ha ha.

Most babies don’t weigh 20-40 p0unds, and no one tells you the dirty little secret that those maternity clothes should be called maternity and mother-with-newborn-can’t-wear-normal-clothes-yet clothes.  Most of us take months to get smaller.  When we gain weight with pregnancy where is it?  Is it water weight? Fat? Blood volume?  Why do some lose it so quickly and others don’t?

When you gain weight with pregnancy, some of it is clearly the weight of the baby.  I have researched many sources, and the consensus of a typical pregnancy is:

Baby – 7½ pounds
Enlargement of uterus – 2 pounds
Placenta – 1½ pounds
Amniotic fluid – 2 pounds
Breast enlargement – 2 pounds
Extra blood and fluid volume – 8 pounds
Extra fat stores – 7 pounds
Total – 30 pounds

If you are gaining more, then the question comes, which of these is it?  Babies, placentas, amniotic fluid, and breasts likely aren’t going to be a big contributor.  So when you see women who really balloon up, the likely cause is extra fluid or extra fat.  The women who lose a ton of weight in the first week likely are those who carried a lot of extra fluid, and lose it right after birth.  The others… well those are women who likely have extra fat.  This is much harder to lose, and a common reason why I see women plateau at a higher weight than their prepregnancy weight.

So look at the blogs on the guidelines of how much weight to gain during pregnancy.  For a normal BMI woman with a healthy pregnancy,  you should gain 25-35 pounds.

Every person is different with how their breasts change with pregnancy. Some barely look different, some go up 3 cup sizes.

Breastfeeding adds another layer of change. Are you a producer? Do you favor one side? How big do you get? How long do you breastfeed for?  If you had surgery with an incision at the nipple areola, your milk production may be affected.  I have many blogs on breast milk production after breast surgery.

Each pregnancy is different. As for the droop, it depends on your skin tone, how many pregnancies, how old you are, what your size changes are, and the above.  Keep your fingers crossed.

Advice?
1. SUPPORT SUPPORT SUPPORT. Sleep in a bra. Wear it 24 hours a day.  Wear a good one which looks like Fort Knox.
2. When breastfeeding, alternate (don’t favor one side).  See other tips on my blog.
3. If you see any kind of infection, mastitis, rash, etc, JUMP ON IT EARLY.  Most implants are submuscular, so there is a nice muscle between your implant and the breast.  Most implants have formed a capsule, which protects your implant from your breast.  What you don’t want though is an issue with your breast causing a breast implant infection.  It is rare… but if you are worried about any breast redness, tenderness, or discharge, see a doctor sooner as opposed to later.

And remember to focus on the big picture! CONGRATULATIONS!  Most implants do just fine with pregnancy.

So what is the magic answer?

First, figure out your BMI.  Body mass index.   weight (pounds) / [height (ininches)]² x 703.  For those who don’t want to do the math, go to the calculator here: http://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/assessing/bmi/adult_bmi/english_bmi_calculator/bmi_calculator.html  This is a fairly reliable way of figuring out body “fatness” in most people. It doesn’t directly measure your fat, but research has shown BMI correlates with accurate measurements of body fat.

What are the categories?

• If your BMI is less than 18.5= underweight
• BMI is 18.5 to 24.9= normal or healthy
• BMI is 25.0 to 29.9= overweight
• BMI is 30.0 or higher= obese

SO. the IOM guidelines?

If you are pregnant with ONE child:

• Underweight: Gain 28-40 pounds
• Normal weight: Gain 25-35 pounds
• Overweight: Gain 15-25 pounds
• Obese: Gain 11-20 pounds

If you are pregnant with TWINS :

• Underweight: no guidelines due to insufficient data
• Normal weight: Gain 37-54 pounds
• Overweight: Gain 31-50 pounds
• Obese: Gain 25-42 pounds

So most likely,  to do this, you need to eat basically what is your normal.  Exercise.  Don’t think of this time as “eating for two.”  If you do, in addition to gaining more weight than you should (which leads to a host of other issues), you will be hurting your body’s ability to bounce back after pregnancy.  Trust me- as a plastic surgeon, I see it all the time.

Egads.  Back in my mom’s day, women didn’t gain much weight with pregnancy.  15 pounds was likely normal.  I know a woman who was told by her doctor (remember this is a long time ago…) to start smoking (!!) as she was gaining too much weight with one of her pregnancies.

You don’t need many extra calories for your little bun in the oven.  According to a nutritionist, you need more nutrients during pregnancy, but not more calories. In the first trimester you need no extra calories.  In the second trimester you should have an extra 350 cals/day,  and in the third 450 cals/day. 

Which nutrients? Protein (recommendation is an extra 20g/day), folate (extra 50% of normal rec), iron (50% more than normal, so about 27mg/day total), and zinc. Don’t take any supplements though without checking with a doctor or registered dietitian because too much of certain vitamins is bad.

As far as weight gain, according to guidelines, you should gain 25-35 pounds if you are a normal “healthy” weight when  you begin your pregnancy.  If you are 5’6″, to be at a healthy weight when you start means you should weigh 118-148 pounds.  If you weigh over 150 pounds you are “overweight.”  If you weigh 186 pounds you are obese.

See my blog on BMI and weight gain recommendations by the IOM.

For those with no attention span (and can’t read past a twitter title), the findings were 

• the higher your BMI, (underweight–>normal–>overweight–>obese), and
• the more your weight gain past recommendations during pregnancy,

the higher your chance of high blood pressure during pregnancy. (High blood pressure during pregnancy is bad.)

Terms:

BMI= Body mass index. To calculate yours, here is a link from the US department of health  :http://www.nhlbisupport.com/bmi/bminojs.htm

PPBMI= Your prepregnancy BMI

IOM= Institute of Medicine.  It has guidelines recommending how much you should gain.  Those will be posted in another blog, but if you are normal weight, you average weight gain during pregnancy should be around 30 pounds, if obese around 15 pounds.

Study: American Journal of Perinatology Jan 2011

• Evaluated new Institute of Medicine weight gain guidelines within each PPBMI category
• Patients with singleton term deliveries
• Women without history of  heart disease, diabetes, or pregnancy high blood pressure
• Pregnancy high blood pressure rates were compared overall and within each PPBMI group
• Looked at women gaining less than recommendations, within recommendations, and above recommendations

FINDINGS:

• High blood pressure during pregnancy was higher when your prepregancy BMI was higher (5.0%, 5.4%, and 10.8% for less than, within, and above recommendation groups, respectively ( P < 0.001).
• Above recommended weight gain resulted in higher high blood pressure incidence within each PPBMI category (underweight 7.6%, normal weight 6.2%, overweight 12.4%, and obese 17.0%), reaching statistical significance in all but the underweight PPBMI group.
• Excessive weight gain above established guidelines was associated with increased rates of high blood pressure. 
• Regardless of PPBMI, women should be counseled to avoid excessive weight gain during pregnancy.

So if you are considering getting pregnant, or you are pregnant, look at your BMI and weight gain.  It is important for your health and your pregnancy.  In general, as a plastic surgeon who specializes in the mommy makeover, I see women who don’t fare well with pregnancy.  Weight gain is part of that issue.

Any surgery to the breast will affect the breast.  This seems obvious, but it is something I always discuss with patients, particularly if they have not had children yet. 

If someone comes to me in their mid 30s and wants to have kids, I will counsel them to wait to have surgery until they are done having kids.  Your breasts get larger when you are pregnant and breastfeeding anyway.  Your breast changes with pregnancy and breastfeeding–after you are done with kids most women end up smaller in volume, so the size they would choose would change. (Some women do end up larger in breast size after kids, but don’t hold your breath for that one- it isn’t as common.)

So. Back to the title of this blog- if you have a breast augmentation, does it affect your future ability to lactate (ie breastfeed)?

Yes.

A study came out in Breast Journal, Jan-Feb 2007 out of the UK.  I have a few issues with the study, particularly one of their opening lines which I think is really untrue, “It does not occur to most women to consider the possible effects of breast augmentation surgery may have on their future ability to exclusively breastfeed their baby.”  Maybe it is because I live in the hypereducated Silicon Valley Palo Alto area, but I think all of my patients consider the effect of any breast surgery on their future ability to breastfeed, and it is part of my usual discussion, particularly with regards to incision site. 

But back to the study, which I am citing because it did bring out some interesting facts. 

• Women who have breast augmentation surgery have a greater   lactation insufficiency.  NOTE: This does not mean they do not produce milk, but they may not be able to exclusively feed their child by breast milk alone to meet their parameters of weight gain.
• Factors related to surgery include impairment/loss of nerves to the nipple areola complex, which lead to reduced sensation and loss of the suckling reflex resulting in decreased milk production.
• complications in surgery (hematoma, need for additional surgery, capsular contracture, etc) can lead to impairment.

Their conclusion? “With good surgical technique and proper postoperative management, most of the complications associated with surgery that may result in insufficient milk production can be minimized but not always avoided.”

So what does this mean? This study would not change my general advice to women, which is:

• If you are in your early 20s and have a good decade before having kids, in the pros/cons of deciding to do breast surgery, you need to factor in potential decrease in your ability to breastfeed.
• I have had many patients who have successfully breastfed after breast augmentation.  This study shows a decreased amount of milk production, and it varied due to multiple factors.  Their final statement was that good technique and proper postop management you can minimize the impairment.
• IF YOU ARE WITHIN A YEAR OR TWO OF HAVING A BABY, WAIT.  I counsel women to do this all the time. I get that having larger breasts will make your wedding dress fit better, but if your plan is to get married and then start a family right after, wait to do the surgery.
• IF BREASTFEEDING IS OF PARAMOUNT IMPORTANCE and you would be upset to supplement with formula if needed, WAIT.  I know this is controversial in my plastic surgery world where many doctors have become salesmen for procedures, but you have to look at your life big picture when looking at these things.

Remember also, some women can’t breastfeed for whatever reason who have never had breast surgery.  There are no guarantees.

I do a ton of breast surgery.  I have 3 kids.  I am a huge fan of breastfeeding.  How can I advise my patients about breast surgery and the relationship to breastfeeding?   I know a lot from being in practice for over a decade, and I read a lot of studies.  Every piece of information helps in the decision making.

There are women who are going to have a hard time breastfeeding.  Some of these women have had breast surgery, others did not.  Is there some way to predict who is whom?  Who will have a harder time?

A study came out in Birth, Sept 1990 looking at the influence of different factors on your ability to breastfeed a baby.  The study followed 319 women who were pregnant with their first baby who intended to breastfeed.  These women were evaluated in their last trimester for their initial measurements.  They looked at:

• surgical incisions
• size
• symmetry
• nipple protuberance (do you have inverted nipples?)
• and the woman’s estimate of their breast increase during the pregnancy

At two visits after the first 2 weeks postpartum (all were term babies), the infants were weighed and the moms estimated how big their breasts got when their milk came in.  Breastfeeding was evaluated and help was given when there were problems, looking particularly at how to maximize the amount of milk made.

“Sufficient” milk production related to an average weight gain daily of 28.5g between visits.  If they had to supplement with formula this was noted as well. 

What was related?                                                              

• 85% of mothers had sufficient lactation
• 15% had insufficient lactation, despite intervention
• 7% had some kind of breast surgery prior to their first pregnancy.  If a periareolar incision was used, these women had a 5x rate of lactation insufficiency compared to those without any surgery.
• Insufficient lactation was significantly associated with minimal prenatal breast enlargement
• Insufficient lactation was significantly associated with minimal postpartum breast enlargement when the milk came in
• Inverted nipples were more likely to have lactation insufficiency (not statistically significant)

So. How can you anticipate?  If you have inverted nipples, or prior breast surgery with an incision in the periareolar area, you may have decreased milk production.  15% of women in this study had insufficient milk production, and many did not have any prior surgery or inverted nipples.  If your breasts get much larger with pregnancy and when your milk comes in, signs are good you will produce enough milk. 

What I have seen in my plastic surgery practice here in Palo Alto, where there is positive peer pressure to breastfeed, is prior surgery does not mean you can’t breastfeed.  What I found in practice and these studies is your milk production may be lower.  But any breast milk is good for you, your baby, and your bond.

Let me start first with an email I received from a patient,  ”I just want let you know that I have had no problem breastfeeding.  I am grateful that nothing was damaged during my breast lift surgery.  Nice job to you!!  We had a beautiful girl.  I was worried about breastfeeding but it is going great.  I have a ton of milk supply on both breasts.   I just wanted to let you know. “

All breast surgery affects the breast.  Seems like a simple concept, but we forget it sometimes.  A 20 year old woman who wants a breast reduction may be more focused on getting her breasts smaller and somewhere above her waist, not the bonding and nutrition she may give with breastfeeding 10 years down the road when she decides to have kids. 

So I discuss it. 

Any woman who has not had children and wants to do any surgery of the breast needs to consider the effect surgery will have on the breast and your ability to breastfeed.  Thankfully, for most women, they are able to make milk.  The studies show there may be a decreased amount of milk, but I have had many patients who have had breast augmentation or breast reductions and lifts who have successfully gone on to breastfeed.

If you are a decade away from thinking about kids or you have a lot of issues with your breasts (backpain, droop, asymmetry, etc), then know there are techniques which help maximize your future ability to breastfeed.  If you are on the verge of having kids, wait to do the surgery.   It will totally preserve your ability to breastfeed among other advantages:

So what am i going to say?  Eat broiled fish and salad?  Lose the weight by “chasing your children” and breastfeeding??

NO!

I love to read Men’s Health magazine.  The articles are great.  Here are some good rules of thumb, and he focuses on the tiny changes- not the “I am going to exercise for 2 hours every day” kind of programs, but the “I am going to not put the extra food on the table” kind of things. So I am not going to write this article again- I think he did a great job.  But I will post it here because he cites some interesting studies.  And much of the body work I do as a plastic surgeon has everything to do with weight.

7 Habits That Make You Fat
By David Zinczenko of Men’s Health

FAT HABIT #1: Putting the Serving Dishes on the Table
Researchers at Cornell University found that when people served themselves from the kitchen counter or the stove, they ate up to 35 percent less food than they did when the grub was on the kitchen or dining room table. When there’s distance between us and our food, the scientists theorize, we think harder about whether we’re really hungry for more.

FAT HABIT #2: Getting Too Little (or Too Much) Sleep

A sleep schedule is vital to any weight-loss plan, say Wake Forest University researchers who tracked study participants for 5 years. In the under-40 age group, people who slept 5 hours or less each night gained nearly 2½ times as much abdominal fat as those who logged 6 to 7 hours; also, those who slept 8 hours or longer added nearly twice as much belly fat as the 6- to 7-hour group. People with sleep deficits tend to eat more (and use less energy) because they’re tired, says study coauthor Kristen Hairston, M.D., while those who sleep longer than 8 hours a night tend to be less active.

FAT HABIT #3: Not Multitasking While Watching TV
We don’t need to tell you that too much TV has been linked to weight gain. But here’s what you may not realize: You can have your TV and watch it, too. Just do something else at the same time. Washing dishes burns 70 calories every 30 minutes. So does ironing. Here’s another thing to keep in mind: Cutting TV time even a little helps you burn calories, say researchers at the University of Vermont. In their study, overweight participants who cut their viewing time in half (from an average of 5 hours to 2.5) burned an extra 119 calories a day. “Nearly anything you do—even reading—uses more energy than watching TV,” says study author Jennifer J. Otten, Ph.D.

FAT HABIT #4: Drinking Soda
Researchers say you can measure a person’s risk of obesity by measuring his or her soda intake. Versus people who don’t drink sweetened sodas, here’s what your daily intake means:

½ can = 26 percent increased risk of being overweight or obese

½ to 1 can = 30.4 percent increased risk

1 to 2 cans = 32.8 percent increased risk

More than 2 cans = 47.2 percent increased risk

That’s a pretty remarkable set of stats. You don’t have to guzzle Double Gulps from 7-Eleven to put yourself at risk—you just need to indulge in one or two cans a day. Wow. And because high-fructose corn syrup is so cheap, food marketers keep making serving sizes bigger (even the “small” at most movie theaters is enough to drown a raccoon). That means we’re drinking more than ever and don’t even realize it: In the 1950s, the average person drank 11 gallons of soda a year. By the mid-2000s, we were drinking 46 gallons a year. A Center for Science in the Public Interest report contained this shocking sentence: “Carbonated soft drinks are the single biggest source of calories in the American diet.”

FAT HABIT #5: Taking Big Bites
Dutch researchers recently found that big bites and fast chewing can lead to overeating. In the study, people who chewed large bites of food for 3 seconds consumed 52 percent more food before feeling full than those who chewed small bites for 9 seconds. The reason: Tasting food for a longer period of time (no matter how much of it you bite off) signals your brain to make you feel full sooner, say the scientists.

Fat Habit #6: Not Eating Enough Fat
You don’t have to go whole hog on a low-carb diet to see results. Simply swapping a few hundred calories of carbs for a little fat may help you lose weight and reduce your blood-insulin levels, according to researchers from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. People in their study who consumed just 43 percent of their calories from carbohydrates felt fuller after 4 hours and maintained their blood-sugar levels longer than those who ate 55 percent carbs. Carbs can cause blood-sugar levels to spike and then crash, leading to hunger and overeating, says study author Barbara Gower, Ph.D. Fat, on the other hand, keeps you satiated longer. Some easy swaps: butter instead of jam on toast; bacon instead of potatoes; low-fat milk instead of a sports drink.

FAT HABIT #7: Not Getting the Best Guidance!
Signing up for e-mails (or tweets) that contain weight-loss advice can help you drop pounds, a new study reveals. When researchers from Canada sent diet and exercise advice to more than 1,000 working adults weekly, they discovered that the recipients boosted their physical activity and ate smarter. People who didn’t receive the reminders didn’t change.

EAT RIGHT RULE: If your food can go bad, it’s good for you. If it can’t go bad, it’s bad for you.

Perfect candidate for breast surgery! Sign her up?!

Not quite.  She should consider waiting.

Why?  She is in her mid thirties. She wants to have kids.  Even when she said, “I won’t breastfeed because I want to minimize changes in the breast” (which I don’t recommend due to the overwhelming evidence of the benefit of breastfeeding, but those are topics for other blogs), your breasts still change.  She is not a 20 year old who has a good decade before having children.  She is in her mid 30s and will have them in the next year or two.  I could make her breasts perfect- exactly what she wants- and pregnancy and/or breastfeeding will change them. 

What do we see?

• Loss of volume (Rarely increase in volume)
• Skin laxity/droop
• Stretch marks
• Sensory change
• Shape change

Other thoughts…

Pregnancy is tough.  It is hard to work on making your body look good for decades and then lose control of it in pregnancy.  I don’t want you to ever regret or have negative feelings about having a child and breastfeeding because it is doing “damage” to your breast.  If you are in my office you are not adverse to doing surgery to improve things.  Great! So time your surgery well.  If you are on the cusp of your babymaking years, go have that baby. Breastfeed.  Enjoy it.  When you are done with all your kids, your issues with your breast will have changed.  Your breasts will be different.  Let’s address it then.

If you live in Northern California as I do, women breastfeed.  I would even venture to say there is peer pressure to breastfeed.  When I had my first child I went to a mommy and me gathering for new moms at Stanford.  All these moms from Palo Alto, Menlo Park, Atherton, and Woodside gathered in a circle to discuss their babies.   A mom took out a bottle to feed her child. As people looked, there was almost a hush in the room.  I could feel her discomfort- she wasn’t breastfeeding her baby.  My girlfriend advice (I’m putting on my girlfriend hat, not my doctor hat) is to see how you feel when you have your baby, perhaps even try breastfeeding, before you decide you will or will not do it.

Now if you are 20, flat chested, and self conscious about your breasts, I would advise differently.  For you  it makes a lot more sense.  You could easily have a decade until you even think about babies.  And I have women who understand everything I mentioned above but still want the breast augmentation now.  That is fine. 

I believe in choice.  I am here to educate you and to help you understand the issues.  I will support you (and be honored to be your surgeon) regardless of your choice.

The number of cases is at the highest level since 1958.

Why do we care?

• Case rates are highest in infants
• Adolescent and teens follow close behind
• 12% of cases required hospitalization
• 8 deaths have been reported, all in babies less than 2 months of age, and none had been vaccinated yet.

Whooping cough is spread by inhaling respiratory droplets (ie it gets into the air you are breathing) and is highly contagious.  On average they think most patients infect 12 other people!  Whooping cough in adults does not have the severe whooping cough characteristic of infants and young children, therefore it frequently goes undiagnosed.

Infants are very vulnerable.

Infants are protected for the first few months of life from maternal antibodies during gestation.  Unless recently immunized though, most pregnant women have little immunity to pertussis, so they are not giving sufficient protective antibodies to their fetus.  As a result, the California Department of Public Health is recommending

• all women of childbearing years be vaccinated with Tdap. (Tetanus, Diptheria, Acellular Pertussis) Pregnancy is not a contraindication to vaccination, though usually women are vaccinated in the 2nd /3rd trimester or postpartum. 
• Anyone in close contact with infants– family members, caregivers, and health workers– should be vaccinated at least 2 weeks before contact.

Provide a cocoon of safety for your infant and your family. The first dose of DTaP is given at 2 months of age, but may be given as early as 6 weeks to provide protection earlier in life.

Gestational diabetes is when you develop diabetes (high blood sugar) while pregnant.  You don’t want your blood sugar to be too high.  People with long term diabetes have issues all over their body due to problems with blood flow- heart disease, loss of sensation, loss of limbs, higher infection rates, vision issues to name a few.  In pregnancy, diabetes is associated with higher birth weight of your baby, early delivery, higher C section rates, diabetes in the mom, and future diabetes and obesity in your child. 

A study came out in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology of 65,000 women studied from 1991-2008 at Kaiser.  It showed for recurrent gestational diabetes:

• if you have gestational diabetes with your first child, you are 6x more likely to have it again with your second pregnancy
• if you have it with your first two pregancies, you hae a 26X risk for having it with your third pregancy
• higher rates found in Hispanic women, and Asian/Pacific Islander women
• higher recurrence in women over age 30
• higher recurrence when bigger time gap between pregnancies

This may seem like a “of course that makes sense” kind of thing.   But for those women who have had gestational diabetes, are older, or are certain ethnicities, that glucose tolerance test is extra important.

It is one of those things we discuss for our entire lives.  Watching what we eat, trying to fit into jeans, comparing ourselves to others while changing in the locker room.

A recent study in Nature magazine showed some interesting facts.  The basic jist:  the number of fat cells you have as an adult remains constant through your adult life.  They postulate that number is formed by the amount of fat cells you have in childhood and adolescence.  When you gain weight as an adult, you are enlarging the fat cells you already have.  When you lose weight, you are shrinking them.  As a kid though, when you put on weight, you add fat cells. 

Their thought? If you gained weight in childhood, you have more fat cells, and it is harder for you to lose weight as an adult.  For those who gained as adults, their fat cell number was determined when they were kids, so they don’t have as many cells, therefore  it may be easier for them to lose weight.  (Maybe this has something to do why some can lose the baby weight easier than others?)

• The number of fat cells rises until age 20
• The number then remains constant
• The number of fat cells is linked to BMI (your body mass index)

They found patients who had stomach stapling had no change in the fat cell number despite losing 18% of their weight.

Bottom line: Keep your kids healthy during adolescence.  Their fat cell number is set as an adolescent for the rest of their life.

Being overweight isn’t good for pregnancy. We all “know” this, but a study in the British Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology came out which looked at 23,000+ women in different countries.  They showed weight is an issue by itself.

We know obese and overweight women have a higher rate of pregnancy related gestational diabetes.  Gestational diabetes can lead to larger babies.  Larger babies are harder to deliver, causing more issues during delivery, including injury to the baby like shoulder dislocation.

So this study wanted to look at is it the weight? Or is it the gestational diabetes?

The women in the study all had oral glucose tolerance tests, height, and weight measurements.   Metzger and his colleagues looked at whether body mass index (BMI) influences pregnancy risks and fetal and newborn health unrelated to gestational diabetes.

Women with BMI of 42 or greater (severely obese) had triple the risk of an excessively large baby.  The risk of having a C section was doubled.  Preeclamisa risk was 14 times greater.

In an interview Metzger stated, “We’re pretty confident that treating gestational diabetes going forward is going to continue to be beneficial,” “We have much less evidence at this point as to how to neutralize or reduce the impact of overweight on pregnancy outcome.”  “What is becoming clear is that it’s probably a woman’s weight before she gets pregnant, rather than how much she gains during pregnancy, that’s important in determining risk.”

SOURCE: BJOG, online January 20, 2010.

Findings?

They looked at 43000+ women aged 15-49 who were pregnant with a single fetus.  The women’s exercise was walking jogging, biking, weight training, aerobics, etc.  They averaged 6 times a month for the first half of pregnancy, and then once a week until week 30. 

The average weight of the infants at birth was 3,677 grams (8 pounds. Ouch!), and those who exercised during pregnancy did not have a significant effect on birth weight.

BUT, they did find an association with BMI. 

What is BMI? BMI is body mass index, to do it in US measurements, it is 703 x weight (lb)/ height (inches) squared.  BMI 18.5-23.9 is normal, 24-29.9 is overweight, and greater than 30 is obese.

The prepregnancy average BMI of the women in the study was 24. Fleten’s team found each unit increase in the mother’s BMI was associated with 20 grams (0.70 ounces) heavier birth weight.  So an increase in BMI of 5 units — 29 versus 24 — would cause a birth weight increase of 103 grams (3.63 ounces).

The Norwegian doctors suggest doctors focus on preventing or treating overweight and obese women of childbearing age to help reduce the risk of giving birth to babies who weigh too much. (OUCH!)

SOURCE: Obstetrics and Gynecology, February 2010

Well, what makes you want to get a tummy tuck now? You are likely

stretched out,

hanging or loose skin,

loosened muscles,

and maybe stretch marks.

When we do a tummy tuck we 1. tighten the muscles and 2. tighten the skin.  Another pregnancy will do the opposite.  Your muscles and skin will stretch to accomodate the pregnancy.  Your internal stitches to tighten the muscles will likely loosen or rip.  Your skin will stretch  and if you are prone to stretch marks, you will likely form new ones.

STORYTIME:

I had a patient who had major weight loss. 100 pounds.  She came to me for a tummy tuck.  She also was 30 ish, and when I asked, she said she wanted children in the future.  She was a great tummy tuck candidate- she had horrible stretch marks and hanging skin.  But I told her to wait.  Why? She is 30.  She can’t wait too long to have kids due to that darn fertility time clock.  She formed bad stretch marks from her weight gain.  People who form bad stretch marks tend to do it again.  The stretch marks now are mostly on her lower belly, and I will remove them when I tummy tuck her.  If I tuck her now and tighten the skin, when she gets pregnant she will form new stretch marks.  These stretch marks will go where she stretches, which includes above the belly button.  I most likely won’t be able to cut these out after her pregnancy.

IF she waits, she is “prestretched” for her pregnancy (from her prior 100 pounds of weight.) She will likely look just like she does now after the baby.  I can then tuck her after the baby, and likely get rid of her stretch marks.  It is also one less surgery.

And, something doctors don’t talk about, but being pregnant can be tough.  Watching your flat belly stretch… and stretch…and stretch is hard to do.  When you”fixed” your belly with a tummy tuck and your new pregnancy and baby is now “ruining” it – that is not a good dynamic.

If life throws you a curve ball, then it happens.  But if you are planning things out, think of your body for the long haul- what will be the best result 10 years down the road.

http://bizymoms.com/palo-alto/surgery/mommy-makeover-palo-alto.php

1. Exercise.  A healthy body does better with pregnancy.  A lot of the women I see with great figures after pregnancy had them before pregnancy.  So improve your muscle tone, particularly your core muscles (especially the rectus muscles and oblique muscles which you use to do pilates/the plank/sit ups).

2. Healthy skin.  The “rosy skin” of pregnancy sounds great. And many women do get it.  They also get a lot of pigmentation.  The sun spots, age spots, freckling- call it what you will- worsens with pregnancy.  So prior to pregnancy, try to reverse any skin pigmentation you have.  Hydroquinone and Retin A are great for pigmentation, but they are NOT baby safe.  There are products with Vitamin C and E which are okay while pregnant and breast feeding.  And the key to pigment? SUNSCREEN and the big floppy sun hat. You should apply sunscreen daily.  Try to find a moisturizer or makeup base with sunscreen in it.  When doing activities in the sun, apply sunscreen 20 minutes before going outside, reapply every 45 minutes in water, reapply every 2 hours regardless, and use sunscreen less than a year old.  I am a fan of the clear zinc based sunscreens.  They are mechanical blockers, not chemical, so they are likely less absorbed in the skin.  Very effective and thought to be a little more baby safe.

3. Ideal weight.  You will gain weight with pregnancy.  (Oh my!? shocking.) The amount of weight you gain varies, but the usual recommendation is 25 pounds.  There is a correlation with weight gain and body changes- stretch marks, loose skin, diastasis, and higher post pregnancy weight.  There are studies which link obese children to mothers who were obese before pregnancy.  (The amount of weight gain has been revised to 11-20 pounds for women with a BMI of 30 or more.)

4. Stop smoking.  I could go on for ages on this one.  It affects every body system; increases your chance of heart attacks, stroke, and cancer; along with sun exposure it is the biggest ager of the skin, and does things I can’t fix with products and peels; no surgeon will do a tummy tuck or a breast lift on a smoker, so you might as well stop now; it is expensive; you can’t do it in restaurants; it yellows your teeth.

The health effects on the baby: it lowers the amount of oxygen they get in utero, increases heart rate, and increases rate of miscarriage and low birth weight.  There are other studies indicating after birth these babies have issues with asthma, behaviorial issues, and higher SIDS. For more information go to: http://cerhr.niehs.nih.gov/common/smoking.html.

5. Surgeries. The one surgery I like before pregnancy is liposuction.  If you have a discrete problem area, like “my outer thighs,” or are an exaggerated pear or apple shape, your shape will not improve with pregnancy.  Particularly for those women who are teeny tiny up top and carry all their weight in their thighs/hips, when you put on baby weight it will all go there.  Fast forward: you are now 10 years older and have stretched that skin more, for a longer time, and your skin is older- it won’t bounce back after liposuction like it would at age 25. Skin tone is key to liposuction, and young skin is better.

I do not like to do abdominoplasty (tummy tuck) or breast surgery right before babies.  If your breasts really bother you and you will not have babies for 5-10 years, then it may be worth it to do now. But pregnancy and breast feeding affect the belly and the breast the most.  If you can, wait to fix up those areas until after you have kids.

So,

Exercise. Wear sunscreen. Eat well/be your ideal weight. Don’t smoke.  Sounds simple, eh?

Now go get practicing to have that baby.