Obstacles to Exercising While Breastfeeding

Although it is possible to breastfeed while exercising (baby-weighted lunges are killer!), this post is in reference to exercising in general while being a lactating mama.

As a birth-world-movement that includes “Fitness” as one of our Four Pillars, we often meet women who believe they cannot, or worse, should not exercise while they are breastfeeding their baby(ies). That could not be further from the truth! As moms, we must continually call upon our functional fitness to get through our daily lives. Picked up your toddler? There’s fitness. Pushed a stroller? Fitness. Rolled over in bed to change nursing positions? Fitness there, too. Since we can’t escape fitness, we at BIRTHFIT find it best to train intentionally for all movements of life.

Many people conflate functional fitness with exercising to lose weight, which is not the same thing at all.

We embrace functional training with intention throughout the Motherhood Transition, which includes breastfeeding mamas. Please know that BIRTHFIT does not preach fitness as a means to lose weight or even to look a certain way, but rather as a means to improve your overall quality of life and get to know and understand your body better! You can do functional fitness postpartum; here are some common objections we hear from moms who are concerned about exercising while breastfeeding:

“My baby doesn’t want to eat after I exercise.”

Some babies just don’t like sweaty or salty boobs! Simply showering (okay, maybe showering isn’t that simple for moms) or wiping off the breast can take care of that. You could throw a package of pacifier wipes in your gym bag if you’re concerned about the food safety of regular baby wipes. While you’re at it, consider changing clothes if you’ve gotten grimey in the gym.

“My baby doesn’t like my milk after I exercise.”

Has this actually happened to you, or is this just something you heard could happen from someone on the internet? Research has shown that moderate exercise does not affect the taste or nutrient content of breastmilk (1). If a mother performs maximal exercise (which is not what BIRTHFIT encourages in the immediate postpartum period anyway), the lactic acid content of her breastmilk may increase somewhat for up to 90 minutes after exercise. This could change the taste of her breastmilk but does not affect the safety or nutrient content. Some babies don’t mind that, some babies may. If you find your baby dislikes the taste of your milk following maximal exercise, here are a couple of work-arounds:

1. Don’t exercise to exhaustion.
2. Feed your baby just before exercise so that lactic acid has cleared before the next feeding.
3. Exercise moderately. (Yep, that’s the same as #1. It’s that important.)

I would like to reiterate here that hours of intense cardio with the hopes of reclaiming some past version of your body are not necessary or helpful in your motherhood transition. Moderate levels of exercise are all that are needed to increase your functional fitness to aid you in the movements of motherhood. If you are struggling with embracing your new post-baby body, I highly recommend a consult with a BIRTHFIT Leader on Mind-Body Nourishment (2).

“If I exercise, I’ll lose my milk supply.”

Many times when people set out to “get in shape,” it is accompanied by a radical diet change at the same time in the hopes that they will magically turn into a fitness model within a few weeks. This approach, again, is a conflation of fitness-for-life with fitness-for-weight-loss.

If you begin an intense new fitness regimen at the same time you begin a calorie-restricted diet, then, yes, you could hurt your milk supply. But if we try to embrace the spirit of fitness-for-life, then we realize that intense exercise and calorie restriction is not necessary or beneficial during the motherhood transition. If you continue to eat sufficient calories (you actually may need more calories while breastfeeding than you did while pregnant!) through varied nutrient-dense real food, there is no need for your milk supply to suffer (3).

Abi Glisson

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References

1. https://kellymom.com/bf/can-i-breastfeed/lifestyle/mom-exercise/
2. https://birthfit.com/programs/consultations/
3. https://kellymom.com/nutrition/mothers-diet/mom-calories-fluids/
4. https://kellymom.com/bf/pumpingmoms/pumping/milkcalc/
5. https://kellymom.com/ages/older-infant/breast-fullness/