The New Sodium Guideline 1500 mg Anyone Meeting It?

I've been trying for the last two weeks. Most days I go over by like 200. I have gone a few days where I stayed under. But only on the days that I had the opportunity to make everything from scratch! My down fall is how I season my food. salt is so yummy! LOL. I have been avoiding processed and prepackaged foods as much as possible. Or buy things that say no salt or low salt. And if I go over I try to have a high potassium food, so I don't retain water.

Good Luck!

It's difficult for me and I read that article about the increase in strokes among young adults. One of the causes is our sodium intake, I believe this is from the American Heart Association but I'm not sure. You can do a search in the forum because I posted the article a couple of weeks ago. Search for "strokes" and the title was "I thought I would share".

Here's the article: http://health.yahoo.net/news/s/ap/us_med_stroke_younger_victims

I'm having a hard time coming close to the sodium goal. I'm always about 1000-1700 under!

Claire, under is good! Most of us run over.

Yes but I have low blood pressure so my doctor is always telling me to eat more salt and drink more water! I thought I was eating a lot of salt. Guess not!

I manage to get anywhere from 800-1400 mg a day. I rarely go over since I've started using dry beans instead of canned, fresh and frozen vegetables instead of canned, and I rarely touch boxed or pre-packaged foods. If I do by chance have something like a veggie burger or tuna burger, I make darned sure that the sodium is less than 250mg a serving.

I wouldn't be too worried by those numbers justsayit, as long as you drink 8 cups of water a day that amount of excess sodium is very easy for the body to flush.

USDA sodium guideline: For about half of the US population, the recommendation now is that the dietary sodium intake be restricted to 1500 mg/day or less. This applies to all adults aged 51 years and older, all blacks, and all patients who have hypertension, chronic kidney disease, or diabetes. Half of the United States has a recommendation now for dietary sodium intake of 1500 mg/day or less. For the rest of the population, the remaining half, the recommendation is that dietary sodium intake be reduced by approximately one third from average current levels to 2300 mg/day

Its really important to limit sodium for overall health. High sodium intake elevates blood pressure, stresses kidneys, decreases capacity of heart to pump efficiently to name a few. I work in the health care business and see patients all the time coming in with heart failure due to sodium binges.

I am on the other end too, I dont eat enough sodium so I have to try to add more in. I normally cook all my meals from scratch and I dont really add salt only a mixed seasoning if it needs it.
From what ive seen its the packaged foods that have a large amount of sodium in them so maybe you could try making your own version?

You may not have to add sodium. I don't know exactly how much we need for our bodies to function well, but I am guessing it is less that 1500mg a day. Those numbers are meant to stem the tide of extreme overeating of sodium that marks our culture.

The Heart foundation here (NZ) recommends 920-2300mg sodium a day, so I would say somewhere around 900mg is a good minimum for health.

I've hit it or near it last three weeks in a row, my nutritionist gave me this goal back in January ... personally, if a majority of people followed the 1500 mg of sodium guuidelines it would bankrupt all fast food establishments ... or any other place considered "eating out' ... just check out the nutritional guidelines ... the average person has no idea that high blood pressure "can be" a contributing factor to kidney failure