How much weight stays on after birth?

[8abyDust]

Hi,

I am 27 weeks pregnant with a rather large bump. I used to have a pot belly before I was pregnant and am worried that with rather alot of eating recently that I'll still look preggers once my little one is out!!

How was your weight after you had had baby?

Hate to tell you but at one point i was heavier than when i gave birth.....( although i did have a premmie). I found the BF and change of lifestyle, being at home made me eat.........with this pg ( im now 27 weeks) i am being much more careful and hopefully that will continue post birth :)

Ime, you lose best part of a stone on the day and within the first couple of days. But obv depends on the size of your baby!

Def bf helped me immensely. As did going for long walks with the buggy.

But for the first few months don't put any pressure on yourself at all, it's really not important.

Good luck!

I have 3DCS and am 27+6 with number 4. With each of my DCS, I steadily lost weight after birth, to the point 4-6 months afterwards, where I actually weighed less than my pre-pregnancy weight (although I then gained some back once I'd finished breast-feeding). You'll probably find that you do still look pregnant for a few days-couple of weeks, it all depends on how quickly you recover from the birth. My DH said that over a few days I looked like I was going through pregnancy in reverse! This time around though, I expect it to be harder to shift the weight, as I've already put on 22 lb!

Massively varies- some people seem to deflate much faster than others. A lot of it isn't about fat, per se, so much as the rate at which the uterus contracts back to its normal size (that's what gives you the tummy) and how well your abdominal muscles have survived the ordeal . I know people who look back to normal a week later, and people who still had that "bump" look 6 mo later.

Try not to put pressure on yourself. We're all different.

Breastfeeding makes the uterus contract faster than it would otherwise, but there are other factors- some people do just contract faster than others it seems.

I lost just over a stone 'at birth' with both mine, but I put a lot more weight on with DD1. To give you an idea, a year after giving birth I weighed a stone and half more than I did pre-pregnancy. I lost some weight while preg with DD2 (ill all the time) and then got back to pre dd1 weight within a year.

I actually eat a lot less now than I did before I had kids. I think that other factors such as your age have an effect on how quickly you lose the weight.

I'd lost all my pregnancy weight 2 days after leaving the hospital, I did only put 17lbs on during my pregnancy though. I found that walking during my pregnancy helped keep it down, and walking now is helping too x

Oh Lord. I am not looking forward to this. I started at 8 stone - now, at 25 weeks, I'm 10 stone 7.

That could easily mean I will put on another stone :( I wont ever see my skinnies again!

Straight after having my DD I was still very bloated with fluid. This went away over the course of about a week.

I have a picture of me exactly a month later and I'm really small, fitting into clothes that hadn't fit me in years. I think sometimes it does come off and you are busy with the baby all the time.

Not sure how it will be this time (4 years on), I was already over weight before getting pregnant, but I'm not sure if I have put that much weight on. Guess I can always diet and exercise afterwards.

I put on 3st in my first pregnancy. Within a couple of weeks of giving birth I'd lost about half of it (baby, placenta, water retention). The rest I had to work to lose, and I did still look pregnant for at least a month. I had a biiig bump.

Put on 8kg, 2kg over my pre-pregnancy weight 'after birth' and then lost the 2kg after first 2 weeks. Kept as active as I could in pregnancy and ate my normal diet. Did not eat for 2!!!!

I put on about one and a half stones during pregnancy with dc 1 and 2. For a while afterwards, maybe a month thefirst time round, I still looked pregnant with big bump. With dc1 I never lost the last 10lbs to pre preg weight, but with dc2 it literally dropped off me in a couple of weeks, probably due to stress as I had a hard time bfing and just forgot to eat - not a recommended plan for weightloss! I piled it back on again anyway and now after 14 weeks I am back to pre preg weight with proper healthy eating and exercise.

I have noticed though that my shape has changed, especially my waist, which is thicker now so I can't fit into some of my old clothes with fitted waistbands.

I am going to carry on losing until I'm back to pre dc1 weight but taking my time!

Quite a lot, in my experience. Myself and most friends seemed to still look about 6 months pregnant in the initial days after birth. Second pregnancy I'm definitely being careful with what I eat - salads every day - as it took me 2 years to shed pregnancy weight first time around (admittedly I wasn't really trying for a long time).

I lost a stone straight away. 6 weeks after birth I was still carrying 2.5 stone extra. I had to diet within an inch of my life to get the weight off which took 18 months. Then I got pg again...

I gather that the uterus and abdomen area stays swollen for a while after the birth (BF helps reduce quicker due to hormonal effect) so the post birth belly is not all weight, and dieting won't help with this.

Yeah, it's basically fluid- what no-one tells you is that you sweat (esp at night) and pee a lot because the uterus is like a giant sponge getting wrung out and all that water has to go somewhere. Weirdly, you're also majorly thirsty from bf. It settles after a few weeks though.

It does vary from person to person though

I was 52kg when I got pregnant, 73kg at 9 months, 65kg a week after birth and now 60kg five months later. The last 8kg just won't shift and I have a wardrobe full of lovely clothes that won't fit over my hips...

Hi, hate to say but I was size 6/8 before first pregnancy... and before this current pregnancy I had only just gotten back into 8/10 clothes! And it's been 3 years since I had my first child!!

I started off probs 8st or so (really no idea can't remember that far back!) and AFTER having baby, about 9/10 months after, I weighed 10 and half or 11 stone!!! But I got back down to about 8 stone 3lbs...

Depends how determined you are I think? I wasn't really concerned about weight, didn't exercise much before during after, was naturally thin and I didn't notice I was getting pretty obese until my mum and dad and brother said to me seriously that I had developed a 'muffin top' lol...

So that kind of hurt cause they're all overweight too!
I think after I deliver this baby I will make more effort to get rid of that bit flab!

depends - this baby was so big, he was all of the bump, and I'm back to a slightly rounder version of normal really fast.

other smaller babies - it was mostly cake not baby and i was still big after the fact.

"I gather that the uterus and abdomen area stays swollen for a while after the birth (BF helps reduce quicker due to hormonal effect) so the post birth belly is not all weight, and dieting won't help with this."

That's right. I had a real jelly belly straight afterwards. It felt really odd. However, breastfeeding helps massively. You can feel your uterus tightening every time the baby sucks. It took 10 days for my uterus to return to its normal size (according to the mw).

As for the inital question, it depends on how much you put on in the first place. When I was pregnant I felt full after eating a few mouthfuls so I ate less than I normally do.

This isn't what you want to hear, but I was back into my jeans when DD was three weeks old, but that was only because I didn't put much on in the first place.

I don't think there is any science to it. With ds1 I was very careful about what I ate and yet put on 3 stone. I only lost half a stone after the birth and had to diet to lose the rest.

With ds2 I was less careful with my diet and put on 4 stone! I lost it all within a couple of weeks without any effort.

started at 8st 3lbs, was 11st 3 lbs just before giving birth, lost 1.5st straight away after birth then very slowly ended up down to 9st 3 over 9 months. Now have morning sickness with no.2 and have lost a few pounds.

I just loved eating during pregnancy & breastfeeding - chocolate chocolate and more chocolate, but I was surprised that i didn't go right back to my old weight immediately because I never gained weight before.

Will try to be a bit more restrained this time (but not very hard!).

With DS1, I started pregnancy weighing 8st3 and finished up at 10st8. I lost a stone immediately and the rest of the weight crept off gradually until I hit 8st10 when I got pregnant again. I'm now 30 weeks and weighing 10st11 already .

Feeling really depressed about how much weight I've put on but that doesn't seem to stop me eating like a pig. I have nothing to wear as I'm bigger now than at the end of the last pregnancy. I went into a maternity wear shop yesterday and broke down in tears in front of the lovely shop assistant as I was so upset about the hot weather and looking and feeling like a giant .

I don't weigh myself religiously, so I think I put in about 16kg with my DD (I started off 'well' as the first couple of weeks of the pg included my wedding and a cruise honeymoon, where you could eat CONSTANTLY). Not sure when I lost it all, but it took a couple of weeks for my jelly belly to go but even still, I needed slightly bigger clothes throughout the summer (DD was born late April, I had clearly put on weight on my hips/bum, and my boobs were bigger due to BFing). However, I think I was back to roughly my post-cruise/normal pre-pg weight by 9mths - I was certainly back in my normal jeans in the Autumn, but then I stopped BFing suddenly due to appendicitus and lost another 3-4kg.

Essentially, I started this pg 1kg on average lighter than my pre-wedding/slightly slim weight, but have put about 7-8kgs on already (am 23wks). I figure I will gain about another 7-8kg before the birth if last time was anything to go by & hopefully it will be the same "9mths on, 9mths off" type thing.

I put on 3stone 7lbs and lost 2stone of it in three weeks. The rest will require work and from my experience last time, I will find it hard to lose weight dieting/through exercise until the baby starts on solids (rest fell off as soon as solids introduced). Some people seem to lose lots through breastfeeding, others find it really hangs about until the demands reduce.. would be nice to be the former, but I think it's more common to hold onto some weight (about 10lbs to a stone) while you are solely responsible for providing your baby's nutrition.