The Breastfeeding Diet To Feed Yourself And Baby

Your new baby is finally here and you’ve made the commitment to breastfeed. While you thought this was a personal decision, everyone from the checkout clerk at the supermarket to the lady sitting behind you at church has conflicting advice about how to eat when nursing. It’s enough to make an overwhelmed and underslept mother cry like a colicky baby. Relax, Mom! Eating the best diet for your baby is as easy as pie…which, by the way, you can eat while breastfeeding your baby.

The most important point about your breastfeeding diet is to be aware that everything from the garlic in last night’s Italian extravaganza to the chocolate on the hot fudge sundae you ate for lunch will affect your baby’s next meal. Generally this is fine, but it is advisable to consult a knowledgeable medical practitioner to determine if your medicinal herbs or drugs are safe.

The mother’s diet is often the cause of gas or symptoms of colic in a nursing baby. While there is no single universal trigger, some simple trial and error will tell you what is troubling your little tyke. Some of the more common contributors to your little bundle’s stomach aches are cruciferous foods (cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower), caffeine-related products (coffee, soda, chocolate), or foods that pack a punch (garlic, hot peppers, spices). Pay attention to your baby to determine if such foods are bothering the little nipper.


Common edible allergens may also have an effect on your little one’s system if the baby is prone to a food sensitivity. The most common foods in this area are peanuts, dairy, soy, eggs, wheat, shellfish, and corn. If your baby indicates such a sensitivity through recurring fussiness after you have consumed such foods or if food allergies run in the family, simply eliminate the guilty party from your diet for a while.

The concerns for consuming fish during pregnancy still apply when nursing. While fish oils help build your baby’s brain, do not consume high mercury fish or eat and seafood more than twice a week. Let the current EPA recommendations guide your choices.

As a nursing mother, make common sense, healthy eating choices for your own benefit. While your body requires 500 more calories to feed a baby than it did before you were pregnant, the abundance of extra food should come from fruits, vegetables, lean proteins, legumes, and complex carbohydrates, not from cookies and ice cream. This will assist your body in replacing nutrients lost to the breast milk and in achieving your post-partum weight loss goals. Do not attempt any form of dieting for at least six weeks after your baby is born. If you do eventually pursue a weight loss diet, do not cut back on the healthy, common sense essentials. Your body needs nutritional support to recover from pregnancy and combat sleep deprivation.

Eating to feed that new bundle of joy should be a pleasure, not a stress. Trial and error will tell you what your baby can and cannot tolerate, and a healthy eating plan will give you the energy to lovingly tend your new blessing and the patience to smile politely at the checkout clerk with the parenting advice.