Do you add calories to your goal if you’re nursing?

MissesBaum

I’m not sure whether to go with the 1 pound of loss recommendation or add onto it

MsOpus

On average, a nursing mom needs an extra 500 calories a day. So if your calories are set for 1 lbs loss per week, you might find yourself losing close to two anyway.
Make sure you stay very hydrated for both you and babe. If you are hungry, don't be hard on yourself if you go over. Baby is counting on you to eat enough for both of you.
Fruits and veggies are great to fill up on for both of you and fruit will help with the hydration too.
Good luck! It's doable, but be patient.

PAV8888

One option is to set yourself at maintenance letting nursing create a reasonable deficit. The other option is to log an "exercise" equal to the calories of nursing. A third option is to declare a higher base activity level than normal to account for nursing (assuming you aren't already very active).

Out of three I think that #2 and #1 are probably the better ones in terms of accuracy and flexibility depending on how detail oriented and number driven one is.

It is extremely unlikely that the recommendation to a nursing mom would be to create a deficit that is larger than 500Cal a day. If such a recommendation is being given by an attending physician, any questions should be directed to them and their staff as opposed to the forum

kimny72

MissesBaum wrote: »

I’m not sure whether to go with the 1 pound of loss recommendation or add onto it

Yes you do. If you don't eat enough, you risk losing your supply. Most of the veteran posters here that I've seen set their calories to maintenance and allowed nursing to create their deficit.