A few weeks ago, I reached my pre-pregnancy weight. It was a nice thing to see on the scale, but since it is still pretty far from my target weight, it was also a bit anti-climactic.
There's a lot of talk about pregnancy weight, but I found most of it to be supremely unhelpful. What follows is my two or three cents on the subject.
The total - I know a lot of new moms now, and most everyone I have talked to has put on more than the recommendation. These are educated and moderately (if not more) active women. This isn't really a surprise, given that so many of us struggle with our weight even prior to pregnancy. My peers don’t smoke like previous generations did, which probably throws off some stats. It also seems to me that some of the most active women put on the most weight because they aren’t able to keep up their normal exercise habits.
But what gets me is the recommendation. For my pre-pregnancy weight, I was told 15 pounds would be good. Has anyone ever put on that little? It would mean that you'd be essentially losing weight as you gain weight.... It felt so far out of reach as to be irrelevant and various medical professionals threw out that number without much conviction.
The rate - The linear weight gain graphs are pretty useless. The reality is as curvy as, well a pregnant lady. Here’s what my graph of gain and loss looks like:
The measurement - Given that so much emphasis is placed on the number on the scale, you'd think that it would be measured accurately, but it is not. To keep my sanity I weighed myself at the same time in the same conditions, at home and tried to ignore the post-lunch, fully-clothed numbers at my appointments. The difference between those two numbers was easily more than 10 pounds in a single day. This really bugged me.
There's a lot of talk about pregnancy weight, but I found most of it to be supremely unhelpful. What follows is my two or three cents on the subject.
The total - I know a lot of new moms now, and most everyone I have talked to has put on more than the recommendation. These are educated and moderately (if not more) active women. This isn't really a surprise, given that so many of us struggle with our weight even prior to pregnancy. My peers don’t smoke like previous generations did, which probably throws off some stats. It also seems to me that some of the most active women put on the most weight because they aren’t able to keep up their normal exercise habits.
But what gets me is the recommendation. For my pre-pregnancy weight, I was told 15 pounds would be good. Has anyone ever put on that little? It would mean that you'd be essentially losing weight as you gain weight.... It felt so far out of reach as to be irrelevant and various medical professionals threw out that number without much conviction.
The rate - The linear weight gain graphs are pretty useless. The reality is as curvy as, well a pregnant lady. Here’s what my graph of gain and loss looks like:
The measurement - Given that so much emphasis is placed on the number on the scale, you'd think that it would be measured accurately, but it is not. To keep my sanity I weighed myself at the same time in the same conditions, at home and tried to ignore the post-lunch, fully-clothed numbers at my appointments. The difference between those two numbers was easily more than 10 pounds in a single day. This really bugged me.
you are perfect from your nose to your toes!
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