trying to lower sodium intake?

EmilyStrick

after finding out i had high blood pressure, i was told to reduce my sodium intake, increase my potassium intake and lose weight, and i am doing those things. someone posted the other day that you should consume 1 mg of sodium for every calorie you take in due to the importance of electrolyte balance. i thought that was interesting and did some more research. i have found that to be true, and have also found that you should consume at least twice as much potassium as sodium, and this alone can control many things. if you are eating a lot of processed foods, you will be hard pressed to eat double the potassium of the sodium you're taking in. whole foods are high in potassium - bananas, avocados and potatoes (thank gawd, since those are some of my faves) are among the highest! so, if you're indeed taking in double the potassium of sodium, it is highly unlikely that you are eating a lot of processed foods, and that is a wonderful thing no matter what!!! anyway...i have just seen a lot of interest in sodium on here and thought i would post that because i think it answers many of the questions i've seen! hope it helps someone!!!

p.s. - you can track both sodium and potassium in your mfp food diary!

mamaturner

Thank you, that was great info! I finally have my iron under control so I'm gonna switch that to Potassium to see how I'm doing w/ it!

ractayjon

This is great info thank you --

smae1980

I'm wondering where you found your info. The reason being that the recommended max for sodium is 2300 mg a day and not many of us eat that many cals. In fact many people who thought they were doing ok would be nearly 1000mg over following that basic guidline and that is worriesome....

sprags

Sodium and potassium are fickle things. In nursing school, that's the most important thing we learned. Yes, high blood pressure can be controlled with lower sodium intake, but don't go crazy with the potassium. Too much potassium is just as bad for your heart as too much sodium. Balance is key

msarro

Yep! If you look at what ancient humans would have eaten -meats, nuts, fruits, veggies- most of them contain about 2x the potassium as sodium. Its modern day food processing that has made the sodium amount skyrocket and the potassium level plummet.

Most studies show that when you restore this balance, chance of heart failure drops, hypertension starts to go away, etc.

mamaturner

I've really been looking into higher potassium foods and found a website w/ a list of foods and how much potassium it contains. It also stated the recommended sodium intake was 1000 mg while potassium was 3500 mg. Say wha? I always thought sodium was 2500 mg, and as I strive much under that, I dunno if I could do it to 1000, although I'm going to try.

I also noticed that many foods don't contain the potassium nutrition in our database I found that's because pre pracked foods are not required to put this on the label... yay for the internet I guess!