If you recently had a baby, congrats! It is an exciting and exhausting time of life. Now that the baby is here, you can turn some of your attention to caring for yourself and losing the extra weight that hung around after you gave birth. Successfully losing weight after having a baby is dependent on three factors: your mindset, your nutrition, and your workout routine. You will have the best results if you work on all three factors.
Work on your mindset
Some women seem to pop back to their pre-baby weight immediately after having a baby. I was not one of those women. When I started trying to lose weight after having a baby the biggest obstacle to my success, by far, was my mindset. When the weight did not fall off immediately, I was discouraged. Every time I looked in the mirror my focus was on how far I had to go. The very first thing I tell any new mom who is struggling to lose weight is to honestly examine your mindset. Hating your body and being mad at yourself for slow progress is not helpful. In fact, those thought processes can sabotage your weight loss efforts. Focus instead on the amazing thing that your body accomplished. Try and remember that it took nine months for the changes to occur in your body – it is going to take some time to get back to where you were before. Slow progress is still progress. As long as you are moving forward you will eventually reach your goal.
Focus on adding in good nutrition
A complicated nutrition plan can be overwhelming – especially when you have a baby or young child in your life. If the nutrition plan you choose is over-complicated or too time-consuming it will be difficult to maintain along with your other responsibilities. Before you throw away everything in your pantry and start an elaborate meal planning routine, try adding in a few things to your diet first. Add some fiber-rich vegetables to your plate at lunch and dinner. Make it a point to drink more water each day. Instead of focusing on taking things away (and feeling deprived) you can focus on what you can add. Eating more vegetables and drinking more water will help you feel full longer and naturally eliminate some of the less nutritious foods in your diet.
Add weight training to your workout routine
Many women think that the way to lose the baby weight is to hit the treadmill as soon as possible. Losing weight happens when you have a calorie deficit and cardio burns calories, right? When you start a new workout routine that is cardio-based, you will see some quick results. However, your progress will start to slow over time and will eventual stall completely. The reason for this is because your body is always adapting. When you start doing cardio your body responds by burning a lot of calories. As you consistently do the same cardio, your body adapts and burns less calories in response to the same amount of cardio. Adding weight training to your workout routine will help in a couple of ways: it will keep your body guessing as you change up your routine and the muscle you build will help you burn more calories around-the-clock. Building muscle is the key to long-term weight loss and management. More muscle equals a higher metabolism which means you naturally burn more calories throughout the day.
Losing weight after having a baby is a process. You can lose weight if you get your mindset on the right track, add good foods to your diet, and include weight training into your workout routine. Mind Pump Media has resources to help you with all of these factors and more. You can get started by checking out the Fit Mom Bundle or MAPS Anywhere.
