Nursing

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Anandabarker10
Anandabarker10 Posts: 2
in Health and Weight Loss
How do I add in calories for nursing?

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  • kitka82
    kitka82 Posts: 350 Member
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    You can search "Breastfeeding" when adding your food and it will give you a deficit anywhere between 200-500 calories. If you are tracking macronutrients closely, I am not sure if it accounts properly for macros.
  • CarrieCans
    CarrieCans Posts: 381 Member
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    If you are pumping it's easy. 20 calories per ounce. I would ask dr for specifics when it comes to calculating calories by feeding times. I had a heck of a time with this when i was feeding my daughter because i got so much varied info.
  • Myriambaril18
    Myriambaril18 Posts: 9 Member
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    That is hard to say...I'm nursing a very hungry baby. My nutritionist (I consulted on this very topic) told me to add 450 calories per day to my target calories/day. I believe that my little hulk is taking me around 1000 calories a day.... I've been losing 2 pounds a week for 10 weeks and I eat 2300 calories!!!! (I'm 5'9'')

    Then again, I believe it's a good idea to start with around 450 cal/day and adjust the following weeks depending on your weight loss. I've been told not to lose more than 2 lbs/week to avoid milk production problems and to avoid putting pollutants that are in our fat mass back into the bloodstream (and hence into the milk).

    Another tip: make sure you eat enough protein (again from my nutritionist) to account for the protein in your milk. For my size (5'9'') she said to aim for around 90 g/day.

    As to how to manage it in myfitnesspal...I manually adjusted the target calories.

    Good luck!
  • veganbettie
    veganbettie Posts: 701 Member
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    you add it as a food, you can look at my diary if you want. it comes up as a -200 (my baby is a 2 and half year old monster)

    If your baby is exclusively nursing, no table food or formula add about 500.

    For older babies eating food its about 300.

    Also judging the calories that you should be taking away by pumping probably isn't the best idea, not all women respond well to a pump so it's not really a good indicator of supply, so while you may only be pumping 2 ounces a session, there probably is a lot more milk you're making. :)

    Most nursing mothers should not go below 1800 calories a day, but of course there are a lot of factors that come into play.

    How old is your baby? Congrats btw. :)
  • Anandabarker10
    Anandabarker10 Posts: 2
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    Thanks!! He is 2 months old.
  • mrsmcmo
    mrsmcmo Posts: 109 Member
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    Don't bother asking your doctor, please. I have heard of doctors FAR too often giving out terrible breastfeeding info/advice. I would see if you can track down a IBCLC (internationally board certified lactation consultant) and see if they can give you any info. It really does depend on how much your little guy is nursing. :)
  • Southern_Doll
    Southern_Doll Posts: 9
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    mrsmcmo wrote: »
    Don't bother asking your doctor, please. I have heard of doctors FAR too often giving out terrible breastfeeding info/advice. I would see if you can track down a IBCLC (internationally board certified lactation consultant) and see if they can give you any info. It really does depend on how much your little guy is nursing. :)

    This is SOO true. Ask a lactation consultant. You should have LC's at the hospital/birthing center you had your baby at. Also when working out don't forget to drink a ton of water. I can't work out at all because my supply drops. So my baby is 16 months old and I still haven't started working out. Breastfeeding lost all of my baby weight for me though. :) I'm 5lbs less than when I got pregnant. haha

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