Beyond providing nourishment and helping to protect your baby from getting sick, breast-feeding can also help you lose weight gained during pregnancy. When you breast-feed, you use fat cells stored in your body during pregnancy — along with calories from your diet — to fuel your milk production and feed your baby.

Is weight loss during breastfeeding normal?

Breastfeeding burns up to 500 calories a day. This means that even though you are probably eating more to sustain breastfeeding, you can still lose weight. On average, if you're taking in the recommended amount of calories each day and breastfeeding exclusively, you should lose about 1 pound every week or two.

Does breastfeeding make you lose or gain weight?

Breastfeeding alone does not make you gain weight. Weight gain while nursing is caused by eating more calories than your body burns throughout the day. If you eat 2500 calories, but your body only needs 1800 calories to survive and produce breast milk, those extra calories may be stored in the form of fat.