path towards losing that excess weight.
Knowing that, it’s important to remember again that there is no such thing as a safe or effective diet plan that is better than another. It is important for a new mother to eat a very healthy, well-balanced diet especially if she is nursing. What you eat is providing nutrients to your infant. So don’t ever plan for the severely restrictive diet. If you eat sensibly and you eat a well-balanced set of meals, four to six times a day – keeping portions reasonable but not excessive – that’s a great first step.
Daily Exercise
During your period of recovery, you will feel yourself regaining your energy. Walking is a great way to rebuild your strength, recharge your batteries and begin your exercise regimen before you start over-exerting. So what does that mean? Go for a short walk in the morning and the evening. Initially, see if you can leave the baby with your spouse or parent so that those excursions are some quiet time to yourself. Fifteen to twenty minutes is a great target time for these initial walks.
As the baby gets older, he or she can join you in a stroller and they will enjoy the time as well. These daily walks are ways to begin increasing your metabolism. Bit by bit, you will find yourself walking longer and longer. But remember, 20 minutes in the morning and 20 minutes in the evening is 40 minutes a day. As your energy levels increase and your sleep begins to stabilize as the baby settles into better habits – you can add different forms of exercise to your workout as you like.
But remember, walking is a great and easy way to workout and it’s good cardiovascular support for your system and it also helps trim the excess pounds. You just need to burn an extra 3500 calories per week to drop 1 pound. So balancing your eating habits versus your energy output habits and you will find that 3500 is a lot easier to attain than you know.
If you are doing this and after a year you are still measuring those extra pounds – then it may be time to get extra help either in the form of a personal trainer to kick up the workout or a evaluation for the diet plan from a certified nutritionist or even a visit to the physician to find out their medical evaluation – or all the above.
What have you done to help you lose weight after your pregnancy?