Thanks to biological and behavioral changes, it's totally normal to gain weight when you stop breastfeeding. "It's really common that women will stop breastfeeding and their weight goes up," G. Thomas Ruiz, M.D., an ob/gyn at MemorialCare Orange Coast Medical Center in Fountain Valley, California, tells SELF.
You will burn some stored body fat, but your body protects some fat for the purpose of breastfeeding. Many women don't lose all the baby weight until they completely stop nursing.
Both oxytocin and prolactin contribute to feelings of calm, love, relaxation, closeness and contentment. As breastfeeding ends, both prolactin and oxytocin levels will lower – and so may your mood and sense of wellbeing. It may last a few days, or it may go on for longer.
Your body will generally hold on to an extra 5-10 pounds above your pre-pregnancy weight, until several weeks after weaning and this is to protect your ability to produce milk, in case of illnesses or famine/severe calorie restriction, which is often seen in fad diets.
If your weight retention or gain is related to breastfeeding, whenever you decide to stop breastfeeding you may find it easier to lose weight – if that's what you want.
Weight Gain
Your body uses a lot of calories to produce breast milk, so you may have been able to eat more during breastfeeding without facing any consequences. Once you stop expending those calories, you may notice the weight adding up more easily.
Overall maternal adaptations during lactation include increased basal metabolic rates and mobilization of fat stores [22–24]. Maternal fuel metabolism is altered markedly, with a 15 %–25 % increase in energy expenditure for milk production [24, 25].
After your postpartum checkup (6 weeks after the birth) you can start to lose weight gradually at the rate of about 2 to 3 pounds per month. If you're considerably overweight, you may lose weight faster.
Breastfeeding can be a very magical time for both Mum and baby. It can also help enormously with the initial weight loss and stimulates the shrinking of the uterus and helps flatten your tummy. As well as helping burn calories the nipple stimulation of breast feeding produces the hormone oxytocin.
In a 2004 study in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers actually found that lactating women retained more weight than non-lactating women, presumably “due to the influence of prolactin on appetite stimulation.” Some women may mistakenly treat breastfeeding like a no-effort diet.
How long after weaning will it take for hormones to balance and your cycle to recalibrate? “Any changes to our body's systems typically takes up to three months. This is the time for our hypothalamic-pituitary-ovarian (HPO) axis, which is the communication from brain to ovaries, to recalibrate.
Going back to work is a very common reason why committed breastfeeding mothers have to stop. Breast pumping at work is time-intensive and very boring. Generally, women end up locking themselves in a closet somewhere during their lunch hour.
The best way to lose weight once you stop nursing
Just adjust your diet and exercise habits to ensure you burn calories. Set a cut-off period and make some serious changes to your diet and routine. These are a few pointers — replace carbs like rice and maida with complex carbs and multigrain items.
Postpartum Hormone Imbalances Make Weight Loss Difficult
For a lot of women, postpartum weight loss issues stem from hormonal imbalances. Obviously, pregnancy causes a lot of hormone changes. Your hormones probably won't snap back to normal the second your bundle of joy is here.
The extra fluid that built up in your body during pregnancy will gradually decrease, reducing swelling and bloating . And any extra fat you put on to nourish your baby will start to burn off, especially if you're breastfeeding and exercising . But it takes at least a few weeks to see noticeable results.
Expect it to take around six weeks for your uterus to contract fully. At six weeks, you may have already lost the weight you gained during pregnancy. This is especially true if you're breastfeeding. Breastfeeding mothers shed around 500 calories per day.
“It is true that higher [prolactin] production slows down your metabolism. It doesn't prevent weight loss; but some women reach a plateau,” says Meghna Joshi.
The truth is that breastfeeding doesn't affect breast shape or volume. Instead, the ligaments that support a woman's breasts stretch as breasts get heavier during pregnancy. After pregnancy, even if a woman doesn't breastfeed, this stretching of the ligaments might contribute to sagging breasts.
Breastfeeding. It takes about 500 extra calories a day to make breast milk. You get those extra calories from the foods that you eat every day and the fat that is already stored in your body. Using up those fat stores helps you to lose weight gained in pregnancy faster.
69% of babies are receiving some breastmilk at 4 months of age. 60% of babies are receiving some at 6 months. 28% of babies are still breastfeeding at 12 months.
If you're unable or choose not to breastfeed, it's definitely okay—and you're not alone. Canadian and U.S. surveys have shown 10% to 32% of mothers never begin breastfeeding and 4% stop within the first week of life. An additional 14% of mothers stop nursing before their baby is 2 months old.
But they say this crankiness in babies is normal and just their natural way of communicating their needs to their mother and is no cause for alarm. For example, some cries will be down to tiredness not hunger.