5 Easy Tricks on How to Stay in Shape During Pregnancy

1. Start a Healthy Diet

It is very important to start a healthy diet, the moment you decide to start working on your pregnancy. It will help you conceive and it is very important for the normal growth of your baby.

Your diet should consist of four types of food – proteins from meat and eggs, milk and dairy products, fruit and vegetables and cereals, rice, potatoes and bread. Each and every one of these should be eaten daily.

When it comes to meat, avoid fatty pork and bacon, but include lean chicken, turkey and beef. Fish is also very important because it is a source of necessary omega 3 acids. Eat eggs boiled or poached, and keep omelets to a minimum.

Increase the amount of milk and dairy products. Eat a lot of fruits and vegetables and keep the food from the last category whole grain when it comes to bread and cereals. Brown rice is better than white and potatoes. This should be on your menu rarely, because these products are high in calories.

2. Stay Active

Staying in shape during pregnancy comes down to these two things – a healthy diet and being active. It is of great importance to stay active while you are pregnant. It’s good both for your body and for your mind.

Unless your doctor ordered you to be on a bed rest, there is no reason why you shouldn’t be an active pregnant woman. Pregnancy is a state, not a disease, and although you will need some time to adjust to it, you can still work and exercise.

Seek advice from your doctor and choose exercises that are best for you, according to your age and your state before the pregnancy. You might need to adjust your exercising regime several times during pregnancy.

Exercises will not only help you stay in shape, they will help you deal with the pregnancy easier. You won’t be in such a high risk of back pains and swollen ankles, and you will feel much better.

3. Don’t Indulge all Your Cravings

We all know that pregnant women have cravings and it is a common myth that all of them should be indulged. Seriously, nothing bad will happen either to you or your baby if you don’t eat a pound of ice cream in the middle of the night.

Cravings are, at most, just a shift in hormone levels and yes, they could be overcome. The easiest way is to stop buying all the things you crave for. When you feel a craving for ice cream and pickles in the middle of the night, you can’t really have them if there is no ice cream and pickles at your home.

And, whenever you feel a craving for something, keep your mind occupied with something else. Cravings usually pass quickly and you might not even feel the need to indulge them if you don’t do it right away. Just a couple of minutes later, you might not feel like eating that any more.

4. Include Vitamin C

Vitamin C is one of crucial ingredients for your pregnancy diet. It’s very important for your baby and it’s quite helpful during pregnancy.

Vitamin C actually has a power of melting the fat from your cells. Of course, this doesn’t mean that you can eat whatever you want as long as you have a glass of lemonade after, but high amounts of vitamin C could help you gain less weight.

It’s a common myth that lemons, and other agrumi, are the best source of vitamin C. Cabbage and bell peppers have a lot more. In any case, take your vitamin C out of fruit and vegetables rather than vitamin C pills.

5. Include Pineapple

Pineapple could be your good friend when it comes to easy tricks on how to stay in shape during pregnancy. Sounds silly? Here’s the trick.

Have you heard about a substance called bromelain? It is an enzyme extracted from stems of pineapple, and it is found in the meat of the pineapple itself. It is mostly used for meat tenderizing but some claim that it can affect weight loss.

Bromelain actually tenderizes the meat by breaking down the fat cells. It is said that taking it, can also affect your own fat cells and help you loose some weight. Still, be careful and consult your doctor about it, because there’s a tale of pineapple being used to induce labor. Do not under any circumstances take bromelain or any other type of diet pills during pregnancy.

There are women saying that eating pineapple in the last trimester induced their labor. On the other hand, there are women that had the pineapple during their whole pregnancy and had no side effects whatsoever. In any case, I have to advise you to contact your doctor and to keep the amount of pineapple at a reasonable amount. After all, your baby’s health is quite more important than a couple of extra pounds.

All in all, a healthy diet and some exercising will certainly help you stay in shape during pregnancy. Anything else is less important and less effective for that matter. There is no magical cure, you just need to be disciplined.