Time for Part Two of the Body After Baby Q + A! Check out part one where I discuss things like calorie counting, the baby pooch, and more. Now, more of your fabulous questions! Once again, please remember I answer solely based on my own experience.

Do you ever feel like you’re doing well but the scale doesn’t reflect it?
YES! The scale varies so much for me from week to week. I try to focus on the overall trend and also keep other measures of tracking progress. If the scale hasn’t moved for awhile, but I still see measurements going down, notice clothes fitting better, or feel and look stronger/leaner, then I don’t bother with what the scale says. So many variables can affect that reading – like water weight from what you ate recently and your hormones. I also turn to progress pictures for the most motivational progress tracking.

However, if I notice the scale not moving and other measures not displaying progress for more than a few weeks, then I know I need to take a closer look at things to bust through a plateau. This is another reason why I believe in eating more, not cranking out 2 hours of workouts a day, etc. That way, when you reach a plateau you have room to tweak things such as cutting back a tiny bit more on food or adding a little more intensity in workouts. For me, this usually means just cutting back a little on the treats I inevitably have during the weekends and giving a little extra EFFORT (not extra time!) to my workouts.

How do you know when you’ve reached your “happy weight” and can go into maintenance mode?
I stand by the fact that if you eat whole, quality, nutritious foods the majority of the time and move your body on a regular basis your body will get to its happy place. In my opinion, you know you have reached your “happy weight” when you have energy, feel strong, and you consistently fuel and exercise your body well. Personally, by doing those things, I don’t stress myself and have steadily been dropping the baby weight.

Another thing I remember is the fact that if I have to take on practices that leave me hungry, fatigued, deprived, or less than optimally functioning in any way to lose more weight, I am likely already at my “happy weight”. I think we all need to change our ideal weight or size to match with our healthy weight or size. Be sure the two coincide and if you take care of yourself, your “happy weight” will naturally be where you feel healthy.

How did you determine what you were ready for physically?
I always started out with as light a workout as possible for a week and then checked how I felt. If I felt okay, experienced no soreness/fatigue, and had no signs of doing too much too soon (increased *ahem* bleeding), then I would increase my workout load. In a way, I almost worked backwards from my pregnancy. I started off with moves I could do easily the end of my pregnancy, then gradually added back in things I could do earlier on in the pregnancy until achieving my regular workout intensity. Keeping up workouts while pregnant certainly helped me regain my ability to workout sooner!

I listened to my body and kept feeling great so kept trying just a little bit more. After the first month or two, I found my body able to pick up where it left off quicker than I expected. I will also say though that it took me a good bit longer after Makenzie. I think my body knew what to expect more after the second pregnancy.

You always seem to make progress so easily. Do you ever struggle with the weight loss? Please, tell me you do and that I’m normal!
Of course, you’re normal! Trust me when I say that making progress in reaching my “happy place” does take work. I don’t skip through workouts and keeping track of my eating without a single care in the world. The weight does not just fall off me as I sprinkle rainbows and sing Barney tunes. Heck, no! It. Takes. Work. And a lot of it. I have an avid sweet tooth coupled with a raging appetite from nursing that I always have to be aware of with this journey. I am busy and have plenty of days where I want to not worry about cooking a healthy meal or getting to the gym. I know how much better I feel for it though, and that motivates me to keep going. It certainly is not easy.

Even though, making progress is not what I would deem easy, please note the importance of not making it harder than it has to be either. I make my progress by consistently working towards my health. That’s pretty much the gist of it. I don’t try to restrict food so much that I’m starving. I don’t fatigue myself with overtraining. I don’t jump from this diet to that eating method to this cleanse to that detox and all that madness. So yes, progress is hard for me in the sense I have to persevere through things at times, but not hard in the way I approach my goals.

• What ways do you bust through a weight loss or training plateau?
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Breastfeeding and weight loss. Where did the notion that a child sucking the life out of you 6 times a day equates to easy weight loss come from? I would like to know. And I would then like to smack the idiot for opening this can of worms that leads women to believe breastfeeding is THE way to lose weight. Watch out Hydroxycut…mama’s making milk!!!

[Note: diet pills are crap and I’m just enjoying my sarcasm…mmmkay?]

You know I never keep my big mouth shut on the realistic side of all things…well, life. So, here you go. The top 5 reasons breastfeeding does NOT make you skinny. 

1. You get HANGRY. To make the baby juice, your body needs extra fuel. Yes, you need the extra calories for milk production, but it can still be easy to go overboard. I know I have never run a long distance race, but I can imagine that the hunger of a growth spurt day rivals it. No joke. I’m in one right now. Bottom. Less. Pit. Calories still count. The hunger beast that is breastfeeding can quickly make those calories add up above weight loss levels. 

2. There is no snooze button.

Babies get hungry. They don’t care if it’s 2 am. Then 4 am. Then 6 am. And guess what? Daddy doesn’t have the booby. Lucky you. You get every overnight feeding. Like…all five of them I experienced last night. That can easily make for a sleepy mommy. I don’t know about you, but sleepy mommy = a mommy with more cravings. Sleepy mommy also = less motivated to workout mommy. It’s hard to stay on your A game when the exhaustion of all those feedings inevitably hits at times.

3. Freedom? What’s that? You’re on cutie patootie’s schedule. That quickly leads to workouts sometimes being hard to fit in or having to be cut short. And sometimes, the only option for food you have is a frozen meal because the kiddo decides he’s hungry just as you start prepping lunch.

4. I’m not letting go!

Despite what the rumors say, the body wants to hold onto some fat to have stores saved up to make the baby nectar. It doesn’t all just fall off automatically. Your body may actually fight you over it. I know I immediately dropped almost 5 pounds after I stopped nursing Makenzie.

5. You fell for it. You get caught up in the belief that you will effortlessly lose weight while breastfeeding. You get frustrated when it doesn’t happen. You make excuses easily, such as needing to eat more so this candy bar is A-OK! Sorry. Doesn’t quite work the way “they” would like you to think.

Disclaimer: I 100% believe in breastfeeding and that it is one of the best things you can do for your child, if possible. I wrote this post simply to say that it’s not a cure-all for post-baby weight loss woes, despite what some may think. I wanted to debunk that myth. It still takes discipline and consistency to make those physical changes. Breastfeeding should be embraced for all the other numerous benefits and not as a magic answer to post-partum weight loss. 

Question of the Evening – Is there a myth you wish to debunk? Any of the above surprise you?