This is something that I worried about a lot when I was pregnant. When you get pregnant at 38, you know that your body is not going to snap back as well as those who get pregnant in their twenties. (And, spoiler alert, it did not.) So I was quite careful to eat healthy foods and to not indulge a great deal. I ended up gaining about 35 pounds, which is at the high end but in a normal range.
Ann and Alyssa give some good tips here about what to expect when you’re expecting, at least when it comes to weight gain and nutrition.
Proper nutrition during pregnancy
with advice from Ann Cowlin, MA, CSM, CCE
When pondering the parameters of pregnancy, there are many things that expectant mothers will research in order to be as healthy as possible. It can be confusing to consider how much weight one should gain while pregnant, as the recommendations from the Institute of Medicine and National Research Council of the National Academies give different ranges based on the pre-pregnancy weight of the mother.
Ann Cowlin, the creator of Dancing thru Pregnancy, one of Physiquality’s partner programs, points women to the paper they published in 2009 for their recommendations: An underweight woman (with a BMI of less than 18.5) should gain 28 to 40 pounds. A woman of average weight (a BMI between 18.5 and 25) should gain 25 to 35 pounds. Women considered overweight (BMI of 25 to 30) or obese (BMI is more than 30) should gain less weight, 15 to 25 pounds, or even less if obese (11 pounds).
Most of us don’t usually know our BMI, so if you want to calculate it, use the one posted by the National Institutes of Health. And keep in mind that a) BMI doesn’t take into account your fitness level, only your weight and height, and b) it’s a good idea to speak to your doctor about the proper weight gain for your body.