Pregnancy and breastfeeding affecting hair growth?

[Flossy]

I have had 3 children, all in reasonably quick succession. There's only been 6 weeks in the past 5+ years where I haven't been pregnant or breastfeeding.

Do you think this might be affecting my growth rate? It feels like my hair has been the same length forever. I can understand that it might, your body throws all it's efforts into making and sustaining these little people, rather than producing a Rapunzel-like mane!

I'm hoping that no trims until 2011 will make it seem like it is growing...

[UltraBella]

Yes, I think it can most definitely affect it. You have been busy !!

[May]

Actually, I just had my first baby and my hair grew faster while I was pregnant and at a relatively normal rate afterwards. I also did not experience any "post partum" shedding.

That being said, a friend of mine who didn't experience "post partum shedding" after her first pregnany experienced it after her second pregnancy. I suppose this suggests that things like hormones can impact and influence hair growth differently among the same woman and between different women.

Our bodies are amazingly complex...

[OperaTeacherMom]

I did have crazy fast growth while pregnant (or at least it seemed that way), quite a bit of shedding from 3-6 months, and now at 9 months post partum (still breastfeeding quite a bit) my hair seems to be growing pretty normally. Are you eating enough protein and taking your prenatal vitamins?

[Arctic_Mama]

I've been pregnant or breastfeeding pretty much the last three years, with only a short break in 2009. This is baby #3 and I honestly have never noticed fast growth when pregnant or significant stalls when breastfeeding. It seems like I shed less during pregnancy except this time around (had a huge shed and now I am not shedding much), and had the typical postpartum sheds, but my growth rate seemed fairly steady.

[eamane]

Since I got pregnant in spring 2006, I have been pregnant or breastfeeding constantly and I'm still breastfeeding my youngest a little, him being 19 months old. It hasn't really affected my growthrate, maybe growing a little faster during pregnancy, but I have lost a lot of hair about 4-5 months postpartum both times.

[fairystar32]

Mine was awful when pregnant, it was dry, brittle, broke and shed badly. It has only just recovered now in the last 6 mths and he is 2. i am still BF so maybe thats why it took so long?