Does Drinking Milk Help You Gain Weight?

Milk is a delicious and nutritious drink of everyday life. While it is understandable to believe drinking milk will surely help gaining weight, this is not necessarily true in practice.

1. Nutrients of Milk

There are various types of milk that are equally good for health, such as cow milk, goat milk, or vegan milk made from soy and beans. Yet, cow milk is the most popular type for its reasonable price and nutrition.

That’s being said, this article will focus only on whether drinking cow milk helps us gain weight.

Overall, milk gives a high amount of nutrients that are essential to our health.

A 240ml glass of milk can offer 12–15 grams of carbohydrate and 8 grams of protein, and a high amount of calcium, vitamin D, and minerals.

Milk also has a high amount of vitamin A which helps your vision and immune system greatly.

Whey and casein are 02 important types of protein in milk that can help keep your blood pressure and cholesterol level at a stable condition – preventing the risk of cardiovascular diseases.

Saturated fat, though not commonly known, is an essential nutrient in milk.

Except for when you are indicated with cholesterol hyper-sensitiveness, you can choose to drink whole milk rich in saturated fat – a nutrient that can help prevent cardiovascular diseases. (saturated fat was once basslessly accused of of causing obesity)

2. Drinking milk does not necessarily help gain weight

Despite the high amount of nutrients contained inside, milk can help you gain weight in the following cases.

Case 1: Science has so far proved that drinking milk after exercising helps build lean muscle and improve body composition resulting in gaining weight. 

Therefore, you should make sure that besides the habit of drinking milk, you also maintain a frequent exercising routine if you want to gain weight in such a way.

Case 2: the amount of nutrients in milk varies in accordance with the types of milk you drink. The popular types of milk on market these days: whole milk, 1% fat content, 2% fat content, and skimmed milk.

Types	Calories (gram)	Fat (gram)
Whole milk	150	8
2% fat content	125	5
1% fat content	100	2.5
Skimmed milk	80	0-1

Dieticians recommend using whole milk for the highest amount of nutrients, together with a nutritious daily diet, if you want to gain weight.

Case 3: make sure you are not sensitive to cholesterol, which can cause cardiovascular diseases, or allergic to lactose, which can cause gas, bloating, skin reactions, and stomach discomfort.

These are the two substances available in milk. Only drink milk to gain weight if your body is not sensitive / allergic to them.

3. Do’s & Don’ts 

Here are some tips that can help you confidently drink milk to gain weight.

✅ DO’s:

• Use milk to cook dishes that can allow you to consume more milk enjoyably;
• Use whole milk for high amount of nutrients;
• Use organic milk for more nutritions and also safe, healthy ingredients.

Read more: Organic & Non-organic Milk

❌ DON’Ts:

• Drink milk if you are sensitive / allergic to cholesterol / lactose;
• Not maintain a healthy daily diet (meat, fatty fish, nuts, etc) besides drinking milk, , which results in gaining weight;
• Not exercise on a daily basis to improve body composition, which results in gaining weight.

 

Reference:

• Does Milk Help You Gain Weight? – Healthline: Milk for Gaining Weight: Does It Work? (healthline.com)