Is it possible to have mackerel while breastfeeding: smoked, baked?

The health of a breastfed baby directly depends on the mother’s diet, so nursing women should be especially careful when planning a daily menu.

At the same time, it is important for a nursing mother not only to provide her baby with all the necessary nutrients, but also to take care of her own body, which needs to recover after pregnancy and childbirth.

Products recommended for nutrition during lactation include white fish. This is a rich source of protein that is perfectly absorbed by the bodies of mother and baby. Mackerel (mackerel) is also a white fish; many tasty and healthy dishes are traditionally prepared from it. Can a nursing mother include them in her menu?

Beneficial features

If you carefully read the composition of the product, you can note that 100 g of mackerel fillet contains:

up to 20 g of protein;
12-30 g fat;
about 4.5 g of omega-3 (polyunsaturated fatty acids).

Quite fatty mackerel meat contains about 200 Kcal per 100 g. But the fat of this fish is completely absorbed by the human body - it is processed into vital amino acids and is a supplier of healthy cholesterol.

It is worth noting that a 100 g serving of mackerel contains half the daily protein requirement for an adult. This protein is required for muscle growth and for the proper functioning of many organs and systems.

Mackerel meat also contains micro- and macroelements, including iodine, which is necessary for the normal functioning of the thyroid gland. This fish is rich in vitamins and other beneficial substances that restore elasticity to the skin, make hair silky, and strengthen nails and teeth.

Magnesium, calcium, niacin, vitamin D make bone tissue stronger and have a beneficial effect on the nervous system, which is especially important for women during postpartum depression.

The lack of carbohydrates makes mackerel dishes dietary and healthy for nursing mothers who are trying to get rid of extra pounds gained during pregnancy and lactation due to poor nutrition or metabolic disorders.

The importance of Omega-3 fatty acids can hardly be overestimated - their consumption helps prevent diseases of the heart and vascular system, reduce the risk of blood clots, and improve blood circulation. Mackerel is a valuable commercial fish; the beneficial substances included in the product help strengthen the immune system.

What are the benefits of fish during breastfeeding?

Nutritionists believe that fish should be included in the diet 1-2 times a week during breastfeeding (BF). Such dishes are nutritious, but at the same time low in calories. Fish protein is absorbed by the body twice as fast as meat protein, and the mineral composition of the product improves the quality of mother's milk and saturates the child with the elements necessary for development.

What the product contains:

B vitamins . They support the nervous system, the body’s protective functions, improve metabolism and high-quality hematopoiesis. Affects appearance: teeth, skin, hair, nails.
Vitamin D. Supports immune functions, nervous system health, muscle tissue. Promotes better absorption of calcium and strengthens bones.
Microelements. Iodine supports the functioning of the thyroid gland, protecting against bacteria. Calcium and phosphorus contribute to the formation of a strong skeleton and healthy teeth. Selenium is essential for nourishing skin, hair, and nails.
Omega-3. Fatty acids normalize the activity of the cardiovascular system, metabolic processes, synthesis of female hormones, improve skin condition and hair growth.
Protein. Prevents salt deposition, reduces the formation of uric acids, which have a negative effect on the kidneys.

What are the benefits of fish during breastfeeding?

Eating the right fish products several times a week will support the functioning of the internal organs of mother and baby. In addition, fish consumed by the mother during breastfeeding will reduce the risk of food allergies in the child in the future.

Contraindications

Mackerel meat is a strong allergen, which makes it impossible to widely recommend the product for feeding nursing mothers, despite all its positive properties. Studies have shown that heat treatment does not reduce the allergenic properties of mackerel.

You can reduce the risk of allergies by consuming canned mackerel that has been vacuum dried at low temperatures. However, canned products are dangerous for babies, as chemicals pass into breast milk, and fish dried without high-temperature treatment causes food poisoning.

Mackerel causes a type of allergy against which antihistamines are powerless. Symptoms may appear 2 hours after consuming the product or several days later. In addition to skin rashes, indigestion, redness of mucous membranes, allergy symptoms can include sleep disturbance, increased fatigue, myocarditis and many other manifestations that are difficult to associate with eating fish.

Another danger of eating mackerel is that the meat of the marine fish may contain excessively high levels of mercury and other heavy metals. This is due to the environmental problems of the World Ocean. For this reason, a nursing mother should limit her consumption of mackerel and other sea fish.

Possible harm to fish and seafood

Despite the obvious benefits of gifts from reservoirs, in some cases it is better to refuse them.

Reasons why a nursing mother should not fish:

The risk of allergic reactions in the baby. The tolerance of this product varies from person to person. Some varieties of fish, especially red and exotic ones, contain potential allergens.
Heavy metals in the product. The substances are toxic and inhibit the activity of the entire body. Toxic elements are contained in large marine varieties: shark, Norwegian salmon, swordfish. Be careful when consuming tuna that contains certain amounts of mercury.

The presence of heavy metals in meat is caused by unfavorable environmental conditions. Toxic substances are rarely found in river fish. However, any product when feeding a baby with breast milk must be eaten carefully, in small portions, and properly prepared.

For people prone to allergic reactions, fish and seafood are potential allergens. Before use, you should consult your doctor.

Introduction of fish dishes into the diet

You can start including white fish in your menu a couple of weeks after giving birth. But not mackerel, you should choose the safest product from an allergy point of view.

You can try adding mackerel to the diet after the baby has adapted to other types of white fish (cod, pike perch, etc.), as well as red fish (pink salmon, sockeye salmon).

The mother should eat a piece of steamed mackerel after finishing her morning feeding. It takes at least two to three days to monitor his reaction. If no negative manifestations are noticed, the portion of fish can be increased to 100-150 grams.

What kind of fish can a nursing mother eat?

During the first months after childbirth, a woman can eat dietary fish 2 times a week. This will replenish the body’s strength spent on childbirth and balance the composition of the milk.

Hypoallergenic types include:

River inhabitants: carp, carp, pike, pike perch.
White sea creatures: blue whiting, hake, cod, pollock, halibut.

Experts advise consuming red fish, as well as fatty varieties, when the child is 3 months old.

The group of moderately allergenic products includes:

flounder;
tilapia;
herring,
mackerel;
sole;
pink salmon;
salmon;
trout.

Before eating fish, a nursing mother should make sure that it is an environmentally friendly product. You need to eat fish in small portions, observing the baby’s reaction.

How many grams of fish should you eat per week? The norm is 350 g per 7 days.

Mackerel dishes

It is recommended that a nursing mother first introduce fish dishes prepared without frying into her menu. This can be mackerel in broth or steamed in a double boiler or slow cooker. Rice and vegetables make a tasty and healthy side dish that can be steamed.

If the baby is already 8-9 months old, you can cook fish for mom by baking it in foil or a bag. This dish retains a maximum of vitamins and nutrients, and there is no excess fat. And what can a baby eat at 8 months, see the article at the link.

You can try fried mackerel little by little when the child is one year old. At an earlier age, excess fat in breast milk and extractives lead to digestive disorders.

At home, mackerel is salted and pickled, but this product is contraindicated for nursing mothers, since it does not undergo heat treatment and contains a high amount of salt.

Canned mackerel is widely available on sale, and this fish is also sold smoked. All types of canned fish should be excluded from the menu during lactation, since there is no guarantee that they are of high quality and do not contain additives that are dangerous to the baby.

Smoked mackerel during breastfeeding is also not a recommended product, since when processing fish with real or liquid smoke, substances harmful to health, including carcinogens, enter the product.

A nursing mother can include healthy dishes made from fresh mackerel in the menu two to three times a month, if she and her baby are not allergic to this fish.
A serving can reach 200 grams. Subscribe to our VKontakte group

How to eat red fish correctly and include it in the menu of a nursing mother

When introducing red fish into the diet of a nursing mother, you should follow simple rules:

In the first month of lactation, you do not need to eat red varieties of fish. They are introduced into the mother’s menu no earlier than three months of breastfeeding. At the same time, by this time a woman’s diet should already include white, safer varieties, for example, pollock or hake.
First, they eat boiled or steamed dishes.
The first portion should not exceed 50 grams. After using it, the mother observes the child’s reaction. If the perception is good, if no allergies are detected over the next two days, the mother can introduce the product into her menu. Then the portion is increased to 100 grams and eaten no more than twice a week.
If a dish provokes an allergic reaction, then limit the consumption of the product and call a doctor. There is no need to use self-medication during guarding. You are allowed to try the product again only after a month.
When purchasing, pay attention to the quality of food; fresh or chilled fish is suitable. They look at expiration dates, storage conditions and packaging. The carcass itself should have red gills, solid, non-slippery and non-sticky scales.
Before cooking, the carcasses are cleaned, cut into portions, and then boiled. Varieties such as trout and salmon are cooked in 15 minutes.
Canned food and other fish delicacies are not recommended for nursing mothers. Such products are difficult to digest and dangerous for the body. It is generally better to exclude canned foods from the diet of a woman who is breastfeeding.

A sandwich with butter and sliced salted fish is a fairly common breakfast, but is it healthy for lactation?..

Is it possible to have red salted fish during gw?

Breastfeeding women should not eat salted fish, as well as smoked, dried or spicy versions of its preparation. High salt content leads to poor milk production and is bad for the baby's health. In addition, when buying such products in a store, a young mother consumes a large amount of preservatives, which often lead to poisoning.

What to avoid

We all love to treat ourselves to something tasty, but when you have a baby in your arms, you have to weigh the expected benefits and harms. In particular, salted fish is not healthy at all. Excess salt is harmful to the baby. When choosing a product, you must also take into account that dried, smoked and dried fish often hide spoiled goods. No matter how much you love sushi, now is not the time for exotic delicacies. It’s good if the manufacturer uses salted fish to prepare them, but in the original it should be raw. It may contain organisms that are not at all beneficial for a nursing mother, and especially for her child.

Despite the obvious benefits, red fish is not very useful for nursing women. Excess Omega-3 fatty acids can be too much for a child's body to handle and cause various digestive problems. This is primarily our favorite mackerel, herring and salmon. This includes sea trout, salmon, as well as some other varieties that contain a lot of fat.

A lot of seafood has appeared on the shelves today. These are mussels and clams, crabs and shrimp. Of course, they are tasty and healthy, but this fully applies to the fresh catch, and not to what we usually see on supermarket shelves in the form of preserves. Mom's diet should not contain products of such dubious quality. We have described in sufficient detail what is most useful for a nursing woman, and what may pose a threat. The choice is yours.

Fish is a source of protein and Omega-3 acids, which help the child’s brain development. It should be consumed during lactation. What kind of fish can a nursing mother eat?

Product Features

Among the huge variety of seafood, a nursing mother is not too limited in her choice. Eating fish during breastfeeding is not only possible, but necessary. After all, it contains valuable substances necessary to maintain a woman’s health.

Unsaturated fatty acids. These substances are found only in varieties of fatty fish, which is why salmon, salmon, and herring are especially important in the diet of a young mother during breastfeeding. Omega-3 and 6 fatty acids are responsible for external attractiveness, as they participate in the synthesis of skin tissue and its regeneration. However, they also perform more responsible work: they normalize metabolism and participate in the synthesis of hormones. Thanks to fatty acids, which a person can only get from food, his body's systems work correctly.
Minerals. Fish during breastfeeding will become a supplier of essential minerals: calcium, selenium and phosphorus. They participate in the formation of the skeletal system, skin and vessel walls. Marine fish are rich in iodine, which protects the young mother’s body from thyroid diseases.
Vitamins. Seafood contains a full range of B vitamins. Fish contains pantothenic acid, riboflavin, pyridoxine (vitamins B1, B2, B6, B12), which are involved in the functioning of the nervous system and hematopoiesis. It also contains vitamins A, C, E. They create conditions for the body’s immune defense, the functioning of the bone and joint systems, and skin regeneration.

Fish should be eaten regularly. If a woman adheres to this rule during pregnancy, problems during lactation will most likely not arise. The baby’s body is already familiar with fish dishes, so it will tolerate them normally.

Risks and dangers during lactation

Like any protein product, fish during lactation can cause allergies in the baby. When consuming it, adhere to the basic rules for introducing new components of the diet.

Consume only those varieties that you ate during pregnancy. In this case, fish when feeding a newborn is unlikely to cause an allergy, so it is allowed not to change the diet in the first month after the birth of the baby. If a reaction occurs, remove the product from your diet and try it again in the second month.
Introduce new varieties carefully. No matter how safe and healthy red fish may seem when breastfeeding, it can cause allergies in the baby. To reduce the risk of a dangerous reaction, do the following: Try a piece of fish, take a break for two to three days. If there are no rashes on the skin, try the same piece again. The peculiarity of the action of allergens is that after the first use of the product they do not appear. But each subsequent “experiment” makes the allergic reaction more pronounced.
Diversify your seafood diet. If you do not notice any unpleasant reactions from your baby to different fish, there is no reason to limit it in your diet. Eat any one you like.

Buy high-quality, fresh carcass. It preserves valuable and useful substances. After cooking it will be juicy and tasty. A frozen product will not please you with its rich taste.

Choosing fish

First of all, you need to give preference to the most familiar varieties. Most often, for our country, river fish or low-fat sea fish are recommended for breastfeeding. Excess Omega 3 means an increased risk of allergic reactions, which is something you don’t need right now. If you decide to try fish for the first time after giving birth, it is best if it is pollock, hake, pike perch, cod, sea bass, carp and herring. These are the white meat varieties. If your choice is exclusively river fish, then give preference to species such as trout, bream, river perch, burbot and pike. This fish contains a minimum of allergens and is easily digestible. Let us emphasize once again that how you prepare it is also very important. Any fish is fried in about 15 minutes, and during this time all useful substances are destroyed. At the same time, the same amount of steaming time allows you to preserve them in their original form.

Fish: pros and cons

Fish is rich in fats and amino acids, vitamins and proteins. It should be emphasized that these elements are absorbed in the body very easily. By eating fish 3-4 times a week, you fully meet your protein needs, that is, it is an alternative to meat. Don’t forget about the wonderful fish oil, which will be useful both for the mother’s recovery after childbirth and for the growth and development of the child himself. However, despite all the beneficial properties, you should not eat only fish, much less eat it indiscriminately.

What harm can fish cause to mother and child? The only thing that can be said about this is that it is a fairly strong allergen. That is, first of all, you need to figure out what kind of fish is suitable for nursing mothers, and only then decide at what age and in what quantity to include it in the diet.