Are you a pregnant woman and looking for a diet chart to keep your baby healthy? If it is a yes, you are at the right place. Keeping in mind the current situations it is important to follow a diet regime to boost your health and immunity. Eating well not only keeps you strong but also keeps your mental health sound. It will also help to maintain a healthy BMI.
What Makes a Good Diet?
- Consult your doctor before starting any diet plan to avoid gestational problems.
- To avoid infections, one’s body needs the right nutrients, vitamins, and minerals.
- One can take two tablespoons of pure ghee and a handful of dry fruits every day.
- Grains, cereals, and dietary fiber will help to maintain a normal weight during pregnancy.
- Fresh fruits, vegetables, and greens must be on your plate. One can add meat and dairy products if one is willing to.
- To be precise veggies like bottle gourd, ridge gourd, and citrus fruits will help you a lot.
- One needs to limit the intake of caffeine, alcohol and increase the intake of water to stay hydrated.
- One can prefer homemade curd rice, lentil dals, kichadi for dinner.
- Regular breakfast like idly, dosa, with coconut chutney along with a tablespoon of ghee will keep your stomach filled and active.
- Along with water, one can take lemon water with salt or buttermilk.
- To get sound sleep, make sure you have a glass of milk before going to bed. To add some more protein value one can add nutmeg to milk.
- Many pregnant women suffer from hair loss. Try to have coconut laddu or sesame laddu to prevent hair loss and prematurely greying hair.
- Along with the diet plan, you can take vitamin, calcium, and protein supplements if only prescribed by the doctor.
What is the Recommended Food?
One needs to take 300 extra calories during the second and third trimesters.
- Vitamin-A rich foods like spinach, apricots, sweet potatoes, and carrots will be helpful for tissue and cell growth.
- Calcium helps in the fast growth of the fetus. Eggs, milk are rich in calcium.
- Iron helps in carrying oxygen in the blood cells. Dry dates, bajra, and curry leaves have iron content.
- Folic acid will help in maintaining the baby’s weight, abnormalities in the spinal cord and brain. Papaya, groundnut, and mangoes are rich in folic acid.
Hence maintaining a balanced diet is essential for sound health.
What do you Need to Avoid?
- Try to limit the intake of processed, salty, high sugary foods to avoid further weight and health complications for you and your baby.
- Avoid beverages like tea, coffee, or alcohol.
- Raw eggs and raw sprouts may lead to sickness and premature birth. Raw sprouts may contain contaminated bacteria. So, cooked sprouts are good for pregnant women.
Do not skip any meal, if you are tired of taking the same dishes, try making salad, toast, or soup. Listen to your body, keep yourself hydrated, and eat in a limited quantity.