Do you watch your sodium intake? Am I the only one with VERY horrid sodium levels in my diet?

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Replies

  • ashxtasticness
    ashxtasticness Posts: 160 Member
    I have never added salt to anything aside from a potato here and there so I always assumed my sodium intake was probably pretty low... whenever I actually started watching it I realized how incredibly wrong I was and was glad I didn't add more to anything! I've since cut back on canned/packaged meat and switched to fresh which has made a huge difference. I never had any blood pressure issues or anything but I would get bloated and have some swelling that I wasn't even really aware of until I cut back.
  • JBApplebee
    JBApplebee Posts: 481 Member
    I try to watch mine, but I'm always over in sodium & usually protein. My blood pressure & other numbers are really good, so I just try to make sure & drink extra water when I'm over more than usual, like when I have buffalo wings.
  • jefamer2017
    jefamer2017 Posts: 416 Member
    I never pay attention to the nutrients. I just checked and mine is at or right above the recommended levels. However, it's actually more than that because I do not log spices many of which contain or are salt. So lord knows how much sodium I'm actually getting.
  • Verity1111
    Verity1111 Posts: 3,309 Member
    Verity1111 wrote: »
    Because I seriously probably double the recommended intake and I only eat 1200-1500 calories. I rarely am below 3,000 and I have hit 4,500-5,000 a lot. Lol. My blood tests etc are all good. Should I worry about it or chill since I don't have any bad signs from it when I see my dr? Also, am I the only person with this issue? I assume not but it's always nice to know lol. It is all from sauces or prepackaged stuff, cheese, etc. I don't use actual table salt sprinkled on my food.

    I get about 10k+ a day lol

    That makes me feel so much better haha no harm meant
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,329 Member
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Sodium is something you should be concerned about only if you are hypertensive. Sort of like how sugar really only matters if you are diabetic. Personally I just turned the sodium tracker off because I didn't care.

    Sodium is in balance with water. If you eat more sodium and drink more water that is totally fine. In fact if you drink more water you probably should eat more sodium. So the idea of tracking sodium as some independent thing when its really the ratio of water to sodium that matters is a bit silly in my opinion. Right now the way it is set up you could have someone drinking a lot of water (like a gallon) a day and having MFP telling them to limit their sodium even though they should probably be getting like 4x the normal daily suggested amount.

    I'm a bit doubtful after two interesting papers by Titze et al, 2017. They found that a diet high in sodium raises glucocorticoid levels, which in return breaks down tissue to release water. Thus you don't hold onto more water by eating more salt but the water is created in situ. Basically what camels do when they don't get anything to drink: they break down the tissue in their humps to create water. Breaking down tissue though is not a good idea as you also lose muscle tissue.
  • jflongo
    jflongo Posts: 289 Member
    yirara wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Sodium is something you should be concerned about only if you are hypertensive. Sort of like how sugar really only matters if you are diabetic. Personally I just turned the sodium tracker off because I didn't care.

    Sodium is in balance with water. If you eat more sodium and drink more water that is totally fine. In fact if you drink more water you probably should eat more sodium. So the idea of tracking sodium as some independent thing when its really the ratio of water to sodium that matters is a bit silly in my opinion. Right now the way it is set up you could have someone drinking a lot of water (like a gallon) a day and having MFP telling them to limit their sodium even though they should probably be getting like 4x the normal daily suggested amount.

    I'm a bit doubtful after two interesting papers by Titze et al, 2017. They found that a diet high in sodium raises glucocorticoid levels, which in return breaks down tissue to release water. Thus you don't hold onto more water by eating more salt but the water is created in situ. Basically what camels do when they don't get anything to drink: they break down the tissue in their humps to create water. Breaking down tissue though is not a good idea as you also lose muscle tissue.

    I think you should do more research than just read a paper by 1 group:wink:
  • yirara
    yirara Posts: 9,329 Member
    jflongo wrote: »
    yirara wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Sodium is something you should be concerned about only if you are hypertensive. Sort of like how sugar really only matters if you are diabetic. Personally I just turned the sodium tracker off because I didn't care.

    Sodium is in balance with water. If you eat more sodium and drink more water that is totally fine. In fact if you drink more water you probably should eat more sodium. So the idea of tracking sodium as some independent thing when its really the ratio of water to sodium that matters is a bit silly in my opinion. Right now the way it is set up you could have someone drinking a lot of water (like a gallon) a day and having MFP telling them to limit their sodium even though they should probably be getting like 4x the normal daily suggested amount.

    I'm a bit doubtful after two interesting papers by Titze et al, 2017. They found that a diet high in sodium raises glucocorticoid levels, which in return breaks down tissue to release water. Thus you don't hold onto more water by eating more salt but the water is created in situ. Basically what camels do when they don't get anything to drink: they break down the tissue in their humps to create water. Breaking down tissue though is not a good idea as you also lose muscle tissue.

    I think you should do more research than just read a paper by 1 group:wink:

    Of course I should. Having normal sodium levels yet at times extreme salt hunger (under investigation) and such low blood pressure that I can't stand up I am looking for interesting papers on this topic. Mind pointing me in some interesting directions?
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    edited April 2018
    yirara wrote: »
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    Sodium is something you should be concerned about only if you are hypertensive. Sort of like how sugar really only matters if you are diabetic. Personally I just turned the sodium tracker off because I didn't care.

    Sodium is in balance with water. If you eat more sodium and drink more water that is totally fine. In fact if you drink more water you probably should eat more sodium. So the idea of tracking sodium as some independent thing when its really the ratio of water to sodium that matters is a bit silly in my opinion. Right now the way it is set up you could have someone drinking a lot of water (like a gallon) a day and having MFP telling them to limit their sodium even though they should probably be getting like 4x the normal daily suggested amount.

    I'm a bit doubtful after two interesting papers by Titze et al, 2017. They found that a diet high in sodium raises glucocorticoid levels, which in return breaks down tissue to release water. Thus you don't hold onto more water by eating more salt but the water is created in situ. Basically what camels do when they don't get anything to drink: they break down the tissue in their humps to create water. Breaking down tissue though is not a good idea as you also lose muscle tissue.

    That doesn't sound right to me at all.

    Is these the papers you are refering to?

    https://www.jci.org/articles/view/88530

    https://www.jci.org/articles/view/88532

    I haven't read the entire paper but I read the abstract and I don't really see how it supports the claim you made here. Since you read the paper can you point to where it states that muscle tissue is cannibalized to release water in people who have high salt diets? Also can you explain how someone who needs to literally digest their own tissues to balance out their sodium intake would continue to live? How would such a thing even be sustainable. Okay on day 1 you cannibilze your muscle tissue to release enough water to balance out the sodium you took in...which would have to be a substantial amount right, I mean like a kilogram worth.......what do you do on day 2? what about on day 100?

    What I see this study talking about is hormonal control of water homeostasis under different sodium intake levels in a controlled enviornment, not destruction of tissue to free water to balance sodium.

    The second paper mentions catabolic muscle wasting with sodium load in rats without a controlled diet, under conditions of free feeding. Is that what you are referring to?
  • Christine_72
    Christine_72 Posts: 16,049 Member
    I rarely go over the 2300mg recommended here. I don't have blood pressure issues, but i do pack on water if go too far over. Yesterday i was at 3122mg (822 over), and this morning I'm nearly 4lbs up on the scale. I'd be a walking water balloon if i went thousands over.

    I rarely eat packaged foods, so it's easy to keep sodium on an even keel.
  • UncaToddly
    UncaToddly Posts: 146 Member
    Nope. My sodium is rarely under double. And that is with us rarely eating out anymore. For lunch I commonly make a sandwich with the Orowheat thinbuns, 20g each of ham, roast beef, chicken and cheese. Today I also had 28g of pork rinds with it. Total sodium.....over 1500mgs. Daily goal? 2300 or less. I will likely have 3-4 ounces of smoked salmon tonight as well..... that will likely be over 1000. And there are all the 100-200 hits like cheese, eggs, etc through the day.

    Heck, I made a large chef's salad last night and it came out to 1700mg.

    On average I am around 3500-4500 but have had some days that hit over 7000.
  • OliverRaningerVegan
    OliverRaningerVegan Posts: 349 Member
    yes i do
  • T1DCarnivoreRunner
    T1DCarnivoreRunner Posts: 11,502 Member
    In the summer, I rarely get enough even at 8K-12K mg daily. I just sweat it all out while running, hiking, etc. Plus, I don't eat carbs so I need more than most people anyway. When I don't get enough sodium, I get serious muscle cramps.
  • Sp1tfire
    Sp1tfire Posts: 1,120 Member
    Vaguely try to keep it under the daily recc, but I don't stress about it too much. If my Dr tells me to cut back I'll happily comply.
  • flitabout38
    flitabout38 Posts: 48 Member
    I am low carb so I eat lots of salt
  • littlebear0121
    littlebear0121 Posts: 1,073 Member
    edited April 2018
    I eat about the same amount of calories, eat very little packaged food (we have a large family so I almost always cook our meals from scratch), and my sodium intake according to MFP is way too high as well. However, I don't care about my sodium intake because my blood pressure is usually on the low side. My family doesn't like salty food, so I generally don't add much salt when I'm cooking. At the table I only salt my eggs, nothing else. I'm surprised but not worried.
  • Lillymoo01
    Lillymoo01 Posts: 2,865 Member
    edited April 2018
    jflongo wrote: »

    Anything peer reviewed says the opposite. I know it helps when I can search articles through a uni library data base which won't have all that Google crap. Peer reviewed articles from a uni database or YouTube....... um which one to believe?

    If you have hypertension then you should be taking doctors orders by watching sodium levels.