Losing weight after having a baby should have been “easy” for me.
I stayed within the 25 to 35 suggested weight gain target (I was exactly 35 pounds up on delivery day), I’m a NASM certified personal trainer, Nutrition Coach, and I’m a health writer who has spent the last 10 years learning about what it takes to lose weight and get healthy.
I was also nursing my son and, if you’ve ever heard, that’s supposed to burn a ton of calories and help with postpartum weight loss.
But, guess what?
None of that worked or mattered.
Despite losing the first 20lbs pretty easily, the last 15-ish were sadly sticking around.
And despite eating healthy, I was starting to go up in weight.
I also felt so much worse.
I hated how I looked in photos (note: I love my body, especially for helping me give birth to my son, but I just didn’t feel like myself. I felt unrecognizable and that’s the part I hated, not the size I was at. That I couldn’t care less about. See photo below).
I tried a bunch of tactics, failed a few times, and finally fine-tuned what worked for my body, and that’s exactly what I’m sharing in this article — I’ll show you how I lost the last 15+ pounds I gained (plus some more after that) and what I’m doing now to continue to lose a bit more weight.
I’m also sharing a free bonus resource towards the end of this guide so be sure to check that out too!
But first, I want to share what didn’t work in case you’re struggling with this too:
The Big Postpartum Weight Loss Strategy That Didn’t Work For Me
I’m sure you’ve heard it before – to lose weight, you need to eat less and move more.
I thought for sure this was the reason why I was not losing the weight and maybe I was overeating without realizing it because I was so hungry breastfeeding.
So I started tracking my food intake and was left feeling starving more often than not.
After some time and huge amounts of trial and error, I dove deeper into why this strategy of eating less and working out just doesn’t work — I wasn’t alone in feeling this way and maybe you’ve even experienced it too.
Here’s why it doesn’t work:
For starters, if you’re just eating less, you’re likely missing out on key nutrients that your body needs to thrive and to stay full.
You may also miss out on the important nutrients your hormones need to stay in balance and function properly.Low-calorie diets also limit fat intake to cut calories and this can lead to a host of problems, including wrecking your body’s delicate hormone balance.
Eating less also sets you up for this diet mindset that is so unsustainable it can eventually lead to a binge.
When this happens, you may overeat foods you “shouldn’t”, feel guilt and shame, vow to never do it again and “be good”, go back to rigid diet rules, and repeat until you can’t take it anymore.
You don’t need to do these awful strategies to lose weight.
Here’s what you can do instead:
The 5 Sustainable Weight Loss Strategies I Followed to Lose the Last Bit of Postpartum Weight And Then Some
These tips are great for improving your health and your waistline and you don’t need to be postpartum to see results.
Personally, my husband and I lost weight far quicker than we anticipated, we lost stubborn belly fat specifically, and our clothes fit so much better now. We also feel so much better.
Here’s what we did to get that way:
1. Focus on Blood Sugar
Instead of focusing on calories, I honed in on blood sugar.
I took my fasting blood sugar reading as often as I could each morning and made my daily dietary adjustments based on those readings.
A fasting reading between 95-120 meant I needed to scale back on carbs and add in some more movement to use the excess glucose I had.
Anything from 80-90 meant I was heading in a good direction.
I made sure to reduce how much of an insulin spike I had at meals by lowering my carb intake while increasing my protein and fats.
If I did eat carbs, I ate them last in my meal so that my blood sugar was not instantly spiked.
On the rare occasions I ate sandwiches, I made sure to take at least one bun off if not both to lower the insulin spike further.
Carbs and “treats” were always paired with protein and fat, which also blunts the spike and I never ate them on an empty stomach — only after a meal if I had one at all.
Now, I know what you’re thinking — you don’t have diabetes so why should you bother tracking your blood sugar right?
Wrong.
Upwards of 90% of people have metabolic issues (aka blood sugar issues) and most don’t realize it which means there’s a good chance you could be experiencing unwanted spikes and crashes.
Poor blood sugar control is also responsible for:
- Craving something sweet after a meal
- Preference for sweeter drinks and coffees
- Carb cravings
- Energy swings throughout the day often crashing in the afternoon
It’s also why you could be struggling to lose weight, especially around your midsection.
To fix these issues, pay attention to your blood sugar — that’s what worked for me.
This is not only your fasting blood sugar levels but what your insulin spikes look like after a meal.
I’ll get into this more throughout this site but I wanted to first mention it here because it is the absolute foundation to better health and weight loss.
If you’re not tracking your blood sugar, you’re doing it wrong. I’m sorry to be so harsh.
Moving along…
2. I Focused on Nutrient Density and Hitting These Targets
I also made sure to eat enough protein, fats, and fiber and I made sure they served as my main sources of nutrition. (See what I typically eat for breakfast or lunch)
These three nutrients are filling and satisfying and they can help curb hunger because they actually send signals to your body that you’re full.
Unlike eating processed foods and too many carbs, you won’t struggle as much with sugar cravings or low energy when you prioritize these foods.
They also provide the biggest dose of nutrition which meant I was really fueling my body instead of starving it.
This made a huge difference in my energy levels and mental focus on top of keeping me full.
You can see exactly what I ate in my free bonus resource:
3. I Tracked My Food Intake for This Reason
I’ve been on and off with tracking my food intake — I still am.
It’s a love-hate relationship for me.
It’s a pain in the ass but it really does hold me accountable and it helps educate me into finding the right portions for my needs.
But, unlike my previous times tracking my food, I didn’t just focus on calories this time.
Instead, my first priority was hitting my macros — my protein, fat, and fiber targets.
Because, time and time again, if I hit those, I had a better chance at staying under my calorie budget without feeling like I was starving and I lost weight much more effortlessly.
I also tracked my water intake and made sure to add in electrolytes since I was going so low-carb and quickly losing fluids.
4. I Stopped Being Scared of Fat (But I Also Used It Strategically)
Another big nutrient shift for me was moving away from carbs and towards eating more dietary fat.
With breastfeeding, I didn’t know what to eat that would also keep my supply up so I followed traditional (and terrible) advice that said to eat more carbs — quinoa, rice, oatmeal, etc., and I learned the hard way that my blood sugar just couldn’t support it — for me, this was hello! weight gain, low energy, constant cravings, and more.
Traditional advice saying you need to eat carbs like pasta and grains just isn’t true.
Most of us can’t handle the carb load — I know I couldn’t.
So as I moved the carbs out of my diet, I added in more dietary fat to compensate.
This looked like some olive oil for my salad dressing, adding olives to my lunches and snacks, enjoying a handful of nuts before a meal, and eating avocados regularly.
I also opted for full-fat dairy like 5% Greek yogurt in places of things like sour cream and mayo.
The fat and protein in this style of yogurt is much more satisfying than low-fat or fat-free options which are often loaded with sugar and chemical ingredients.
I noticed right away that I started to feel less hungry all the time, I had better blood sugar and energy, and my sleep also started to improve.
From there, I also:
5. Focus on Movement, Not Just Exercise
And finally, after having Jett, exercising has looked wayyyyyy different.
No longer am I able to (consistently) get up early to workout in the morning (I was waking up at 4am because he loves a good 5am wakeup but sometimes, like now, he’s getting up at 4:15 which is not feasible), which meant I had to prioritize moving throughout the day.
We’d go for walks, park trips, beach strolls, rollerblading, and anything else I could do to squeeze movement in throughout the day and in between work.
I also made sure to park far as often as I could and get steps in by making laps around the house chasing him or going up and down the stairs.
My goal was always a walk a day and movement added on top.
The good news is that this strategy is much more effective than spending 30 minutes to an hour at the gym every day and then being sedentary the rest of the day. You won’t see a huge difference with the latter but you will with the former.
Try to get in movement throughout your day even if you can’t commit to a formal workout — it’s tough for me to do too but it’s always my goal.
Do You Plan to Try One of These Strategies?
These strategies helped me lose the last stubborn 15 pounds of pregnancy weight and almost another 10 on top of that.
By stepping outside of the outdated advice of eat less and workout more, I was able to lose more weight than I’ve ever had without having to starve myself.
I also increased my nutrient intake which set me up for feeling my best and keeping my hormones happy.
Don’t forget to download my free bonus resource which shows you what I ate to lose the weight:
If you decide to try any of these strategies or you have a question on this article, feel free to reach out to me anytime at devan@behappynothangry.com. I’d be happy to help and I’d love to hear from you!
To feeling and looking your best in a healthy way,
Devan