Accounting for breast feeding

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berk87
berk87 Posts: 2 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I am nursing my baby, according to what I have read, I can assume I loss about 500 extra calories daily by nursing... however if this was true, I would weight a lot less... Anyone have any hints on what worked for them.

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  • zlagv
    zlagv Posts: 10 Member
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    I am also breastfeeding. I do not figure it into my calorie calculations but my understanding is that you do burn about an extra 500 a day when baby is nursing around the clock and that decreases to about 300 a day when baby is nursing less frequently. With this also comes a massively increased appetite! I thought the baby weight would just melt off while breastfeeding but because I let my appetite be my guide that certainly didn't happen. I got serious about losing weight at 7 months postpartum and I'm currently 19 lbs down!
  • kk_inprogress
    kk_inprogress Posts: 3,077 Member
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    Try not to think of breast feeding as burning calories, but rather keep in mind that you need to intake an extra 500 calories a day to meet your baby's needs.
  • SafioraLinnea
    SafioraLinnea Posts: 628 Member
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    Agreed with the others: your intake needs to be high enough to account for BFing.

    My almost 3 month old nurses every 2 hours during the day and 2-3 times at night. I eat five times a day to satisfaction which is roughly 2300 calories (likely more because I'm not counting closely). I'm not intentionally trying to lose fat but it's happening anyway. I have not experienced the excessive hunger most nursing moms get. I actually have had very little appetite since my pregnancy started and it has continued postpartum.

    I eat to fuel my body and feed my baby. I actually really hope my appetite comes back soon. It doesn't feel normal to be this way but my daughter is very healthy and growing well and I feel better physically than prepregnancy. So I guess something is going right?

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