Frustrated by sodium

weightofyourskin

I'm trying to lower my sodium intake. It's a bit all over the place (today was 2507, yesterday was 1686) and higher than I'd like and I'm not entirely sure why. I don't eat processed foods, very rarely eat chips or other salty snacks, and never salt my food. I like salami and other sandwich meats, but I always get the ones with the least sodium I can find, around 400-500 mg for 5-6 slices.

Even being slightly under my self-set limit of 2000 mg makes me nervous because that's still way over the safe daily intake. I'm just not sure what more I could do to get this under control. It seems like there's tons of sodium in absolutely everything, so I don't know how to avoid it.

pinkita

Yeah, it's in everything! I found a low sodium bread that's pretty decent, but it goes bad faster than regular bread so if you rarely eat bread I wouldn't get it. Safeway has it, it's their Safeway Kitchens brand, and it's called Very Low Sodium Bread--just 5mg per slice. Low carb tortillas also don't have much sodium.

I avoid lunch meats because they do have a lot of sodium--do you like turkey burgers or chicken drumsticks? They have much less sodium. The Jennie-O Turkey Patties I think have less than 200mg each. Greek yogurt doesn't have much sodium either. You pretty much have to avoid foods that aren't in their most natural state, i.e., anything in a can or packaged.

Also, it seems like most of the "fat-free" foods have more sodium than the low-fat or regular foods, so maybe you're consuming too many fat-free products?

Certain smaller grocery stores might carry low sodium products, but they're probably more expensive than regular stores.

Good luck!

aewold

Make sure that on the website you have your settings for Nutrients Tracked set to Sodium as one of the columns, and you can find which food items (or meals) are high in sodium in your diet.

melsinct

Could you open your diary and make it public? Only because it doesn't make sense that your sodium is so high if you truly don't eat boxed/packaged foods or if deli meat is your only sodium vice.

chaitrex

It truly is in everything. When you check the labels on stuff int he store, even things that aren't sodium red flags like deli meat, check the sodium content. A lot of sauces, cheeses, and frozen food are high in it. I bought a no-salt-added pasta sauce after really realizing that my favorite one had like 700mg!

hollyjeanw

I have been struggling with the same thing. I bought a really good food processor and have been making a lot of stuff from scratch, including marinara sauce, salad dressing, pasta, and bread. Those are some of the biggest culprits. You would be surprised where you'll find sodium that is completely unnecessary. I personally am appalled that the American Heart Association endorses Subway when everything except their veggie sub contains over 700 mg of sodium. I suggest googling high sodium foods and make anything from scratch that you can. I find that I like the stuff I make much better than processed stuff in many cases anyway. And you have to be truly diligent in reading labels, and make a commitment to yourself to just say no to those that are unreasonably high. Once you start reducing it, you'll start to like the flavor of things without all the unnecessary sodium

By the way, 2300 mg per day is the recommended level for healthy individuals under 50. It used to be 2500 but was lowered with the issuance of the 2010 dietary guidelines. So I wouldn't sweat 2000 mg per day unless you're hypertensive. I have blood pressure issues and try to keep mine below 1500 (the recommendation for hypertensives and people over 50, along with a few other demographic groups). I usually end up somewhere around 1000 a day, give or take a little, with all the changes I've committed to.


http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/sodium/NU00284