How I Lost 50 Pounds: 5 Steps | Postpartum Weight Loss 

Health
How I Lost 50 Pounds

I was miserable. I was 50 pounds overweight and my postpartum hormones were not getting back to normal. 

I saw a picture that I didn’t recognize of myself. Do I really look like that?

Even worse–I didn’t feel like myself. 

The extra weight took away my personality. I went from outgoing and fun to hibernating away from everyone. I didn’t want to be seen.

I lived in leggings, sweatpants, and oversized t-shirts because I refused to buy any nice clothes in the size I needed.

I wasn’t planning on being overweight long enough to justify a new wardrobe at this size. But after a year postpartum, I didn’t think it would take this long to get back to normal.

I had to make a change. I decided I was going to lose weight no matter how long it took. I was in it for the long haul. 

I stopped looking for quick fixes and started looking for ways I could lose weight and sustain it. I wanted this change to stick. 

Here’s exactly how I lost 50 pounds postpartum.

1. Intermittent Fasting

The first contribution for how I lost 50 pounds postpartum was intermittent fasting (IF). 

I discovered IF in 2018 when I was trying to figure out a way to lose weight without having excess skin postpartum. I have a post about losing the mommy pooch and excess skin if you’re interested.

In my search, I found Gin Stephens. She is a mom who lost 80 pounds with IF and posted a picture of her flat stomach. If I could get my stomach to look like hers after I lost all the weight, I was going to be happy. And I had less weight to lose, so this made me believe it was possible!

IF wasn’t as popular as it is today back in 2018, but it was definitely gaining traction. Gin had a podcast with Melanie Avalon where they simply answered questions about intermittent fasting. I listened to this religiously while I was trying to learn all the ins and outs. 

Fasting was so appealing to me because I already have an aversion to eating food in the morning. So the only thing I needed to change was not adding creamer to my coffee during the fast. And I also needed to be mindful about when I finished dinner.

I wasn’t willing to give up coffee completely, so I learned to drink it black. And now I prefer it that way. The creamer I used now tastes like chemicals to me (because that’s pretty much what it is). It took me about 4-5 days of drinking black coffee to enjoy it. And now I look forward to it daily.

I decided to ease into IF. I started with the basic 16:8 where I ate in an 8 hour timeframe and fasted for 16 hours a day. I broke my fast at noon for lunch and then I finished dinner prior to 8pm. 

I slowly worked my way up to push the fast longer. I would just push lunch back to 1pm, 2pm, 3pm, and eventually I tried one meal a day (OMAD)–which I really loved. 

When I did OMAD I wasn’t strict with my eating window and fasting times. I would often break my fast with a snack while I was cooking dinner–or an appetizer might be a more appropriate term. 

I ate dinner and sometimes even dessert after. Then I would fast until dinner time the next day.

I eventually got to the point of wanting to try out alternate daily fasting (ADF). Whis is where you fast every other day. Some people do this on a MWF schedule vs every other day so that the days you fast are consistent. This is how I did it. 

You can also choose to eat a small 500 calorie meal on your fasting day with ADF–which I did. When I fast, I get so much energy. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to sleep if I didn’t eat. So I would have a small meal around dinner time to help me sleep.

I also ended up changing to a 5:2 schedule because fasting for 3 days a week was more than I cared to do. This is where you pick 2 days of the week to fast (or only have a 500 calorie meal). 

When you do ADF or 5:2, you’re supposed to not do any form of fasting on your “up” days (the days you eat), but I usually still skipped breakfast as I just wasn’t hungry in the morning. 

I personally prefer either one or two meals a day the best. If I am trying to focus on getting work done, OMAD is great. But if you’re not staying busy, it can be mentally difficult to skip lunch. 

I feel amazing fasting. In my post about the magic of fasting, I talk about how I feel high on life. Kind of like a “runner’s high” but without the cardio and sweat. 

I did some form of intermittent fasting throughout my entire weight loss journey. I lost the first 12 pounds with two meals a day. The next 12 pounds I lost with one meal a day. The next 12 I lost with ADF. I cleaned up my nutrition to lose the last 14 pounds with two meals a day.

I have a post on how to fast with different methods and how to make it easier if you want more info.

2. Small Changes

Another contribution for how I lost 50 pounds postpartum was making small changes. 

I knew I was going to do intermittent fasting, but that wasn’t changing much about how I was already living.

So I made a couple “rules” that I knew would make progress easier. 

First, I decided I wasn’t going to snack in between meals. This isn’t a requirement of fasting. I did this because some people reported being so hungry once they broke their fast that they couldn’t stop eating.

I wanted to eat large, good meals for lunch and dinner so that I wasn’t eating uncontrollably in between. Most things I would normally have snacked on were not nutritious–chips and dip, cheese and crackers. So I just cut that out. 

Second, I would no longer eat out. My food had to be prepared at home. I had made a bad habit of grabbing fast food for lunch at work, so I cut that option out. 

So now I had to figure out what to eat. I didn’t want to do anything super restrictive. I have gone down that road many times before. I once did a diet where I only drank these “nutrition” shakes 6 times a day and then ate vegetables for dinner.

If I didn’t lose weight during my weigh-in, they would tell me to eat less vegetables for dinner. Don’t do “diets” like this. You’ll just gain the weight back when you start eating food again. 

This time I wanted something sustainable. I wanted to enjoy my food.

Growing up, lunch for me was always a sandwich and some chips. So I decided to keep the sandwich but sub the chips out for some fruit and veggies. 

My lunch for a while was a ham sandwich, an apple, and carrots with hummus. 

Then for dinner I made some kind of meat, potatoes, and a veggie. Sometimes I would have a roll with dinner. Sometimes I would have dessert. 

I didn’t count calories as this never worked for me in the past. I have a whole post about why you don’t need to focus on your calories. 

I did have success counting carbs in the past, but I really didn’t want to go super low carb or do keto. It pretty much sucks the joy out of your life. Yes I lost weight, but I didn’t feel good.

I did still track my carbs at first, and I aimed for around 100 grams per day. I knew someone at work who lost weight said doing this alone would drastically help with weight loss. 

Doing IF with two meals and no snacks with these small changes in my diet helped me lose the first 12 pounds. I also added short, easy workouts to this–which is my next tip.

3. Short Workouts

The next contribution for how I lost 50 pounds postpartum was doing short workouts.

Working out was not my strong suit. I did gymnastics and cheerleading in school. I had a trampoline at home that I was on almost every day. I also had a swimming pool growing up.

So almost all of my “workouts” were just me having fun and getting in movement from my hobbies. Which is honestly what I recommend if you can make it work. It’s actually a tip I have in my post about 7 easy workouts for busy moms. 

But for those who have sedentary lifestyles thanks to full time desk jobs, you likely need a way to prioritize movement in a short amount of time. 

Luckily I had a friend who was great at this. She sent me and another friend a list of 26 workouts–one for each letter in the alphabet. And you were supposed to spell your name to get your full workout.

The beauty of this is that if something was duplicated or if there were too many lower body options in my name, I had 25 other options I could sub it out that set with. 

The three of us doing these workouts were in a group text, and everyday we had to send each other a check mark that meant we completed our workout for the day. 

This really helped me to stay on track. I could not be the only one not sending my checkmark, and these girls were on it. 

And on days when I was the first to complete the workout and send a check mark, it motivated my friends to do theirs if they weren’t feeling it–which somehow also motivated me to get it done. I wanted to help my friends succeed too. 

We did this challenge for a month. But it was enough to keep me motivated to keep going after.

The same friend told me about tabata workouts. With tabata workouts, you do your exercise for 20 seconds, then rest for 10 seconds. You do this 8 times for a total of 4 minutes. 

During those 20 seconds, you work as hard as you can. You do as many reps as time allows. 

I often did 3 of these a day for a total of a 12-minute workout. I would focus on lower body for one set, upper body for one set, and core for one set. 

And you don’t have to do the same workout 8 times. You could even pick 8 different lower body workouts to do in those 4 minutes. I would normally do 2-4 different exercises for mine. 

These short workouts made me feel amazing and got me exploring other workouts I could do. I eventually added in rebounding (mini trampoline) for 10-15 minutes a day. This is equivalent to a 45 minute run! 

There are so many benefits to rebounding. Cellerciser, my favorite rebounder, made a post on 201 benefits you get from this exercise on their website. 

And since I grew up with a trampoline as a kid and doing gymnastics, this workout was right up my alley. You could also add in something you enjoyed doing as a kid. 

4. Walks After Dinner

The next contribution for how I lost 50 pounds postpartum was going on walks after dinner.

This is something I didn’t realize was making such an impact on my weight loss success until later. 

Walking helps to regulate your blood sugar levels, so going on a walk right after eating is the best time to do it. Although a walk at any time is still great.

Walking helps combat the sedentary lifestyle we all primarily live now. I know people who have basically walked all their weight off. They did nothing else, just walked. 

I lived in a neighborhood with a lot of hills, so I would go on a walk with my husband after dinner and push the stroller up the hills. We usually went around 1.5 miles. If it wasn’t too close to bedtime for the baby sometimes we would go longer. 

I used to always want to jump on the trampoline right after dinner when I was growing up. Which sounds so backwards. But I think it really helped with my digestion and blood sugar levels, so my body would get the urge to do it daily. 

I think this is also what made me want to walk after dinner. It’s so easy to just lay around watching TV and relaxing after dinner. But walking is so beneficial to your body.

I also believe it was great for my husband and I to connect and talk about our day, and for my son to get some outdoor time looking around at the different animals and trees we would see. We also met so many neighbors doing this.

It was almost therapeutic. Walking is the most underrated thing you can do for weight loss. 

5. Whole30

The last contribution for how I lost 50 pounds postpartum was doing a round of Whole30.

While I do believe my weight loss was a combination of all of these things listed, figuring out nutrition is what made the most drastic change in a short amount of time. 

I lost 10 pounds in 10 days when I started Whole30, and I felt amazing. 

I didn’t count calories, I was only concerned with food quality. I have a post detailing why I stopped counting calories.

Most people feel crappy on Whole 30 for the first 2 weeks, but I didn’t. I think because I was fasting and had already made small changes to my diet that whole30 wasn’t such a shock for my system.

The biggest thing I changed when I switched to Whole30 was my condiments. I bought Whole30 approved condiments from Primal Kitchen or I made my own. Or I went without them. 

I could no longer eat bread. But at this point I was OMAD so I wasn’t eating my sandwich for lunch. I just couldn’t eat a roll with dinner anymore. 

I also had to cut out or at least change my appetizer before dinner. It was often chips and salsa or cheese and crackers.

Whole30 advises against doing IF with their program as it can already be a shock to your body to change your diet this much. But I was experienced with fasting at this point, so I kept it in my routine. But I did go back to two meals a day.

I lived on recipes from paleorunningmomma.com. They were delicious. But they were time consuming to make. I was determined to make delicious meals that my family would love, so I made a ton of food.

I would make chicken salad for lunch and eat an apple with it. For dinner it was mainly the same–some kind of meat, potato, veggies. And I would eat fruit for dessert, usually an orange. Sometimes I would have leftovers from dinner for lunch.

I was actually really against doing Whole30 for the longest time. I did not want to be strict with my eating habits. And when I lost 10 pounds in 10 days I did have the fear that I would just gain it right back after the 30 days were over, but I didn’t.

I had a friend who loved Whole30 and always suggested it to me. What talked me into trying it was that it was temporary. It was only 30 days. And if I did it and hated it, I never had to do it again. But the opposite happened, and I loved it!

Another thing that talked me into it was that I had stalled out on losing weight for a while, so I knew I needed to make a change. I wasn’t gaining, but I had more weight I wanted to lose. 

I ended up signing up for a 6 week challenge to see who could lose the most body fat percentage. You had to pay a small fee to enter the challenge, and the winner would get $300. So signing up for this made me extra motivated to try something different.

I didn’t follow the program’s protocols to introduce different food groups slowly after the 30 days were up. But I was strict for the full 30 days.

It’s very similar to the paleo diet, and I often use Whole30 and paleo interchangeably when I am talking about how I eat. There are slight differences though.

The most difficult part of Whole30 is learning how to read ingredient labels. It’s way easier to just eat meat, eggs, fruit, and veggies with no nutrition label. But even meat is often packaged with extra added ingredients, like bacon or lunch meat for example.

Learning about ingredients really opened my eyes to how bad our food is, even things I thought were healthy. 

While figuring this out was difficult at first, it was the most beneficial thing to know. I do have a slightly different opinion than the Whole30 program as to the healthiest way to eat, but it’s a great starting point to get your reading ingredients and eating real food.

By the end of the 30 days I lost a total of 14 pounds, which might seem unimpressive since 10 of those pounds were lost in the first 10 days. 

But this was the last 14 pounds I had to lose. I was under my goal weight at this point. I was the same weight I was at 16 years old by the end of the 30 days. And It’s certainly the fastest I have ever lost this amount of weight.

Once you eat this way, it’s hard to go back. I ended up sticking with eating Whole30/Paleo most of the time. I like to say 80% of the time I was strict and 20% of the time I was eating whatever I wanted. I also continued intermittent fasting.

I was able to maintain my weight loss with this, even if I didn’t workout. I did continue to work out during my round of Whole30. 

Bonus: Journaling

I want to add a bonus tip because it’s something I did that I do believe made a huge difference in my success. 

I did not start journaling because I thought it would help me lose weight. I started it because I wanted to document things my son was doing at the time. Babies change so fast, and I wanted to just write down something he did that day so I could look back and remember it later in life.

I had high hopes of adding photos to this as well and it being a sort of memory book/photo album. But I ended up writing too much that I don’t think photos would fit.

Something about doing this made me so incredibly grateful. I would be overwhelmed with the joy I felt writing down special memories I had of all the funny things my son was saying or doing. Or just writing down how we spent our time that day.

I think the act of writing it down and considering my day made me realize how blessed my life is. I used to attribute these feelings to fasting, and I do believe that was a big contributing factor. 

But I have also fasted and not gotten this experience. So it was really the combination of fasting and feeling so grateful that I can attribute to the joy I was feeling. 

Even if you don’t write it down, just take some time out of your day to consider what you have to be grateful for. Consider the little moments that have happened today or the day before that you may take for granted. You’ll be surprised at the little things that bring you joy. 

This might seem unrelated to weight loss, but I do believe this kept me going towards my goal. It made fasting easier. Thinking about my son and how I wanted to be a good example for him also helped keep me on track.

Anything you can do to keep your mood up and positive while you’re on your weight loss journey will help you reach your goals.

Summary

Let’s summarize everything that contributed to how I lost 50 pounds postpartum:

  1. Intermittent fasting: I eased into this starting with 16:8 and two meals a day, then experimented with a shorter eating window, eventually getting to OMAD, then ADF.
  2. Small changes: I stopped eating fast food, I prioritized fruits and vegetables, and I stopped snacking.
  3. Short workouts: I added in short bodyweight workouts, then tabata workouts, then added in rebounding. 
  4. Walks after dinner: I went on walks after dinner with my family. Sometimes for 20 minutes, sometimes for an hour. Whatever we felt like doing.
  5. Whole30: I did a round of Whole30, prioritizing ingredients and eating real food and lost 10 pounds in 10 days.
  6. (Bonus) Journaling: This helped me feel grateful and kept me positive while I reached my goals.

I hope you found these steps useful for your own weight loss journey. Let me know how it goes if you implement any of them!

But I discipline my body and keep it under control, lest after preaching to others I myself should be disqualified.

1 Corinthians 9:27

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