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Eating for Breastfeeding
from: Maxx Family LifeDuring your third trimester, your baby was old enough to start getting a taste of the foods his/her mom enjoys. Once your baby has arrived and you're breast feeding, your baby will get an even better taste of your favorite food.
Typically, if you're nursing your baby, you should produce anywhere from 23 - 27 oz. of milk a day. In order to do this, you need to increase your calorie intake by about 500 more a day.
You also have to increase your water consumption to at least 2 1/2 - 3 quarts of water a day. You'll probably notice that you're thirstier during nursing session. This is because the water you drink goes right to milk production. Try not to drink more than 3 quarts of water a day. More than 3 quarts can reduce the amount of milk your body produces.
As mentioned, you need to up your calorie intake. Plan to take in about 2500 calories a day or more if you're hoping to nurse for longer than three months. These extra calories shouldn't come from junk food. Junk food and sweets are just empty calories and offer no nutritional value to you or your baby. Eat more protein. A good rule of thumb is to eat 1 gram of protein each day for every pound you weigh. If you weigh 150, aim to eat 150 grams of protein a day.
If you weren't doing so during pregnancy, adopt the six meals a day program. Eat breakfast, a midday snack, lunch, a mid afternoon snack, dinner and a night time snack. Your body is going to be making milk continually so it's a good idea to keep it charged with calories through out the day.
However, there are some foods you'll probably want to avoid during pregnancy since basically everything passes through breast milk and to the baby. This is why pediatricians advise nursing moms to do when their baby has colic is to look at what they're eating. Chocolate has been blamed in many cases of colic and can cause an upset tummy for most babies. If you have a baby with a tummy ache, try to remember if you had a candy bar or even a cookie in the hours before you nursed. The best advice is to stay away from chocolate altogether while nursing.
Stay away from greasy and spicy foods as well. Greasy foods sometimes upset adults stomachs, imagine what it can do to your baby's immature stomach? Wait until your baby is older and no longer nursing before you start making trips back to McDonalds.
You may also want to stay away from garlic and onions while breast feeding. Both of these can flavor the breast milk and you may find your little one won't nurse if you've eaten one of these. Your little one may be just a bit too young to appreciate the taste of garlic and onions anyway.
Remember, it takes a few hours for the food you eat to make its way into your breast milk. You may have eaten one of these foods right before you nurse and see your baby is fine, but by either the following nursing session or the one after you might find your baby having a reaction them.
Your breast milk doesn't just taste like what you eat, but also what you drink. You should stay away from a lot of caffeine while breastfeeding. You might need some coffee or caffeine filled soda to keep you functioning and a cup or two won't hurt you or your baby, but too much could have disastrous effects. Just as people get the jitters and shakes from too much caffeine, your baby can also. Keep your caffeine intake down to a minimum.
You've made an excellent choice breastfeeding your baby. Keep it up by making good choices as to what you eat.
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