The Baby Weight Struggle

Don’t be fooled by what you hear about burning off all your pregnancy weight by breastfeeding. While some moms will, others, like me, will still be struggling with baby weight almost three years later. Sadly the struggles of pregnancy weight aren’t talked about as often by the moms struggling as the moms who nursed it all away. I nursed my daughter for 25 months and didn’t lose a single pound until she weaned. not one. Not even with diet and exercise.

The fact is that there’s a lot more involved than just calories in, calories out. The quality of your food, the type of exercise is important but some other factors may be involved that you haven’t even thought about. How much you sleep, how your body reacts to stress, what your body does to your hormones when you hear your baby cry, how much time you have to decompress, and how pregnancy and breastfeeding changed your hormones. It’s all a delicate dance and when we don’t think about these things and are doing “everything right” it can bring tears to a new mothers eyes. Trust me – I’ve been there.

Exercise has always been a huge part of my life, after all I used to be a personal trainer. While breastfeeding I did a kettle bell bootcamp, insanity, tried a little jogging and started Cross Fit almost a year ago. Although I noticed changes in my body after a few months of CrossFit the numbers on the scale didn’t move at all. I’ve had my fair share of eating disorders in the past and constantly staring at numbers on a scale was terrible for my self-esteem, I finally had to toss it. The fact was that I had, and have, more going on with my body than just needing to move it a little to shed the weight.

When I finally went to a hormone specialist I found out that my testosterone levels were so low they were in the single digits and I’ve recently started Acupuncture where I found I have some adrenal fatigue and a Spleen/Kidney Jing deficiency. I’m a huge believer in Chinese Medicine and have used Acupuncture in the past for different things and have always found it to have great results. Chinese medicine is something that I’ve always wanted to study more in depth and hopefully someday, sooner rather than later, I’ll have a chance to.

If you’re struggling with losing the baby weight or battling with any other health issue that Western medicine just doesn’t seem to be helping with I strongly suggest getting your hormones checked (Here’s a FOX News article I wrote that may shed some light on wether or not your hormones are affecting your health) and maybe find an Acupuncturist or Naturopath that can lead you down a different path that the typical Western medicine solution of prescription medication. Different types of practitioners view the body, and its systems, differently and they might be able to provide some new insight.

On the other hand if you’re struggling to lose the baby weight but haven’t started an exercise program, that alone may help if you don’t have any other underlying factors going on. Here are some of my quick workout tips that you can try to squeeze in at home, if you’re lucky enough to have a baby that still naps, or if you’re inclined to wake up early to burn a few calories. If you’re not sure you want to give up the extra sleep I will say that I started waking up early to workout at around 5:30ish am most days of the week over 6 months ago and the days that I do drag myself out of bed and lift some heavy weights are by far the days I feel the best all around. It takes a few weeks to get used to it and not want to throw your alarm clock across the room but it’s worth it because wether you’re struggling to lose baby weight or not exercise is something you should be doing no matter what.

And if you are struggling remember that feeling good and being healthy really isn’t about a number. It doesn’t matter what number the scale says and your dress size doesn’t determine your value. Muscle weighs more than fat so the scale isn’t a friend for people into lifting heavy and building large amounts of muscle and the only thing that determines your worth is the kind of person you are on the inside.

“When you are content to be simply yourself and don’t compare or compete, everyone will respect you.”
― Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching