We have all heard the phrase “eating for two” when someone is pregnant. Unfortunately this is not the case at all. Here is a conversation that I had this week that made me think if this topic.
When you are pregnant most of your conversations with other people are about being pregnant. When they were pregnant, or their wife or sister or friend was etc. You get to hear all kinds of stories. Some refreshing and some not so much.
This past week I was talking to a mother of one of my students and I asked her daughter if she had any siblings and she said no. Her mom mentioned that her husband was thinking about having another and she told him basically that he was crazy and she didn’t want to get fat again. Her daughter is also 11 now and she didn’t want to start over at this point.
She also talked about how important being physically active was to her now and giving that up would be hard. I could relate to that. I wanted to have my second child as soon as I felt ready so I could get back into shape myself as quickly as possible.
Now getting to the point of my story. This mother has a friend who is a coworker and is currently pregnant. She told me how this woman drinks a whole container of chocolate milk and eats a whole pizza everyday for lunch. I am not sure how big the container or the pizza was but her hand gestures and her face made it seem like they were both pretty big. She said her friend also looks like she is not taking good care of herself. The mom wants to talk to her about it but doesn’t feel it is her place.
In so many of my conversations with other women who have been pregnant I remember some of them saying, “Oh I loved being pregnant! I could eat whatever I wanted!” I would always think to myself, “Really? I can’t.” Either I wasn’t feeling good enough or I just didn’t want to put on the extra pounds. I do eat more when I am pregnant because I know my body needs more calories but I definitely don’t eat whatever I want. In my normal state I eat three meals a day and one snack at some point. Either in the afternoon or after dinner. When I am pregnant I usually have three meals and three snacks a day. I also try to have healthy snacks and not sugar filled snacks.
Eating for two is an old way of thinking. I would hope by now people know that when you are pregnant you are not eating for two. You are still only eating for yourself and a very little person. Most specialists say that an extra 300 calories a day is enough. That is not very much. Eating a whole pizza and a huge serving of chocolate milk is not eating for two. That could be eating for a family of four! The lunch is not only too much but where are the veggies? I’m sure she is not having a broccoli pizza.
I really believe in training your body to burn fat and not to store fat. When you are pregnant and overeat you teach your body to store fat and you also teach your baby to store fat. Please be sensible. Being pregnant is not a free for all. Just remember the more you put on now the harder it will be to take off later. You also want to start your baby off right. Your baby doesn’t want to be a fat storer. It wants to be able to run and jump with the rest of the kids as soon as possible.
Just remember when you are pregnant someone else is living off of you. Take care of yourself and your little one!