Sodium and Weightloss

mechellelruiz

I understand that eating too much sodium can temporarily stall the scale but if I am always in a calorie deficit but also always over in my sodium, will my weightloss never show on the scale? Or will it eventually drop off? I know it sounds like a dumb question. I don't plan on going over sodium everyday but am trying to get a general answer because I feel like I am constantly weighting sodium against calories.

MikePTY

I wouldn't worry so much about sodium. Sodium does not stall fat loss. Fat loss is all about calories in vs calories out. Sodium is one aspect (although not the only aspect) that can affect how much water your body retains. So that can show up on the scale but it not going to cover up fat loss long term. The way sodium affects it most is by spikes in sodium, not overall sodium levels. Lets say you eat 2000 mg of sodium a day normally, and one day you eat 5000mg. That may cause the scale to go up a couple of pounds for a few days because the spike in sodium will cause you to retain more water. However, if you always ate 5000mg of sodium every day, your scale wouldn't keep spiking. You would retain a few more pounds of water than someone who ate 2000mg, but it would stay stable and wouldn't keep growing.

Sodium can mess with short term readings, but that also means you will sometimes have bigger drops, and it will all even out. So for instance if you are targeting losing 1 pound a week, maybe one week you lose nothing and the next week you lose 2. That is still an average of 1 pound a week. So medium and long term, you will lose your expected weight. It's only in the short term that it will fluctuate.

I eat a pretty high sodium diet most days and have lost almost 40 pounds. Sure sometimes my weight fluctuates, but it continues to trend downwards. There's no amount of sodium and water weight that could have masked my drop from 235 to 196 pounds.

Veilleux311

I think if you're always in a calorie deficit regardless of sodium intake then the weight scale stall would be temporary as long as less calories eaten remains the trend. . My trend is similar to yours where my calorie deficit continues daily but my sodium on most days exceeds the max limit under the MFP parameters. Are you staying hydrated with enough water? Salt binds to water but your body also needs plenty of H2O to assist with the chemistry of fat burning during your calorie deficits. During my current first 21 days using MFP I've noticed my disgusting amount of pre-calorie deficit salt intake has impressively declined when compared with this week's intake. Mostly due to a major shift in portion control and less processed foods but there's still work to be done in tweaking my food choices containing salt. You have a great post and that's not a dumb question you posted. Best of luck!

dewd2

mechellelruiz wrote: »

I understand that eating too much sodium can temporarily stall the scale but if I am always in a calorie deficit but also always over in my sodium, will my weightloss never show on the scale? Or will it eventually drop off? I know it sounds like a dumb question. I don't plan on going over sodium everyday but am trying to get a general answer because I feel like I am constantly weighting sodium against calories.

Look for weekly weight trends not daily fluctuations. Food, exercise, sleep, and a variety of other things can affect how much water we have in our bodies at a given time (which will reflect on the scale). Ignore the daily changes. Focus on patterns over weeks and months.

Good luck.