Losing weight after pregnancy - How do you lose weight after giving birth?

Not only is it important how much weight a woman increases during pregnancy, but how much weight she loses later, which would determine her risk of developing urinary incontinence after delivery. Several studies have shown that being overweight, especially when it accumulates in the abdomen, increases the risk of developing urinary incontinence in women, but also that when overweight or obese women lose weight, they reduce that risk.

Urinary incontinence is also associated with pregnancy. Many women have losses of urine during pregnancy, and delivery, especially vaginal, is a risk factor for urinary incontinence in women's lives.

After studying almost 13,000 Norwegian women during their first pregnancy, the team led by Stian Langeland Wesnes, of the University of Bergen, Norway, found a weak association between weight gain during pregnancy and the risk of developing urinary incontinence in children. nine months or during the six months postpartum.

Losing weight after delivery, the key
The results surprised the researchers. "For decades, obstetricians have assumed that excessive weight gain during pregnancy would explain the peak risk of developing urinary incontinence in that period, although without scientific evidence of it," said Dr. Wesnes. "The new study, however, suggests that other factors would trigger incontinence in pregnancy," he added.

According to the results, women who lose more weight after delivery have a low risk of developing incontinence during the following six months, but not if they get fat. Dr. Wesnes stated that it is unknown why the variation in body weight after delivery is associated with the risk of developing incontinence. One possibility, according to the team, is that the type of weight gain influences.

For example, in women who are not pregnant, body fat is what drives that increase, but during pregnancy, the fetus, placenta, and fluids account for much of the excess weight.

The study, published in the American Journal of Epidemiology, included 12,679 women, who answered questionnaires during weeks 15 and 30 of pregnancy and six months after the birth of their children.

Forty percent had urinary incontinence during week 30 of pregnancy and 21% six months after delivery. Women who had gained too much weight in the first 15 weeks of pregnancy (7 kg or more) had a higher risk of incontinence at 30 weeks (45% vs. 38% of those who had gained 3.5 kg or less).

In any case, the increase in weight after the 15th week of gestation was not associated with the risk of developing urinary incontinence at week 30. There was no relationship between the extra kg of pregnancy and the possibility of developing incontinence in the six months postpartum, However, the author noted that the results suggest that "losing weight after delivery and training the pelvic floor muscles would reduce the prevalence of postpartum female urinary incontinence."