Pregnancy Intake Calories

Pregnancy books state you need 300 calories MORE a day!

Check out this WebMD Link for the rest of this article. http://www.webmd.com/baby/guide/healthy-weight-gain

Gaining the right amount of weight during pregnancy by eating a healthy, balanced diet is a good sign that your baby is getting all the nutrients he or she needs and is growing at a healthy rate.

It is not necessary to "eat for two" during pregnancy. It's true that you need extra calories from nutrient-rich foods to help your baby grow, but you generally need to consume only 100 to 300 more calories than you did before you became pregnant to meet the needs of your growing baby.

Ask your health care provider how much weight you should gain during pregnancy. A woman of average weight before pregnancy should gain 25 to 35 pounds during pregnancy. Underweight women should gain 28-40 pounds during pregnancy. Overweight women may need to gain only 15-25 pounds during pregnancy. You may need to gain more or less weight, depending on what your health care provider recommends.

Check with your doctor to be sure but I think you are supposed to be eating about 300 calories above your usual maintenance calories. (Also, month 5 in pregnancy is when I really started to gain weight too. For me, a lot of the weight gain from that time on was water weight and came off almost immediately after baby was born)

Yes, I remember hearing a healthy increase of 300 calories a day will support baby & Mom... :flowerforyou: but check with your doctor to verify. Congratulations on your addition and Congratulations to the new one for having a healthy-minded Mom! :bigsmile:

This is so good to know for the future. My three main reasons for wanting to loose this weight is to be healthy, have a baby at a decent weight, and feel better about myself. I really want to start having kids but don't want to do it when I am already overweight.