Your pregnancy weight gain

Your pregnancy weight gain



Once upon a time, gaining a few extra kilos and taking it easy were part and parcel of being ‘with child'. But now study after study seems to be telling us that when a woman is pregnant, she needs to exercise (sensibly, of course) and watch the weight gain.

So get off that couch, put the chocolates away, and read on…

The exercise factor

As you tackle pregnancy exhaustion, nausea and a growing belly, exercise may well be the last thing on your mind. But recent research has found that women who exercise during pregnancy can increase their chances of giving birth to healthy, active babies.

Mothers-to-be who underwent fitness training on exercise bikes had lighter babies than women who did no exercise, according to the study out of New Zealand's University of Auckland. And the key to this (besides being more comfortable to carry and birth a littler bub)? Smaller babies are less likely to become obese or overweight kids and adults. Which means less issues with diabetes and other weight-related health problems.

The average birth weight of babies born to exercising mums-to-be was 3.4kg, compared to 3.53kg for mothers who did not exercise, claim the researchers. [FYI: Babies born weighing 4kg or more are defined as high birth weight.]

At a two-week check-up the babies of exercising mums weighed on average 3.67kg while the offspring of sedentary mums averaged 3.9kg.

Based on this research, the scientists recommended pregnant women undertake 30 minutes of light to moderate exercise a day.

This study follows another recent one which showed three out of four pregnant women in the US do not get enough exercise.

The weight game

Women who put on too much weight during pregnancy were twice as likely to be overweight even decades after the birth and four times as likely to become obese.

Here are some scary figures gathered by researchers from the University of Queensland and published in American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. Women who gained too much weight during pregnancy packed on an average of 20kg over the next 21 years. But for those women who gained relatively little weight, they stood to be just 9kg heavier over the same period.

There are many reasons for women to be careful with their weight gain, by eating healthily and exercising regularly, while pregnant. Overweight women have higher rates of pregnancy complications such as high blood pressure and gestational diabetes, and are also more likely to have a caesarean.

Yet this study admitted that “it remains controversial whether energy restriction should be advised to pregnant, overweight women to control the potential risk of gaining excessive weight during pregnancy because such a restrictive diet can affect the growth of the fetus.”

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Last revised: Tuesday, 13 April 2010


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