Post Partum Shape-Up – Month 7

Fitness & Food

This post may include affiliate links. See my full disclosure here.

Sharing some progress and tips for losing the postpartum weight loss today!
Whether you just had your second baby or your seventh, nourishing your body is key to weight loss.

It’s been several months since my last fitness check in, including this post about beginning to lose steam in my fitness journey and wanting to stop focusing on it all the time. I promise to always be 100% real with you all here and I think it’s especially important when talking about bodies and body images. You can also read about my first few steps to get back in shape after my last baby here and here.

Since that last post, I’ve made some good strides both physically and mentally in my fitness and self-love journey and I’m excited to share it all with you guys! I have a long way to go still but I’m starting to see some real progress and loving the healthy changes I’ve been able to make and stick with this time around. I did a lot of research before starting my weight loss journey, looking into Houston weight loss programs, diet plans, and personal trainers to find something that would suit my routine and help me achieve my goals in a healthy way. I’m glad to say the choices I made are working for me and I’m feeling much more body positive now.

Below are some pictures of me right when I started working out after having Alice (taken in April 2017, 7 months ago), at the start of the current fitness challenge I’m in (taken in late October, a month ago) and the last set were taken last week.
I lost about 5 pounds between each set of pictures (I’m currently at about 153 lbs) and still have about 10-15 pounds I’d like to lose, but I can definitely feel and see some improvement now! I have no shame that there is some stubborn fat in particular areas that just doesn’t want to move. For those extra few pounds of stubborn fat, I don’t see why visiting a weight loss surgery, like Tonic Weight Loss Surgery is an issue; I’ve lost a lot of weight naturally and I’m feeling healthy, which is the most important thing. It’s a completely personal choice and I’d have to do extensive research to ensure that this is something I’d be doing for the right reasons.



My main change of perspective and source of improvement this last month or so, was starting to follow a meal plan by Carli Williams (@FitnessCarli on IG). Her meal plan (she sells it for $20 on her website) tells you exactly what to eat for 14 days: 3 meals, 2 snacks and a healthy dessert each day and it was a GAME changer for me. I kept using so many excuses for my daily diet: “I’m starving when I’m nursing”, “I really eat pretty healthy, I just can’t count calories” or “I just don’t have time to make healthy foods”. In the end, I kept putting my nutrition too low on the totem pole of priorities and it showed.

After following her plan for just 5 days, I was blown away at how energetic and healthy I felt, how I much faster my Saturday run went and just how great it was to eat a ton of veggies and not feel deprived. Lest this sound like a sales pitch, Carli’s meal plan obviously isn’t the only way to lose weight – I could make up the meals and snacks on my own but it was SO nice to have it all done for me and a grocery list to boot. You can get all kinds of meal plans delivered to your door now, it’s changing the dieting scene for the better; making sure you eat in a healthy and balanced way with easy, affordable meals. It’s a no-brainer really and I’d highly recommend it.

After that first week of following it, I just took her ideas and mixed them up a bit and made my own food choices. I’ve been losing about a pound a week, my milk supply for Alice is still going strong (and she still nurses pretty much exclusively most days, except for a little baby food here and there) and I’m starting to see some physical changes as well. Here are a few of the things that have helped me the most this time around and if you’re trying to make healthy changes, I hope they help you too!

1. Add veggies. If I remembered to do nothing else when making healthier changes, I tried to get 3 solid servings of vegetables in daily. It’s AMAZING how much better I feel and how much less junk food I want to eat when packing my day full of leafy greens!

2. Make room for (healthy) dessert. Carli’s plan includes a simple low-cal dessert every day and for a sweets lover like me, this is brilliant! On my previous health challenge, I tried to eat no sugary treats 6 days a week and it was torture! On my “cheat” day I ate loads of garbage and thought about sugar the rest of the week. Nowadays, I have a cup of hot chocolate, or a handful of chocolate covered almonds or something similar after dinner. I try to keep it to around 200-300 calories and just enjoy every bite. I look forward to it all day!

3. Load up on protein. My second mistake (first being eating too many sweets) is forgetting to include lots of protein in my diet. When I forget to eat, I immediately load up on carbs and, even if they’re healthy carbs, they don’t keep me full and I eat way too much. Now my typical snacks are baby carrots with a Laughing Cow cheese wedge, an apple with a TBS of peanut butter or turkey slices with cucumber. Healthy carbs and fats with a decent dose of protein is the solution to curbing cravings, every time!



4. Make food a priority. I already mentioned this earlier but as a busy mom, feeding myself was last on the list every day. Not only that, but I was trying to remember to exercise as well as eat better. The progress I’ve seen over the last month has been almost strictly from diet changes. As much as I love to exercise, it’s just really, REALLY hard to fit in my day unless I’m up at 5am. Choosing to focus on just one thing (food) this past month has been so helpful. I plan to add more exercise into my day starting the second half of this challenge but I’m just trying not to overwhelm myself right now!

5. Lastly, take the focus off the scale. “Losing weight” can be this obsessive thing and seems to be the best indication of healthy living but it’s really not! At about week 3, I was losing some motivation and not working as hard on my diet but I stopped stepping on the scale for a while and instead focused on how I was feeling on the diet (which was great!) and made promises to myself to continue positive changes so that I could keep feeling great. Even though 5 pounds doesn’t sound like a lot, it doesn’t matter if I’m feeling and looking better.

So that’s the latest update! Carli’s challenge ends in about 3 weeks but I’m assuming she’ll start another one after that. She runs it from her FB group which you get access to if you purchase her plan. That group has been great source of support as well!

Let me know if you have any questions about it or anything else I’ve been doing. And I’d love to hear if any of you are working to adopt some healthier habits and what’s working for you!

UPDATE: See the end of my postpartum weight loss journey HERE, as well as links to my other progress posts!

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3 Comments

  • Reply
    Carli williams
    November 27, 2017 at 6:07 pm

    You are amazing!

    • Reply
      Bonnie
      November 27, 2017 at 6:41 pm

      Thanks for all the support and tools!! XO

  • Reply
    Why it's Hard to Lose Weight While Breastfeeding • Bonnie and Blithe
    November 3, 2021 at 9:22 pm

    […] last February. (See my progress posts and photos here: Before, month 1, month 2, my frustrations, month 7). It’s SO easy to drown in the sorrows of postpartum soreness, flab and low energy, all while […]

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