I'm 21 weeks pregnant today, and over the last 7 weeks I haven't gained any weight. My last OB appointment 3 weeks ago, they weren't worried about it. I had my anatomy sonogram last Friday and baby girl is perfect. She's measuring a few days ahead of her due date, but nothing alarming. They were all VERY impressed with my last a1c (5.2, yay!).
But the problem I'm having, and I'm wondering if anyone else has had the same issue, is that I don't feel like I'm able to eat enough because of the amount of insulin I have to take and the way foods are affecting my blood sugar. I'm at a 1:8 carb ratio right now. If I could eat everything I wanted, I'm pretty sure I would have gained weight by now, but since I can't, it's just frustrating. If the baby wasn't gaining weight I would be freaking out, but knowing she's perfect and everything looks awesome, I'm not worried about it just yet. But I'm concerned it might be a problem from now on. So far I've only gained 9lbs and everything I've read (although I know it's not the same for everyone) says I should have already gained 10-13lbs and that I should start gaining a pound a week (average) from now on. I'm not sure how I can put on more weight with insulin resistance starting to kick in now.
So I'm wondering if anyone else has had trouble gaining weight because of higher insulin resistance? And if so, how did you figure out how to gain weight, i.e; low carb, high calorie meals and snacks?
I had a hard time gaining weight earlier in my pregnancy last time, and it was partly because I was nervous about my increasing I:Cs (and also because of morning sickness). I eventually just told myself that there’s nothing wrong with taking more insulin if I need it. Everyone takes different amounts, and a healthy pancreas creates more insulin as resistance goes up. If you didn’t have D, you’d just produce it yourself. So we have to inject or pump it… We’re just doing the pancreas’s job!
Also, are you overweight? If you are (I am, and was), then the weight gain recommendations aren’t quite as high. Part of the weight we’re suppose to gain is “maternal fat stores.” Well, a lot of us already have that! (My OB told me that she’d prefer that I not gain much more than 20 pounds by the end. I was on track for that, but don’t know what the final weight gain was because I suddenly ballooned up with ungodly amounts if water weight. Like 13 pounds in one week!)
I’m not overweight by medical standards, but i was not happy with my prepregnancy weight. That’s mainly why I haven’t been too concerned so far, but going forward I’m a little nervous. i don’t mind giving more insulin when i need it (i.e. raising i:c ratios and basals) it’s mainly the food that I’m eating is making me spike suddenly, when it hasn’t in the past. Normally i wouldn’t care, it’s not that high, but it’s higher than my endo wants me 2 hours after eating.
I gained 25 pounds throughout the whole pregnancy, but I think that most of that was in the second half of the pregnancy. My doctors were glad that I wasn't gaining near the beginning. (I will check my records later, but this is what I remember.) I was eating a pretty high protein and fat diet (I think that I consumed more cheese than I could even imagine eating now), but also 180g of carb a day. For me the difference was WHICH carbs I was eating. I could eat whole grains, potatoes, plain greek yoghurt, but only ate fruit in 10gCH serving at a time and always ate some protein with the fruit (cheese, yoghurt or peanut butter). I also had a flaxseed chocolate cake recipe that I made in the microwave, which contained an egg, butter, and ground flaxseed. So it was high calorie and incredibly filling with almost no carbs. And I felt like I got dessert too. I found the recipe on TuD somewhere. I will look for it later.
(My OB told me that she’d prefer that I not gain much more than 20 pounds by the end. I was on track for that, but don’t know what the final weight gain was because I suddenly ballooned up with ungodly amounts if water weight. Like 13 pounds in one week!)