Archive for the ‘Pregnancy Weight Gain’ Category

Having a baby is a wonderful experience for any woman; however, many would like to regain their pre-pregnancy shape as soon as possible. If you are reading this, most probably you are also finding the solution on how to lose weight after pregnancy.
 
As most mothers are often worried about many trival issues that lead them to emotional stress and mood swings, you should learn more about pregnancy facts and enjoy the experience of transformation from a woman to mother rather than getting unduly worried on how to lose weight after pregnancy.  

Basically, before you stop breastfeeding, you will hang on to the last few pounds you have to lose. This is dued to your body may need to cling onto a few extra pounds to ensure that sufficient energy to provide adequate milk for the baby. Usually the breasts are the first body parts to gain weight due to the storage of fatty cells in the tissue. While this is good from one standpoint it also is bad in that it sometimes keeps you holding onto that post pregnancy fat that you would like to lose.   

In this article, I will share with you on some simple tips that will help you to regain your pre-pregnancy shape back.  

1. Substitute your snacking with healthy food  

One simple tip to lose weight after pregnancy is to actually substitute your snacking with healthy food such as fruits and vegetables. Fruits and vegetables will speed up your metabolism rate. During pregnancy, we naturally eat more in order to help nourish the unborn baby. Unfortunately,our bodies tend to crave for more food (especially desserts which contain a lot of sugar) during pregnancy that are not particularly healthy. Being pregnant doesn’t mean you should be “eating for two”. It is very important to watch your diet and be scrupulous in the selection of food you eat.   

2. Doing good workouts   

Doing good workouts after pregnancy helps combat fatigue and boost your self-esteem keeping your body shape in trim condition. This will definitely help you to shed those extra pounds after the delivery of the baby. Proper exercise routines are to be followed after pregnancy to regain prior weight . Moms, its best to feed your baby before workout as your breast milk can become much more acid after physical exercises. Breastfeeding your baby before the workout also relaxes the breasts and makes them lighter. This leaves you feel much comfortable during workout.  

It took your body nine months to prepare to give birth, and it takes time to recover. With a positive state of mind you will ensure a healthy and effective post pregnancy weight loss program. This is of paramount importance for how to lose weight after pregnancy.

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By far the biggest worry for us pregnant mums is the safety of our little ones. Most of our energy during pregnancy is focussed on providing a safe and nurturing environment for our babies to thrive and develop and the biggest fear in our hearts is doing anything to harm or disrupt our baby’s development in the womb.

But pregnancy can be a confusing time. There is an absolute minefield of pregnancy health and fitness information out there and unfortunately a lot of it is conflicting, inaccurate, misleading and sometimes even potentially harmful to your pregnancy health and the development of your baby. So it’s no wonder that the forums are full of confused pregnant women with pregnancy information overload; looking for a straight and definitive answer to their truckload of pregnancy questions…

“Is it safe to exercise during pregnancy?”

“My midwife said I should only do gentle cardio exercise, but X said it’s fine to do spin/body combat/pump class during pregnancy?”

“What do I do if I can’t eat because I’m so sick? I’m scared that the baby is starving? Someone suggested I use protein shakes…are they safe?”

So here are the Top 3 Rules to Safe and Effective Pregnancy Fitness:

1) Any exercise is not good exercise

Exercise during pregnancy needs to targeted, specific and relative to both your fitness level and the week of your pregnancy. What works for you in weeks 5-9 will not work for you in weeks 20-24 or 36-40.

Your pregnancy fitness program should be based on results, not doing exercise for the sake of doing exercise, (otherwise what’s the point, right?).

A good pregnancy fitness plan will focus on short pregnancy workouts which target the pregnancy and labour muscles and expose your baby to controlled amounts of physical stress to increase her tolerance to labour.

It will also focus on metabolism boosting pregnancy exercises that will keep you burning calories for at least 24 hours after your pregnancy workout and keep excess fat OFF of your body.

2) Sleep is highly underrated

Too many women these days squash pregnancy into their already hectic lives; ask any pregnant woman if she naps daily in the day and the answer is more than likely, “no” or “sometimes”.

Sleep is the only way our bodies can recover, regenerate and repair from physical and mental stress and daily wear and tear and a daily deficit in sleep adds up and eventually wears down the critical processes you need to maintain your pregnancy health.

Sleep is also the only time that we get to balance hormones. Now hormones are not talked about enough when it comes to pregnancy health as they are VITAL to the physical, mental and psychosocial development of your baby. They are also a major factor in controlling pregnancy symptoms, food cravings and pregnancy weight gain.

Aim for 8 hours every night and a daily nap of 30 minutes to keep you alert, energised and in balanced pregnancy health

3) Your BABY is what you EAT!

You may think that pregnancy is a time when you should be able to relax and enjoy the sweeter things in life, but think about this. Every mouthful of food that passes your lips determines the development and future health of your baby.

That may seem extreme but it is absolutely true. Put junk in, guess what you get out?

A pregnancy diet which includes a lot of sugar, refined carbohydrate and processed food is deficient in nutrients, which means that your baby does not have the tools she needs to grow strong healthy cells.

Base your diet on clean, nutrient dense fresh and organic foods with allowances for the odd treat and both you and your baby will thrive.

By: FitNRG.net

One of the most embarrassing pregnancy symptoms is having bladder control problems. During your pregnancy if you suffer from urine leakage while you laugh, sneeze, or cough you should consider doing kegel exercises regularly.  Kegel exercises during pregnancy will help you cure or improve these problems by strengthening the pelvis muscles that control the flow of urine. These pregnancy exercises can be done anywhere and no one will know you are doing them except yourself.

How to Do Kegel Exercises During Pregnancy

Tighten the muscles around your vagina and anus, as if you were stopping the flow of urine. If you need to locate your pelvis muscles you can locate it by stopping your urine in midstream and starting again. It is not recommend you do kegel exercises by actually stopping your flow of urine when you are on the toilet. This can cause some urine to stay in your bladder so you are not completely emptying your bladder when you urinate. But if you need to locate your pelvis muscles you can stop your urine in midstream until you know which muscles you need to exercise. Once you locate your pelvis muscles practice squeezing these muscles while you are not urinating. Initially, hold the muscles tight for about 5 seconds then relax and work your way up to about 10 seconds. Repeat the exercise 5 to 10 times. Try to do three Kegel exercise sessions per day. Do not hold your breath while you are tightening your pelvis muscles.

You can try to prevent urine from leaking out by tightening your pelvic floor muscles before you sneeze or cough.

Kegel Exercises are important during pregnancy because these muscles support the weight of your growing baby. These muscles also help you control the passing of urine and stool so it’s important to strengthen your pelvis during pregnancy and after birth to prevent urine from leaking out while you exercise, cough, or sneeze.

If you suffer from other pregnancy discomforts such as backache, leg cramps, fatigue, or swelling, you can try doing some simple exercises such as walking, swimming, or low-impact aerobics to help reduce your pregnancy’s discomforts. Staying active during pregnancy will help you control your pregnancy weight gain, keep you fit for your pregnancy, delivery, and post-partum recovery.

We all know that exercise is one of the essential ingredients to a healthy body and healthy mind and the same goes for pregnancy.

Pregnancy fitness is really important to condition your body to carry the extra pregnancy weight, avoid postural problems like pregnancy back pain and manage your pregnancy weight gain. After all, you only want to put on “good pregnancy fat”, i.e. the fat neccesary to support your pregnancy and not excess fat that will slow down your body and the development of your baby.

However, that said, not ALL exercise during pregnancy is good. In fact, if you don’t know what you are doing you can make some very risky mistakes.

So here are the 7 things you MUST be aware of before starting any pregnancy exercise programme:

1. Don’t Forget To Warm Up!

The warm-up is an essential part of any exercise programme but particularly in pregnancy. Your warm-up will increase your heart-rate and circulation sending essential oxygen to the muscles that you’re going to be working. It also signals your body that more strenuous activity is coming and prevents injury by releasing muscle tension.

Your warm-up should be enough to raise your heart rate a little and start to make you sweat, but gentle enough that you should be able to breathe easily.

2. Never Forget Your Water!

You know the scenario, you just arrived at the park or the gym and you unpack your bag only to find you’ve forgotten your bottle of water. But you’re all ready to go and you don’t have time to go get another one so you think you’ll make do with the water fountain – or worse you’ll grab some water on the way home…DON’T DO IT – EVER!

Your pregnant body is already more susceptible to overheating and dehydration as it is and exercising without water can be extremely dangerous for both you and your baby. Just 2% dehydration can seriously affect your body’s ability to function.

3. Avoid Exercising in Hot or Humid Conditions

Overheating in pregnancy is not good for you or your baby. Hot or humid conditions will reduce your ability to workout properly and make you feel dizzy, nauseous and faint. But there are more serious implications for your baby – especially in the first trimester. Temperatures of 39 degress celcius or more could cause problems for your growing baby and may lead to birth defects.

So to ensure your safety, avoid exercising outside during the hottest part of the day (10-3pm) and opt instead for an air-conditioned environment.

4. DON’T Do Traditional Abdominal Work!

Traditional abdominal exercises use the “six-pack” muscles that run vertically down your belly. These muscles insert into a midline called the linea alba. In pregnancy these muscles become extremley stretchy to allow your belly to grow with your baby, and become very prone to “abdominal splitting”.

This is where the muscles literally split apart down that midline and seperate. This can be rectified after birth but it takes a LOT of time and effort and it’s best to avoid the scenario in the first place.

Any traditional abdominal exercises, such as crunches, or oblique work will put enormous pressure on the already weakened muscle.

This is not to say that you shouldn’t be working your deep abdominals, but you need to refer to specific pregnancy core exercises rather than crunches.

5. Never Forget Your Back!

Your back is going to take a lot of stress as your body shape changes and your pregnancy grows. One area that women commonly neglect is the mid-back area. Training this area encourages good posture and will pull your shoulders back and lift your chest up and support the extra weight in your breasts.

Try exercises like rows, scapula squeezes and reverse flys to strengthen and tone in this area.

6. Don’t Overdo It

Exercise with caution and remember you should never exercise so hard that you struggle to catch your breath. At the peak of your workout you should feel that you are exercising “somewhat hard” and you should always be able to hold a conversation.

7. Avoid Jerky Movements

Now that you are pregnant your body is producing a lot of hormones which relax the ligaments in your joints, making them very unstable and much more suceptible to injury.

Games like Squash which require sudden changes in direction at high speed can esily result in a severely sprained ankle or twisted knee.

Not to mention that as you get heavier your centre of gravity will shift, affecting your balance and making falls more likely.

It is ALWAYS adviseable to seek professional help once you have found out that you are pregnant. Pregnancy fitness is a very specialised area and you want to be certain that you are getting the best care possible to ensure a healthy pregnancy for both you and your little one.

It is very important which foods you choose during pregnancy. Now you must provide vitamins, minerals, and protein for you and your baby. These nutrients must meet the needs of your growing baby and get your body ready to deliver and nurse your baby. Food is the main source of these nutrients, but no one food can supply them all. Too much of one nutrient will not make up for too little of another one. To ensure this, you will need to chart out a menu that constitutes healthy nutrition for the entire length of your pregnancy. In fact, the pregnancy diet menu can be used even after delivery of the newborn to continue living a healthy lifestyle.

Pregnancy weight gain is on every new mothers mind. That’s why losing pregnancy weight is every new mothers concern. That is also why an after pregnancy diet plan, as daunting as that sounds, is not really that hard and is a very good practice for new mothers. I am sure losing baby fat is not at the top of your list of things to do when your baby is born, but losing weight and regaining your figure is certainly in the back of your mind.

Iron should also be a part of your pregnancy diet menu since it helps to carry the required amount of oxygen to the growing baby in the womb. Constipation is a general pregnancy related problem, and it can be avoided by consuming fibers. Fibers are present in vegetables, whole grains and fruits. Metamucil and Citrucel, which are fiber supplements of fiber are safe to consume during pregnancy.  In case your weight gain is very slow, you must eat smaller meals. Also, marginally increase the fat component of your diet. You must eat whenever you feel hungry. This is because you are now consuming food on behalf of two people as against one person.

To decrease your overall intake of sodium throughout the day, focus on eating fresh foods instead of packaged foods. Fresh fruits and vegetables are fantastic, low sodium options that are good for you and your baby. If you fill half of your plate with fruits and vegetables before you eat other foods, chances are that you will have much less room for all of the high sodium foods that you used to put on your plate.

Proteins are very much essential for any pregnant woman. A minimum of at least three servings of proteins is required per day. This could be either received from three glasses of milk, or 2 cups of yoghurt and 3 ounces of cheese. Proteins could be brought into your body by varied patterns of intake. They are quite rich in amino acids which contribute in building the baby tissue to a maximum extent.