Continued from Lose Weight After Pregnancy.

Your baby’s in your arms. Now you want to know how to lose pregnancy weight. But breastfeeding isn’t the time to diet, right? Maybe the time has come to reconsider this popular believe.

New research from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro reveals that overweight nursing moms can cut 500 calories a day from their diet without affecting milk production and safely lose six times as much weight as nondieters.

Starting 1 month after giving birth, 35 breastfeeding moms – who were either overweight before they got pregnant or who gained too much during pregnancy – were randomly assigned to cut back on sweets, sodas, high-fat snack foods, and desserts or to eat as they normally would.

The dieters also walked, jogged, or did aerobics for 45 minutes, 4 days a week. In 10 weeks, the calorie cutters lost an average of 10 pounds; the other women lost less than 2. The dieters also lost more body fat.

The only negative: The calorie-watching women fell short on calcium and vitamin D, which could raise these moms’ risk of osteoporosis later in life.

“Although breastfeeding burns about 500 calories a day, 20% of nursing moms don’t lose weight. Some even put on extra pounds,” says Cheryl Lovelady, PhD, a professor of nutrition and lead author of the UNC Greensboro study.

“We’ve shown that overweight women can safely lose about a pound per week.”

But, she cautions, women need to eat at least three servings of low-fat dairy and five servings of fruits and vegetables daily to avoid losing out on key nutrients.

Significantly, both groups of new moms in this study weren’t getting enough of vitamins C and E. [source: Prevention]