Body After Baby

Posted on July 25th, 2008.

If you’ve ever had the privilege of being pregnant and giving birth to a beautiful baby, you are fully aware of the morphing process our bodies go through during that miraculous time. We go from a nice tight stomach to a small poochy thing, to a ginormous rock hard bubble, and then to my least favorite… the “bread dough” stomach, once the baby is here and you’re left with the flabby remains. Ick! I often wondered why nobody told me NOT to touch my stomach after giving birth.

Right after my first child was born, I immediately looked down at my stomach and thought to myself, “Wow! I’m skinny again!” And then I touched my belly…(What was I thinking?)…It wasn’t a pleasant feeling at all. It truly felt like soft, mushy dough! Then, to make matters worse, I immediately tried on my regular sized jeans the minute I got home from the hospital - totally expecting that they would fit. I mean, why wouldn’t they? I just emptied my body of of a 5 pound 8 ounce baby, a placenta, lots of amniotic fluid and I’m sure a bunch of other icky stuff…surely I was down to my pre-baby size right? Boy was I naive! 

 

After plopping down on my bed in tears because nothing in my closet would fit me, the panic started to set in. Would I stay like this forever? Was I destined to have a mushy belly for the rest of my life? Would the “spread” in my hips ever squish back together? I was already a hormonal mess from just giving birth, so the fact that my body was in such disarray made me feel even worse. I just wanted to be back to the original ME.

 

I finally resorted to patiently waiting for the six week mark. After all, everything I read in the magazines said that most new mommies are back to their pre-pregnancy size at about that point. Well, I learned the hard way that whoever came up with that statistic is a big liar! Seriously - did a man come up with that ridiculous idea? Now that I’ve been around the block a time or two, I don’t think I’ve ever met a girl who was back to her TRUE pre-pregnancy size after only six weeks. 

 

The good news is, (and it took me about nine months after my first baby was born to figure this out), our “bread-dough” tummies CAN get tight again and the baby bulge WILL disappear! For most women, it won’t happen without hard work and determination - but if you dedicate yourself to exercising regularly and eating healthy foods, you can look just as good as you did BEFORE you had kids. 

 

Here are three very important things you should do to get down to your original size after giving birth:

 

1. Eat Adequate Servings of Fruits, Vegetables, Lean Protein and Whole Grains. 

This can be a tough one right after giving birth, because we are SO busy taking care of the baby, that we usually grab something quick and easy to satisfy our hunger. Many times, we rely on take out meals or food that our hubbies throw together and let’s face it…those two options are not usually the most nutritious options. After my second child was born, I vividly remember how thrilled I was when my husband cut up carrots and celery sticks for dinner one night. We had been surviving on foods that loving neighbors had brought over, which had consisted mainly of high fat, greasy foods. I was so exhausted from taking care of my newborn, my toddler and my household duties, that I hadn’t even attempted to wash, peel and cut veggies. When I saw that glorious plate of goodness on our kitchen table that night, tears literally filled my eyes because I was so happy to see it. (Did I mention that I also suffered from hormonal, crying spells?) My husband was instantly confused and wondered what he had done wrong…but soon realized the tears he saw were happy tears. I was so happy to finally have some healthy foods to choose from. Make sure you don’t let your insanely busy schedule (or lack of schedule) get in the way of you eating healthy foods. If you don’t get the adequate vitamins and nutrients that your body is desperately needing, you will naturally crave unhealthy carbs and sugars because of the instant energy it can provide. The problem with that is that 1.) The energy won’t last long and soon you will feel like crashing, and 2.) You are adding calories to your diet without bulk - meaning you will feel hungry sooner and therefore eat sooner which only adds more calories. 

 

2. Get Back Into the Habit of Exercising as Soon as Possible

Hopefully, if you had a healthy pregnancy you were able to exercise regularly during the entire nine months you were pregnant. If so, you will have an easier time getting back into shape once the baby is here. It is very important that you get back to an exercise routine as soon as possible after you give birth. Not only will it help you get down to your original size, it will also increase your energy levels and improve your mood. Of course, functioning on little sleep and trying to keep up with the demands of a new baby makes it easy to think that you simply don’t have the time to exercise anymore and that someday you’ll get back into the habit. Well, the more time that goes by without a structured exercise routine, the harder it is to get back into one. As soon as you feel like your body could safely exercise, do it! Doctors recommend waiting six weeks before performing high intensity exercise, but if you feel like you could perform low intensity exercise before that - go for it. After my second pregnancy, I was so antsy to get back to the gym and start working my body, I could hardly stand it! I finally decided to wait NO longer and got back to the gym two weeks postpartum. Of course, I took it easy and didn’t do anything extreme, but I was moving my body, feeling energized and improving my state of mind. 

 

3. Tighten Your Stomach Muscles

Obviously, our abdominal muscles are very stretched out and weakened after being pregnant for nine months. In fact, I was pretty amused the first time I attempted to perform a sit-up after my son was born. I could barely get my shoulders off the ground and couldn’t even really feel them working. It was like they weren’t even there! Well, let me remind you of the good news once again… your abdominal muscles will not be like that forever! To speed up the strengthening process, there is a simple trick you can do any time of day. You don’t have to be at a gym, you don’t have to be working out to a DVD in your living room, you don’t even have to do it for very long. You simply need to contract your ab muscles and hold it for as long as you can. If you imagine taking your belly button and pulling it in to your spine and holding it there - THAT is what I mean. You are drawing in your stomach muscles, forcing them to contract, and THAT results in them becoming stronger and more stable, because you are making them work, work, work. There was a little trick I used to do when my babies were infants. Each time I would brush my teeth, I would contract my stomach muscles and hold them there. When I would stop at a stop light, I would do the same thing until it was green. There were even times I would be rocking my little one in my arms and simply pull in my stomach and hold it there until they needed a break. It’s a simple little action that provides big benefits. After doing this faithfully, you will notice that each time you work your ab muscles, it gets easier and easier. You will also feel so much more “tight and put together”. After my babies were born, I often felt like I was Humpty Dumpty who had had a great fall and who needed to be put back together again. By doing these things, you can slowly rebuild yourself and strengthen your body to be the tight, firm body you want it to be. 

 

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. I can see now that all those worries I was experiencing that first day home from the hospital were not really necessary. I just needed to have faith that through hard work and patience, I could shape my body the way I wanted it to be and I would not be stuck in that mushy, flappy body forever. The same is true for everybody else! It’s never too late to change the way we are and to strengthen and firm our bodies. Whether you had a baby two months ago, or twenty years ago, you can always change and improve. 

 

If YOU have had kids and have been able to get your body to a place that you are comfortable with, tell us what you did. How did you feel during the process? What are your tips and tricks? I’d love to hear comments on this subject because I think it’s one that many of us mothers struggle with from time to time. So chime in and give us your thoughts! 

 

 

 

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