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Study: Sleep more to lose the baby weight
Filed under: Just For Moms, Babies, Your Pregnancy, Health & Safety: Babies
If you are having trouble dropping those pounds you gained during pregnancy, perhaps you just need more sleep. According to new research, getting a few extra hours in each day will not only help you feel better, but will assist you getting back to your pre-pregnancy weight.
This finding came out of a prenatal and postnatal health study of 940 women at Harvard Medical School in Boston. The results indicate that new mothers who slept five hours or less each night when their babies were six months old were three times more likely to still be carrying around that extra baby weight by the child's first birthday than mothers who got more rest.
"We've known for some time that sleep deprivation is associated with weight gain and obesity in the general population, but this study shows that getting enough sleep -- even just two hours more -- may be as important as a healthy diet and exercise for new mothers to return to their pre-pregnancy weight," said Erica Gunderson of Kaiser Permanente.
This brings up two questions in my mind. First, when did they decide that sleeping helped you to lose weight? I must have missed that one somehow. Is it because it is impossible to eat when you are asleep?
Second, how in the world is a new mother supposed to sleep more when she has a demanding infant in the house? Dr. Matthew Gillman of Harvard Medical School has anticipated that question and has a ready answer: "Our team is working on new studies to answer this important question." He must be joking, right?
This finding came out of a prenatal and postnatal health study of 940 women at Harvard Medical School in Boston. The results indicate that new mothers who slept five hours or less each night when their babies were six months old were three times more likely to still be carrying around that extra baby weight by the child's first birthday than mothers who got more rest.
"We've known for some time that sleep deprivation is associated with weight gain and obesity in the general population, but this study shows that getting enough sleep -- even just two hours more -- may be as important as a healthy diet and exercise for new mothers to return to their pre-pregnancy weight," said Erica Gunderson of Kaiser Permanente.
This brings up two questions in my mind. First, when did they decide that sleeping helped you to lose weight? I must have missed that one somehow. Is it because it is impossible to eat when you are asleep?
Second, how in the world is a new mother supposed to sleep more when she has a demanding infant in the house? Dr. Matthew Gillman of Harvard Medical School has anticipated that question and has a ready answer: "Our team is working on new studies to answer this important question." He must be joking, right?
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ReaderComments (Page 1 of 1)
11-20-2007 @ 10:57AM
LS said...You answered your last question by asking the last question... *HE* must be joking, right? Because honestly, as 'liberated' as men are, and many, if not most, are extremely helpful with newborns and kids in general, the bulk of the childcare in the very beginning falls to mom.
I long for the day when we actually study things that can't be figured out with a little brainpower and common sense.
And as long as I'm on a rant... how about letting a new mom just relax and enjoy her new baby and her new life. The "extra" weight will come off when she's good and ready to take it off, and not a nanosecond sooner.
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11-20-2007 @ 1:01PM
Melissa said..."Second, how in the world is a new mother supposed to sleep more when she has a demanding infant in the house?"
Don't the magic, invisible nannies that work in TV land come to your house? haha!
I had that quote in my head the whole time I was reading your post. It'd be nice, if it was possible!
Reply
11-20-2007 @ 2:56PM
acm said...Note that the quote is "...sleep deprivation is associated with weight gain and obesity in the general population" and not that more sleep is associated with weight loss. College students and new mothers have this shared problem in making use of what they put away.
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11-20-2007 @ 11:59PM
David Robinson said...On the matter of getting more sleep - help may be on the way.In the last week I saw on an Australian TV program "New Inventors" a device that gently rocks the baby's cot (and could be used on a cradle). It seems to be effective in getting the baby back to sleep. Let's hope it works out in practice. In the old days of the expanded family (not the nuclear one) grandmother or aunt provided this function.
David Robinson
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11-21-2007 @ 1:01AM
Tamyu said..."In the old days of the expanded family (not the nuclear one) grandmother or aunt provided this function."
In the old days, parents slept with their children and breastfed them, so they usually didn`t wake up as much. And in the old days, without bottles, when the baby woke up it was mom`s job to breastfeed. Someone else waking up to feed the baby is a recent idea.
I really have to wonder about a society in which it`s more acceptable to have a machine care for your baby at night than a parent sleep with them. Even if co-sleeping isn`t for your family, if you really are that sleep deprived why not try it on occasion? Surely it is healthier to actually get some sleep.
- Slept with my son at night and did that "sleep when the baby sleeps" thing during the day, never had any of the "newborn sleeplessness" problems. After about a week, he had a schedule of a single mid-night feeding, and that was it. Can`t comment on losing the baby weight though, as mine was apparently all baby stuff and water. I was back to pre-pregnancy weight before I left the hospital.
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