First week on MFP!

Options
ashbar9915
ashbar9915 Posts: 11 Member
in Introduce Yourself
How did I not know about this app before? I love it.

Anyways, My name is Ashley and I'm a 29 year old newish mom (my boy is going to be 1 in a month !!! :o ) and I'm going to lose about 90 lbs. My weight is something I have always struggled with even though I've not always been overweight. My thinner times were always achieved by basically starving myself. Add that to my pcos with insulin resistance and my metabolism is pretty messed up.

Currently I'm at about 220lbs, and at 5'0", that's just too too much. My goal is to be about 130 lbs. Right now I'm trying a kind of laid back approach to dieting , in that im trying to make my meals as simple as possible, with lean protein and healthy fats and low g.i. carbs. my pcos comes with a side of insulin resistance that im currently on metformin for, so keeping my carbs down is definitely going to be a goal for me. though I cant cut them down too far, as I am breastfeeding and i tend to lose water a lot when icut carbs too low, and no water= no milk, and my baby comes first in that regard.

As for exercise, I'm aiming to use my elliptical 6 times a week for 30-45 minutes a day and will be trying to add in some resistance training next week when i get my garage cleaned up and figure out what i have in regards to weights. Also they say breastfeeding burns and extra 500-800 calories a day. I wonder if this is true and if it is, should i log that somehow?

Anyways that's me and what I'm doing in a nutshell. I'm hoping ill stick around here for a good long while and have some success with this app. I look forward to meeting you all and wish everyone one luck in their endeavors as well. It seems like if i follow it and log my food and exercise then I'm setting myself up for good results. Its all science and math after all, just got to follow the formula of calories in vs. calories out lol.

Replies

  • dkabambe
    dkabambe Posts: 544 Member
    Options
    Congratulations on your little boy, (and on discovering MFP). Take a look around the forums and make some friends here for any support/advice you need.

    Just to quickly respond to breastfeeding point, you definitely should take account of those calories (particularly if you're exclusively breastfeeding) as you don't want to under-nourish yourself or your child. Having said that, it's nigh on impossible to know how many calories you're using up that way - depends how much the baby drinks/you express, (most of the calories end up in the breast-milk rather than being used to make it!). Can be anywhere in the 300-1000 calories range, so I'd count it at the lower end if I were you - as long as you're not being too aggressive with your planned weight loss whilst you are breastfeeding then any difference between that and what you actually use shouldn't be of any harm. Ultimately just listen to your body and your baby - if either of you are constantly hungry/overly tired/overly weak or you're losing weight very quickly then maybe think about eating more.

    Feel free to friend if wanted and all the best with parenthood and your MFP journey, Dzinja.
  • ashbar9915
    ashbar9915 Posts: 11 Member
    Options
    I'm definitely trying for slow and steady weight loss, I don't want to be too aggressive with it right now. I don't want to burn out too early and i certainly don't want to lose my milk supply. Luckily my baby is on solid food now too, so I'm not his only source of nutrition now, but until he is one im his most important course so I have to make sure I don't go overboard.
  • dkabambe
    dkabambe Posts: 544 Member
    Options
    That's ok - you should be fine then. I had misread your post and thought your baby was about to be 1 month old rather than "1 in a month". Since you're not exclusively breastfeeding then I imagine you're not using a huge amount of calories through breastfeeding so carry on being sensible as you are and sure you'll find the happy medium of keeping nourished and losing weight.

Categories