Sodium

It's VERY hard to do. I started changing my diet over a year ago. At the time I was very hypertensive even though I was maxed out on the dosage of two different BP meds. Reducing sodium was much harder than reducing calories, in the end. It took a longer adjustment period, and more experimenting with my diet and log.

1. The biggest difference for me was ultimately changing my snacking habits. A lot of otherwise wonderfully healthy low-calorie foods just had to go on the banned list for me for a while. Notably pickles and pretzels. Even a small serving of either of them would be like 1/3 of my sodium allowance for the day.

2. Understanding that even whole, natural relatively unprocessed foods often have quite a lot of sodium and can easily add up to over 1000 mg. Meat. Milk. Bread (even whole grain, and even made at home with 1/4 of the salt called for in the recipe).

3. Rinsing some canned goods helps. I buy low-sodium beans, but I rinse them too. (Also helps get rid of any bad stinky feet smell that you sometimes get in canned beans).

4. Continuing to use some delicious higher sodium foods (hello, salsa! hello cheese! oh olives, I will never stop loving you!) but becoming super-vigilant about the serving size because again, one little serving would be a HUGE proportion of my sodium allowance.

5. It takes a while, but after about 6 months I found that my palate had adjusted. Food didn't need to be as salty to taste good. That being said, I do like vegetables and I cook a lot. So sodium is much more under my personal control than if I ate a lot of packaged snacks and meals.

My situation is different than yours, since my health issue was one I was ultimately able to reverse. I'm off medication and I don't watch sodium as closely as I did a year ago. But on the whole because of the time I spent on this last year I have better sodium habits now and my averages are way lower than the average.

I restrict my sodium because I retain water faster and better than a sponge. I swell up sooo fast after one potato chip (okay a slight exaggeration, but it's pretty darn close to that) No clue as to all the swelling besides the salt. All tests came out negative. Soooo.... with that said. I restricted mine as much as I can. KIND BARS!!! I can not thank these people enough. 150 - 200 calories with a sodium mgs at 15 to 50.. yes that's right, 15 mg of sodium to 50 mg of sodium.. and yes they taste wonderful. It's a great snack on the side when you're needing something. Kashi has some excellent cereals that have no sodium (I recommend the Autumn Wheat). I boil most of my foods if I can and George Forman the rest. I did cut out potatoes because I didn't need that much starch in my life right now. I'll probably add it back later. I have been keeping my sodium intake to around 1100 mgs a day this way. sometimes a bit higher sometimes a bit lower. it seems to work for me, I seeing signs of having ankles again.

I think the most important thing is to make the switch from pre-packaged foods to making your own meals. Salt is used as a preservative in so many packaged foods like canned soups, Lean Cuisines, etc. Bread is a huge sodium sponge, as well. You'll need to read packages of anything you do purchase to determine the sodium content before you buy. Salt hides in places you'd least expect.

If you're making your own meals instead of buying the convenience foods and eating out, I think you'll find that it's not difficult at all to keep your sodium below 1500. The trick will be changing your tastes so that you enjoy foods without all that added sodium; it can take some getting used to but you will eventually not only get used to it but learn to enjoy the actual flavors of fresh foods. I eat my veggies simply steamed or with just a little butter I no longer think they need sauces or salt to be tasty but you may want to experiment with things like Mrs. Dash to help get you to the same point.