The Best Diet During Pregnancy
Now that you’ve found out you’re pregnant, your whole outlook on life and the way you are living it begins to change—-and you begin to take notice of all the pieces of advice that people around you are dropping as if on cue. All those motherly types who know what’s best for you, even more than your doctor does, will tell you that eating for two is just what you need to do now, to build up your strength and make sure the baby is well fed. But the other side of the coin is just as adamant: “don’t overeat, no no no—be careful, don’t gain too much weight, you must stick to a diet during pregnancy”.
Well, a lot of that is just baloney. Years ago, when our grandmothers and their mothers were having kids—did they diet during pregnancy?? I don’t think so. They walked a lot more, ate homegrown and fresher foods, were physically much more active than we are, and they weren’t afraid to put on a few pounds just to be sure that they had some ammunition in case they got sick.
They didn’t have grease laden burgers beckoning to them from every corner, or chicken nuggets with fries; there were no prepackaged TV dinners touting their cardboard tasting contents; and the technology then was not anywhere near as advanced as today, so they worked harder, were more physically active on a daily basis, and in doing so—burned more calories in a day just going about their lives than we do today. Pregnancy was something that was an expected fact of life, and it was treated as such, with some celebration, but nothing like the megamillion dollar industry it is today.
Diet during pregnancy was something that really was not thought much about in the past, but now that our DNA is still lagging way behind our technologically advanced lifestyles, we have to consider the fact that we are genetically not designed to live the type of life we are living and still stay healthy. There are those of us who can zip right through a pregnancy and not even worry about a stray calorie or two—remaining as slim as when we started; but there are just as many of us, maybe more; who have to not only watch out for those stray calories, but wage all out war against them.
Then there are those women who have been sylphs all their lives and don’t even know how to spell the word calorie; to them, diet during pregnancy has a very different meaning. They think of a pregnancy diet as the overall plan of eating that they should follow to stay healthy, with little or no emphasis on keeping calories under a certain level to maintain weight gain. To them, diet is how much water you take in on a daily basis, how much protein, vitamins, and a well balanced bag of vegetables and fruit, and lots of fiber to keep the inner works working. Calories?? What are those.
I guess, for all of us as a mixed bag of body types, and metabolisms that run the gamut of the scale; the answer lies in the middle area of a little of both ways of looking at things. A good diet during pregnancy for the good of the average female would be one that is well balanced nutritionally, includes lots of water, a goodly amount of fiber, lowered calorie intake, almost no intake of fast foods or prepackaged drivel from the grocery store, and daily exercise to keep the calorie furnace burning at maximum efficiency.
If you are at all a thinking person, this is not rocket science nor is it difficult to remember. What you have been hearing all your life about how to stay healthy and keep your weight within recommended limits also applies when you are pregnant. Why should it be any different? You are growing a tiny life inside you that needs the same nutrients and care as your own body does, so by adhering to a healthy mode of diet during pregnancy, you can take care of both of you just fine.
Dawn Eastman is an author and publisher on such topics as Diet During Pregnancy. For more information on Dieting After Pregnancy visit our site.
