Losing Post Baby Weight

First, I just want to say that I am not a health or fitness expert, nor am I a personal trainer.

Everything I write about in regards to health or fitness is MY personal story.

I've shared with y'all my post pregnancy weight loss journey on my blog, and I love all the encouragement I've gotten about it.

I also love getting emails from women who have told me that I've motivated them.

It makes me feel happy, because in all honesty, the reason why I have documented my fitness journey and post pregnancy weight loss is for my own personal motivation.

When I let the whole world know about my goals, it holds me accountable.

But knowing that it's motivated others is really encouraging!

Health and fitness should be a big priority for everyone, in my humble opinion.

Healthy people are happy people....happy people attract other happy people....happy moms have happy kids....YOU GET IT.

With my 2nd pregnancy, I've lost the baby weight a LOT faster than I did with my first.

However, I feel like my weight loss journey has given some women really unrealistic timelines for getting their post baby body back.

I was watching Wendy Williams today, and she had an "Ask Wendy" segment with a doctor on weight loss.

A woman asked what a realistic timeline was for her to lose all her baby weight (she had a baby 4 months prior).

The doctor told her that realistically, it takes a year to a year and a half for a woman to lose her baby weight.

After hearing that, I wanted to blog about it.

I think women oftentimes forget that it took 9 months to gain all that weight, it's gonna take at least equal that time to lose it too!!!

With my first pregnancy, I gained 60lbs....I added 60lbs to my little 5'4 frame.

I was almost 190lbs when I was full term with Dannika.

 I'm not gonna lie, I ate EVERYTHING I craved when I was pregnant with her.

We are talking In N Out, Mexican food, dessert....anything my little heart desired, I ate it.

After I gave birth, I figured the weight would just fall off.

I was SO wrong.

The weight just seemed to cling to my body for dear life.

This was 3 months after having Dannika.

These pictures do no justice to the amount of weight I was carrying, but at least you get a clear view of my legs, stomach, and butt.

Here's a photo of me on stage at Pacific Coast Church in San Clemente, CA for Dannika's baby dedication (Dannika was either 4 or 5 months old).

Look at my thighs.

It took me almost exactly a year to lose ALL the baby weight.

Nick deployed when Dannika was 6 months old, and when he came back, he came home to this...

This was 13 months after Dannika was born.

 And I was bikini ready for our trip to the Dominican Republic a month after Nick got home from Afghanistan.

With Mattis, the weight has come off a lot faster.

The biggest reason is that I was a lot more careful with my weight gain during pregnancy with him.

I remembered how hard it was and how long it took to lose the weight after I had Dannika, so I held back on my cravings, ate healthy, and watched my weight. 

Having to lose less weight was obviously way easier.

I've also been training my husband to get his run time down for OCS. 

There isn't much that I'm better at than him (as far as physical fitness), but one thing is that I've always been a better runner than him.

I guess the biggest thing I want people to get out of this is that I'm not taking any sort of miracle drug or pill.

For some women it takes a year to get back to their pre baby body.

For some, it takes half that time.

It all depends on what work you put in, and most importantly, how your body responds!

 

I know my body and I know what my body responds to.

I don't take supplements because I'm breastfeeding.

I eat a lot of calories because I'm breastfeeding.

I make sure the calories I consume COUNT.

I work out 5 days a week with an active recovery day.

I switch my work outs up a lot for muscle confusion.

I lift weights.

I do cardio.

I have cheat days...a lot of cheat days.

This is what works for ME.

Find out what works for YOU, and stick with it.

Just keep in mind that that it took you 9 months to make a human inside of you, it took you 9 months to gain all that weight to sustain that human...

It might take you that long to lose what you gained to sustain that baby....

Patience...