Overweight women who are breastfeeding and want to
lose weight can do so safely by decreasing the amount
of sweetened drinks, snack foods, sweets and desserts
in their diet and walking briskly for 45 minutes per
day, four days per week, a new study indicates.
This approach sheds about a pound a week. It does
not affect women's ability to breastfeed, and it's
not harmful to their infants, study chief Dr. Cheryl
A. Lovelady of the department of nutrition at The
University of North Carolina at Greensboro stated.
The post-childbirth period "may be an ideal time
to implement an exercise and diet program," as many
women are anxious to lose weight after the baby arrives,
she and her colleagues note in the Journal of the
American Dietetic Association. However, the effect
of dieting on maternal nutrient intake, which impacts
the nutrient content of breast milk and maternal health,
"must be determined."
Lovelady's team determined dietary changes in a group
of women participating in a study looking at the effects
on infants of weight loss in overweight lactating
mothers.
At 4 weeks after delivery -- once breastfeeding was
established and mothers had recuperated from delivery
-- 35 overweight breastfeeding women were randomly
assigned to reduce their energy intake by 500 calories
per day and to exercise, or to maintain their usual
diet for 10 weeks (the control group).
Exercise consisted of brisk walking or jogging or
aerobic dancing at 65-80 percent of maximum heart
rate. Calorie reduction was achieved, in large part,
by decreasing consumption of foods high in fat and
simple sugars such as chips, soft drinks, sweets,
high-fat meat, and food groups containing starches
with fat, the investigators note.
All of the women exclusively breastfed during the
study and none of the women complained of reduced
milk volume or "fussy" infants, or fatigue as a result
of dieting and exercising. The infants of mothers
in the diet-and-exercise group grew as well as the
infants of mothers in the control group, Lovelady
said.
The diet and exercisers lost significantly more weight
and body fat over the course of the study than the
control group.
The team says the dietary changes "added up to a
significant decrease in overall kilocalories consumed,
without adversely affecting nutrient intake except
for calcium and vitamin D." Lactating women who diet
should increase their intakes of foods high in calcium
and vitamin D, Lovelady and colleagues advise.
"Lactating mothers should also continue to consume
at least three 8-ounce servings of low-fat dairy products
and five servings of fruits and vegetables per day,"
Lovelady stated.
SOURCE: Journal of the American Dietetic Association,
June 2006.
