General Perinatal Recommendations

The idea that during pregnancy you are “eating for two” is outdated and vague. The reality is pretty simple. You’re not eating for two in the sense that you double your normal adult intakes. However, it’s important to keep in mind that you need to eat enough to sustain yourself (an adult with energy/calorie needs to sustain proper hormone levels, continue daily jobs, activities etc) while also eating enough to create another human. You can think of it more practically like you’re eating for “one and a half.”

In other words, you do need to increase your intakes over the course of your pregnancy to not only support fetal development, but also to make sure your baby can survive outside of the womb (which takes adipose tissue on your baby’s frame).

Another big consideration to think of right from the beginning is that if you plan on breastfeeding, milk production takes more calories than even pregnancy does. You can consider your entire pregnancy a nine month reverse diet (slowly increasing your intakes) to get your body ready to create the food you’ll give your baby when the time comes.

Calculate your calories and food group recommendation with the MyPlate widget located in the Resources tab.

If you want specific macronutrient, micronutrient, supplement, and cardio recommendations, we recommend full-time coaching or one-time consults!