Healty Diet for Breastfeeding Mother

The breastfeeding Mother’s Diet...
A breastfeeding mother does need to be sure that her diet contains plenty of the elements that the baby is withdrawing in the milk. A large amount of calcium (Lime) is excreted in the milk, to enable the baby’s bones to grow rapidly. If the breastfeeding mother takes in too little, the breasts will withdraw it from her bones. It used to be thought that she would loose calcium from her teeth, too, but this is probably not so.

Mother should take as much milk as the baby is getting from her, plus a little extra for her own needs, in any beverage that she likes, or cooked into cereals, soups, pudding, or in the form of cheese, her daily diet should include the following elements (even if she has to limit her diet otherwise to keep her weight down).

Milk at the very least, a quart a day, and preferably a quart and a half. It can be the usual fresh milk or it can be the evaporated, powdered or skimmed and it can be served in any form. Fruit and Vegetable 6 servings a day (This may sound too much until you realize that the juice of 2 oranges, a salad, a green or yellow (root) vegetable, and potatoes twice add up to 6 servings) to include enough Vitamin C, 2 of these servings should be raw and 2 should be oranges, grape fruit, tomatoes, raw cabbage or berries. For the sake of vitamin A, there should be one dark green, leafy vegetable or deep yellow one. Potatoes are valuable aside from their calories. Fruits and vegetables can be fresh, canned, frozen and dried.

Meat, Poultry, Fish at least 1 generous portion, preferably 2. Liver is especially valuable and should be included occasionally.

Eggs: Once a day. Cereal and Bread: 3 servings a day, whole gain or enriched (to contain the B-Vitamins) Butter or fortified Margarine for vitamin A. If your weight won’t stand these, eat greener, leafy vegetables and deep yellow ones.

A vitamin D preparation, prescribed by the doctor, to make sure you are utilizing the calcium in your diet.

If a breastfeeding mother is gaining unwelcome weight, she can drink skimmed milk, hold down on butter, keep the cereal and bread portions small ( but the whole- grain products to provide B vitamins), limit strictly or omit such high calcium foods as candy, pastries, cakes, cookies, soda-fountain drinks. (its is too bad that these high calories sweets are the foods that weight gainers crave most). But she should not cut down on the milk, vegetables, fruit, meat and vitamin D.