Trim Healthy Mama Tuesday - 10 weeks postpartum

After stalling for several weeks I finally started losing weight again in the last two weeks. I am down another 3lb in the last fortnight, 1 lb the first week and 2lb this last week. After slacking off in the first 6 weeks after Megan’s birth I knew I needed to get back to sticking to plan to get my weight moving again. 

While I was getting used to nursing a newborn and running after 2 preschoolers I found myself slipping back to my old ingrained ways of eating. Breakfast was my biggest issue. I’d wake up in the morning after several night feeds with a need to eat straight away. On top of that we had moved the boys from cribs to beds so there was no more sneaking downstairs to the kitchen without them. I started making toast for a quick breakfast to keep me going until I could get more than a minute or two in the kitchen. Inevitably a bad start to the day with food led to other “cheats” when the hunger pangs would strike within a few minutes of nursing.

I knew the only way to break the bad cycle I’d slipped into was to get myself more organized. As the initial “newborn fog” lifted at about 8 weeks postpartum I finally felt ready for more planning and structure to our food again. I put a few things in place to help me conquer the early morning munchies. First I set up our little four cup coffee maker in our master suite. That way I could get that important first cup of coffee to kick start my day before I had to cope with the demands of our preschoolers. After the 6am (or thereabouts) nursing I could enjoy a mug of hot black coffee in bed along with my devotional time and my sleeping baby lying beside me in bed. Then I decided I really needed to make sure I never ran out of skinny chocolate in the freezer ready to eat. Right now I’ve been enjoying it with whey protein powder and salted peanuts. This let me have a quick snack that was on plan while getting the boys their first breakfast. (They always start the day with a banana and a cup of milk while they wait for me to make the real breakfast.) Then I finally tried the Muffin in a Mug recipes.

Cinnamon Muffin in a Mug

I had avoided Muffin in a Mug until this point because we don’t use the microwave for cooking. We do have a microwave as part of our fitted kitchen, but we use it to store baking trays and cake pans. Neither Rob nor I like the idea of microwaved food, but it was the perfect size for my baking trays. Since it was mentioned in the book that 2 smaller muffins could be made from the recipe, and Serene had mentioned baking them in the oven instead of the microwave I decided to try the oven method. Since I have 6 muffin sized trays I started with tripling the ingredients and using paper cupcake cases in the muffin tray. I made the cinnamon version first, then next time I made the chocolate version. I also made the cream cheese frosting with Greek yogurt for a nice tangy topping. Now I had a quick and easy muffin that was perfect for a quick breakfast instead of toast. I could freeze the muffins ready frosted in pairs. Then when I had a morning where I couldn’t wait long for breakfast I could take 2 muffins out of the freezer and they would be ready to eat by the time the big pot of coffee was ready. No more off plan toast for this Trim Healthy Mama.

An added bonus of having Muffin in a Mug always available is now I have something I can feed the boys when they are having a “picky about food” day. They are particularly fond of the chocolate version (like their daddy) and think they are getting a chocolate cupcake. Now if they won’t eat anything else I can feed them a nice healthy muffin that won’t spike their blood sugar and lead them to a sugar crash meltdown. Since there is protein in both the muffin and the frosting I also don’t have to be too concerned that they haven’t eaten anything else that day after their initial banana.

Chocolate Muffin in a Mug

The most exciting part for me is that not only have I not held on to my 10lb first trimester gain for the first time, but I have also lost 27lb of the 30lb I had kept from the previous 3 pregnancies. Only 3lb more to lose and I’ll be back at my “before any pregnancy” weight. Being so close to my first loss goal is definitely motivating me to find more ways to help keep myself on plan. If I can stick to the plan right now when I only have little ones and run around all day with an infant in my arms, then I can stick to the plan no matter what is going on in my life.