Confused and Let Down

[Guest guest]

Hi. Been a while since I've posted.

A little history: I started intuitive eating about 1-2 months before

becoming pregnant. I had my baby almost 2 months ago. I did

intuitive eating the entire time I was pregnant. I never overfilled

myself, ate only when I was hungry, and ate what I craved. the only

obsession I had with food was trying to find the right food, because

I was nauseated the entire 9 months.

I had gestational diabetes this pregnancy (and had it with my first

pregnancy also). Last pregnancy I had a hard time staying on the

diabetes diet, and craved carbs constantly. This time I chose to

control my sugar through IE. And it worked great! As my pregnancy

progressed, I natrually became more and more averse to carbs, until I

found myself eating almost no carbs. I went on insulin at that time,

as my blood sugar kept rising, even though I was eating very few

carbs, and starting to feel sick over it.

I was especially sick during my first trimester. I noticed that if I

ate whenever I was nauseated, my nause improved. So at that time I

used nausea as my guide to eating. I gained a lot of weight. I

really didn't gain much more body weight during the rest of my

pregnancy. I gauge this only by the fit of my clothes, since I never

looked at my weight during my entire pregnancy.

I've been noticing my clothes starting to loosen up since I've had my

son. Just a little looser.

The other day, I say the doctor, and without thinking, looked at the

number on the scale. I was flabergasted. I am 45 pounds bigger than

my pre-pregnancy weight. All on intuitive eating.

The sad part is that I was fine with my body (almost--working on

acceptance) before seeing that number. I can't believe that my body

could really be that much bigger.

I'm trying to figure this out. Part of me thinks, well, maybe my

nausea masked my natural hunger signals and I gained more weight than

I should have. Then I think, well, maybe that was part of the value

of my nausea, and why my nausea got better when I ate. Maybe my

pregnancy wanted me to put on all that weight. (The Brewer diet

does say that patients on that diet gain 40-70 pounds on average, and

have excellent outcomes.)

So I'm trying to figure out if intuitive eating let me down or served

me well. I did have a great pregnancy outcome. I had a quick labor

and delivery with natural childbirth. And my baby was off the charts

in length and at the 95th percentile in weight. Maybe my body wanted

extra reserves for breastfeeding a big baby boy.

Part of me is a little scared of intuitive eating now. I was totally

down with it before seeing that number. I'm scared to not check my

weight now. I'm fighting the urge to diet. I want to believe in IE

as much as I did before seeing that number.

And I find myself feeling kind of silly. I've sung the praises of IE

to my family, and wondered why they weren't interested in it. Now, I

realize that seeing me gain all that weight was probably the reason.

Any thoughts or input anyone might have would be so helpful.

Thank you!!!!

Sara