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March 2016 Moms
amyid
member
Pregnancy "diet"
amyid
member
I'm piling on the pounds and although I'm not afraid of the number ... I've had to come to the conclusion that my eating habits are not so great right now. I want to eat best for my baby and try and make my labour as easy as possible so the soda ( which I never drank pre pregnancy ) is going out the window.. The fast food is gone ( also a no no pre pregnancy ) and I'm going to say no to filling up bread and candy. What superfoods are making you all feeling full and bursting with energy ? Have you found any great salads bursting with vitamins or any daily meal plan fit for pregnant mamas ?
Re: Pregnancy "diet"
Honestly, I've been too lax lately and have let the joint excuse of Holidays + Pregnancy take me off track, and I definitely benefit from taking a few days to track my eating on MyFitPlate or other food tracking apps. It can really be an eye opener, to actually write down everything I'm eating and then see the daily breakdown of calories and nutrients that I'm consuming. It helps me see where I'm overdoing it, and also where any nutritional gaps might be. And when I'm on track, I make sure that I'm hitting all the foods/nutrients I need, and usually when that's the case I don't have much space left for junk.
I also try not to give in to every little hunger pang. I read somewhere that we really only need like 300 additional calories per day. That's an apple. One extra apple a day, or the equivalent. If I'm honest with myself, I'm probably overdoing it on the calories.
The holidays have been rough, the cookies need to stop in my house ASAP! But going back to reaching for apples and fruit as snacks (I really don't love raw blueberries but they're great for brain food too) and 'splurging' on things like precut pomegranate seeds that I love but normally can't bring myself to buy.
I also keep fresh spinach on hand all the time. Even if I'm having something without a ton of veggies it's easy to throw a handful into just about anything for an extra boost.
Hope this helps! I totally agree on needing a major post-holiday reset though! Not even for the scale I feel like a walking ball of sugar these days!
Oh I also eat a lot of nuts!
The past month we've been eating unhealthier (dinners out, homemade queso and chips, etc) and I feel pretty gross. We're already joking that Jan will be a detox month.
I like to snack on apples, carrot sticks, cheese sticks and I've also found that Healthy Pop (or whatever it's called) popcorn is a good low calorie, high fiber snack if you just feel like snacking sometimes.
Of course, I have given in to a few too many cookies and desserts myself the past few weeks, but what can you do! I also still workout 5-6 days/week but understand that's not feasible for everytone at this point due to aches and pains and whatnot. But even a short walk can make you feel a little better!
Hopefully that helps, this is my 4th pregnancy and every time it's so hard not to pack on the lbs, so I feel your pain.
Breakfast is my most important meal, pregnant or not. I try to either do two eggs with toast or a personal size baked oatmeal with fruit and I feel a lot better on the days that I do. DH and I are planning our first Whole 30 for mid January. I'll be taking it easy, it won't be the true Whole 30 for me since I think there are some things my body still needs that are on the "don't eat" list, but cooking better meals for DH and eliminating junk food/eating out completely will help me too.
ETA: clarity.
I realized that I wrote a lot of general stuff without any actual examples. These are out go-to meals:
Breakfast is always one piece of whole wheat toast with peanut butter and fruit preserves, and another piece of toast layered with spinach and scrambled egg, topped with avocado. The mister makes it just right so that it's edible as an open-faced sandwich type thing, and nothing slides off. I'm not sure how he does it, whenever I'm left to my own devices I usually just scramble up the egg in sloppy fashion, toss in some salsa, wrap it up in a whole wheat tortilla with a handful of spinach and 1/4 to 1/2 an avocado.
Mid morning snack is fruit salad, which the Mister makes for me the night before. Usually consists of sliced bananas, apples, pears, kiwi, sometimes pomegranate seeds, clementine slices, or mango chunks mixed in. Depends on what's in season. Definitely peaches in the summer, and blueberries or raspberries. Then I usually throw about a half cup of cottage cheese on top, it's pretty darn good and helps me get my calcium for the day.
Lately that snack hasn't been quite enough, so I've been supplementing with a lactation cookie from home (I follow this recipe https://www.drmomma.org/2010/08/major-milk-makin-lactation-cookies.html), or whatever I find in the teacher's lounge (usually something I shouldn't be eating.) I should probably start packing hummus and pita chips or broccoli, or trail mix.
Lunch is usually an arugula salad with a drizzle of olive oil, cherry tomatoes cut in half, shaved or shredded parmesan and some salt. I usually throw in a hardboiled egg. Sometimes I shake things up a bit and have a tunafish sandwich or something similar. Or leftovers from the previous night's dinner.
Dinners we rotate:
Turkey tacos--with black beans on whole wheat tortillas. Sprinkle of colby-jack, salsa, topped with lots of spinach (yes spinach on tacos, shut up) or chopped romaine. Sour cream and Siracha/Cholula to top it off. This is one of our favorites
Lentil stew--Super simple green lentils just bodied in chicken or veggie stock with garlic and salt. Simmered till thick, then I add chopped frozen spinach. Serve over brown rice, topped with sautéed Tofurkey sausage and parmesan. So good, and the kids love it too.
One Pot Meal--quinoa/brown rice mixture dumped together with a can of black beans, a bag of Veggie Melange from Trader Joes, and either ground turkey or sliced Tofurkey sausage.
Coconut Curry Lentils--made with red lentils, Thai red curry paste, coconut milk and bell peppers. Usually over brown rice, with sautéed tofurkey sausage.
Indian food--This is my lazy day no-cook meal. Trader Joe's indian food pouches (usually palak paneer, Punjab Choley chickpeas, Dal Makhani, and Jaipur Vegetables) with a little bit of brown rice and garlic naan bread.
BLT sandwiches and carrot-ginger soup. Another lazy day dinner. Better as lunch, but sometimes it becomes dinner instead.
Pasta--either mushroom and artichoke ravioli in garlic white wine sauce, or whole wheat rotini pasta with turkey meatballs and vodka sauce mixed with chopped spinach. Another lazy meal. I've got a lot of these lately...
I'm interested in hearing other simple, fast, healthy dinner options if anyone wants to share.
But it's really nice to read this thread for some ideas on breakfast. I'm having a hard time there. Nothing ever sounds good.
Oh wait, we're supposed to be talking about healthy eating. Whoops.
Basically I make them on a 4 day rotation.
The egg bake is 8 eggs, whatever protein I have on hand and veggies and sometimes cheese and like 1/4 cup of milk. Baked at 325 for 30ish minutes or til done. Last night's was leftover Christmas ham, a reasonable amount of cheddar, diced apples and onion. Sounds weird but it's good. I always add cracked pepper and sea salt.
My oatmeal bake is whatever oatmeal base (oats, almond milk, salt, baking powder, spices) plus fruit and nuts. I had to use up some bananas so it was a puréed banana subbing for an egg (I ran out from the egg bake!) and mashed bananas and 1/3 cup of PB. Lots of diff recipes are out there, find one that works for your tastes.
I found the combo of eggs/veggie plus oats and fruit helped with supply, kept me full and I was lucky to not have a ton of weight to lose. But BFing burns waaaaay more calories than cutting them out of your diet. Better long term plan.