In defense of salt

Espressocycle

We've all heard that we consume too much sodium. According to this article, however, people naturally regulate their salt intake in a fairly similar manner throughout the world, which leads me to think that if you focus on low salt foods, your body will tell you to eat more to get the salt it wants.

This reminds me of the previous public health diet scares that ended up doing more harm than good. The doctors told us to cut fat, so we consumeed more carbs. They told us to cut fat some more, and we replaced it with even more sugar. They told us to eat margarine instead of animal fat, then decades later told us that the transfats in margine was the dietary equivalent of cigarettes. Every time they tell us to cut something out of our diet, we get fatter and less healthy!

http://www.news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=9265

Now, cutting sodium can be helpful for people that are hypertensive, but that's like saying that because taking aspirin cures a headache, headaches are caused by lack of aspirin. And in any case, apparently it doesn't work that well anyway:

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/12/health/research/12nostrums.html

rml_16

I don't even worry about salt. My BP is liw. I never add table salt to anything and eat mostly whole foods. Every once in a while, I look at my intake out of curiosity and the only time it's above 1,500 is when I eat out. People make a big deal out of nothing with this, IMO.

shesblossoming

For me, I have a huge problem with salt. If I didn't regulate it, I would be way over, and I just hate the water retention and massive bloating. I hear so much information on what to cut out and what to eat, I've started to keep my diet simple.

ahinescapron

Some people are more sodium sensitive than others. I try to limit it only because it makes me bloat a lot and feel yucky. I have very low blood pressure, so that is not a concern. My husband, on the other hand, has to watch his intake because he has high blood pressure.

ShellyMacchi

here's what i know for sure...
all my life i have paid no attention to sodium.. and i know i loved it.
all my life i have also suffered from hands, fingers, feet and ankles swelling with ay exertion, or if the weather was too hot, or i took a drive to higher elevations, or a plane ride, or even just long car rides, walking around the mall yadayada... or even from having a couple of drinks!

since i have been with mfp (since Jan/11) i have kept my sodium under 1500mg (as per my Dr's instructions).. and since doing so... you guessed it... no swelling.. at all... for any of the reasons i used to just accept as being 'something i had to put up with'.

Since the body only 'needs' about 500mg of sodium a day to carry out it's functions in a healthy manner, it made sense to me to get things under control. And yes, *S* doing so for sure has helped my blood pressure which had crept up again in recent years.

whether it is hype of not ... it make me feel like crap when i have too much sodium now, and i instantly start retaining water again... but so long as i keep it under 1500 per day, i actually feel fantastic.. so that's good enough for me *L*

asyouseefit

My father, he's a cardiologist, always says there's no need to watch your sodium intake unless you have high BP!

wolfchild59

I'm a salt fiend, always have been for as long as I can remember. I would shake salt on my watermelon or eat seasoning salt straight from the jar as a kid. In high school my best friend and I would go to a drug store, measure our BP's, go have half a value meal each at McDonald's, eat about four salt packets and sprint back to the drug store to see what our BP's were. I've never had any ill effects and still love it to this day. Though, I do track it and the way I eat now it just stays pretty naturally low. Cheat meals/day is flies up there pretty high and I'll get a little bloaty the next day, but I never really stress over my salt intake.

Actually, for a few months earlier this year I did watch salt closely and tried to keep it as low as possible. I ended up making a drs appointment at one point because I felt so crappy (tired, depressed, lethargic, and more). They ran a bevy of tests, including for hypothyroidism, because too little salt can be a contributing cause for it. Everything came back clear, but afterwards I went back to not trying to purposefully keep salt super low and I've felt fine since.

Espressocycle

since i have been with mfp (since Jan/11) i have kept my sodium under 1500mg (as per my Dr's instructions).. and since doing so... you guessed it... no swelling.. at all... for any of the reasons i used to just accept as being 'something i had to put up with'.

Well, it is certainly true that the average diet doesn't work for everybody because we're not all average. Some people seem to get a benefit from avoiding gluten, eating nothing but meat, etc. That's why it's important to find a diet that works for you. Some people think oatmeal is the greatest most satisfying breakfast in the world. For me, it's a laxative that leaves me shaking in hunger two hopurs after eating it.