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Weight loss and breastfeeding

michaelagreen90
michaelagreen90 Posts: 1 Member
edited November 2024 in Health and Weight Loss
Is anyone else here nursing? How does that play into your caloric intake during the day? I know nursing can burn calories but does your food intake increase as well?

Replies

  • try2again
    try2again Posts: 3,565 Member
    You absolutely have to factor breastfeeding into your calorie intake. I think the rule is, breastfeeding moms require an additional 4-600 calories/day. Take it slow and don't endanger your milk supply :)
  • fourtherecord
    fourtherecord Posts: 103 Member
    I'm breastfeeding at the moment as well. I'm making sure I don't go below 1800 calories as I don't want my milk supply to be affected.
    I have mfp set to 0.5lb/week.
  • DomesticKat
    DomesticKat Posts: 565 Member
    Here's what I recommend: Set your account to maintenance for 3 or 4 weeks. Follow that calorie goal and log all of your food with MFP. A food scale helps with that. Find a weight trending app that shows your rate of loss and deficit per day (like Libra) and start weighing yourself and tracking your weight loss trend. Do that consistently for 3 or 4 weeks, and you'll know what kind of deficit breastfeeding is creating.

    I don't recommend losing more than a pound a week, or starting off by eating in a deficit when you don't know what breastfeeding is doing deficit-wise on its own. I'm nursing my soon to be one year old and losing about a pound a week with 2070 a day. My maintenance calories are likely higher than that since my baby is older but I won't really know until he weans. I've tracked with Libra the last year and my deficit has averaged out to 556 calories a day, but on a day to day basis that can vary a lot depending on a variety of factors. Is your baby sick? Teething? Are you needing to pump extra to leave with your baby? Baby starting solids? Does your baby just like to nurse all day and night? All of that stuff influences how many calories you burn by expressing milk, and nobody is going to be able to figure that out for you. That's why I recommend collecting your own data over time and adjust as you go.

  • DomesticKat
    DomesticKat Posts: 565 Member
    edited April 2018
    It's also important that you log any exercise and set your activity level to the correct setting and eat back the calories it gives you. Since breastfeeding creates its own deficit, you're not doing yourself any favors by making that deficit even bigger. I originally thought I was lightly active. Then I received a Fitbit as a gift and realized I should be set to active with 10,000+ steps per day, so I eat more now.
  • urloved33
    urloved33 Posts: 3,323 Member
    edited April 2018
    http://www.zipmilk.org/ ask a professional. also most times ins will pay for a consult with a nutritionist or a lactation consultant to assist you.
  • kimothyschma
    kimothyschma Posts: 209 Member
    Another note: intermittent fasting is not great for nursing mothers and neither is keto.

    I’m nursing an 18 month old right now and I have no idea what my burn is. I have my calories set to lightly active because I seem to burn somewhere between the lightly active and active setting. It can be frustrating to figure out.
  • ashliedelgado
    ashliedelgado Posts: 814 Member
    Everything DomesticKat said. The guidelines I learned were 500 calories a day for exclusive breastfeeding, 250 once your baby starts solids or any other form of supplementation.
  • DomesticKat
    DomesticKat Posts: 565 Member
    ashliedelgado wrote: »
    Everything DomesticKat said. The guidelines I learned were 500 calories a day for exclusive breastfeeding, 250 once your baby starts solids or any other form of supplementation.

    I've seen the 250 before but I strongly encourage people to start out by eating at maintenance regardless of how much they think their baby nurses. If I had followed the 250 calories extra a day when my dude turned 6 months and started solids, I would have been losing over 3 pounds a week at that point. I've had weeks where my deficit was HUGE and I had to increase my calories significantly to stop from losing too much every week. All of those numbers on the internet (and MFPs calculations) are estimates so it's really important to collect your own data over time. I'm still eating at what MFP considers maintenance for a person of my height and weight who is active and my baby turns 1 in two days.
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