As a newly nursing mom, what you eat will still affect your baby’s nutrition. Having a breastfed baby has many health benefits, and also encourages bonding between mother and child. In order to make sure that you are doing the most to keep your baby healthy, it’s important to keep track of your nutrition as well. Here are some great tips for keeping your diet healthy while breastfeeding.
- Eat a well-balanced diet for YOUR body. Don’t rely too much on one food group or another. By keeping your diet healthy, you are keeping your baby’s diet healthy as well.
- Don’t force yourself to lose weight while you are breastfeeding. Too many mothers try to do one-day cleanses that release toxins that have built up over years while they are breastfeeding. This causes the toxins to appear in breast milk. Going on too few calories can hurt both quality and supply of milk. If you are bent on losing weight, try to lose 1.5 pounds a week at most, and do it in a healthy and reasonable manner.
- Avoid drinking caffeine. Caffeine has negative effects on babies, including hyperactivity and colic. Don’t drink caffeine while nursing.
- Eat foods that taste good to you. Many doctors theorize that the flavors that you ingest will also be ingested by the baby. By eating your favorite foods, you will get your newborn used to the flavors they will experience once they begin to eat solid foods.
- Continue to supplement your diet with vitamins, but consult a doctor first. Although your baby is no longer inside you, he still needs nutrition from you. Take a multivitamin supplement suggested by your doctor in order to keep your baby well-fed. Be careful, it is possible to ingest toxic levels of certain vitamins. Ask your doctor what you should take as a supplement.
Above all, the most important thing to remember when you are choosing what to eat when you are nursing is to remember that as long as the food is healthy and tastes great, you made the right choice.
Do you (or did you) worry about what you eat/ate while nursing? Do you have any nursing tips you’d like to share with us? Leave them in the comments below.
