Help me control my sodium levels!!! (per app recommendation)

Stop eating processed food: it's full of salt and the amounts make you go over your daily recommended intake. By cooking more and eating more fresh food your sodium intake will drop dramatically.

She took the words right out of my mouth. I don't eat a lot of processed foods anymore, and what I do eat is LOW SODIUM. I also don't add sodium to my diet with salt. I use a lot of Mrs. Dash that doesn't have salt in it. It gives it flavor and you can't tell the salt is missing - at least I can't.

I have had to do the same, and what previous posters have said is the key. Processed foods are generally horribly high in sodium. Canned soups are notorious. Canned veggies can have some sodium removed by rinsing, but it's best to just cook fresh, and bypass the sodium. Frozen meals, even the so-called healthy ones, are also very high in sodium. The thing that helped me the most was logging everything I ate, and watching what each item did to my numbers. Gradually I started to see the patterns of which foods shot my sodium up, and I could make better decisions based on the knowledge I was gathering. Good luck to you. MFP is a fabulous free tool. If you use it to your advantage, you can really change your life!

Here's my advice:
AMERICAN Processed food is horrible, avoid it like the plague. I've found that processed foods from some countries (India, and Lebanon are both astonishingly good) are perfectly fine, and NOT loaded with salt.

Cook your own food and pack lunches. Use little salt.

Take potassium supplements. A number of studies have shown that increased potassium levels over sodium levels tend to decrease the deleterious effects of high sodium levels. This makes sense given that in nature sodium is relatively sparse, while potassium is more plentiful. Processed foods are the opposite.

Drink water.

Work out.

My husband recently had a trip to the ER because of his blood pressure! It really scared him and was an eye opener. I knew he wasn't eating well and knew this would eventually happen but I knew it would take a DR to change his mind. So...now I'm on a low sodium mission for him. It is really frustrating because almost everything has high sodium! Long story short I'll tell you my secrets I have found.
*Fruit2o has 70mg of sodium per bottle (he cut out soda and sugary drinks and loves this. It is way lower than propel and other water drinks)
*Roasted No salt pistachios ( I have only found in one Wal-mart but they are there)
*Clint's hot salsa (45mg per 2 tbsp which is waaaay lower than the average salsa and it is excellent to give flavor to meals with low sodium he uses it on his McDonald knock off breakfast burritos)
*Planters lightly salted cashews (45mg not bad at all for a serving and there's some protein and great snack)
*70-72% dark chocolate (0 sodium!!! Yes you will begin to like it more than regular just give yourself some time)
*Thomas 100 calorie muffins (130 mg of sodium not too bad and then you use egg whites 90mg mixed with half a cut up turkey sausage patty the generic kind you get in freezer isle at Wal-mart 185mg and maybe a slice of borden gouda cheese 115 and your breakfast total is 520mg)
*Mission carb balance tortilla (They taste excellent and have 280mg not great but way better than other tortillas and the fiber content and protein is awesome trade off! I make wraps and breakfast burritos with instead of muffin above for hubby with salsa)
*Smoothies barely have any sodium (i use Jullian's vanilla protein poweder 55mg with coconut milk 30mg, fage greek yogurt 85mg and frozen mango's and strawberries 0mg) Its incredibly yummy despite what you may think of coconut milk or greek yogurt i can't eat greek yougurt alone!

Like the others have said cut out boxed meals and processed meats. Go for the low sodium sara lee turkey breast in the deli. Check your BREAD!!! It is the number one sodium hideout!! I also use more basil, parsley, oregeno and other spices to spiff things up. I use soy flour instead of seasoned flour too. Oh bad news about boneless skinless chicken breast...they use broth when freezing and it has sodium in it. Aaah I'm telling you it's everywhere!

We just have to Research and check different stores and their brands compared to named brands. It is frustrating but we can do it! I heard the government is going to start doing something about all the sodium in products too so that will help if it actually happens. Sorry such long post but this is such a passion for me and my family. You can check out my food diary. I'm usually always low on sodium. The less you have the less you crave and if I do, I take a few chips or lightly salted nuts and walk away!

Lately I've been keeping my sodium intake between 1000 and 1500 mg/day. Like has been suggested, avoid processed foods, and of course the salt shaker.

Beyond that, it's really not too bad if you carefully read labels, look up any unknown items, and make the right choices.

You will also be able to find lower sodium versions of many of your favorite foods in the supermarket or health food store. Ezekiel's 4.9 low sodium bread is one example -- ZER0 sodium. You can even find lower sodium frozen meals in the supermarket. Some of the Lean Cuisine line and Amy's lower sodium line are just a couple of examples.

Eating out can be a challenge, but Chinese food is a good choice IF you order your food without any type of sauce (that includes soy sauce), no MSG. A little bit of cooking oil, and seasoning like pepper, fresh garlic and ginger is fine. Soups and most appetizers are out. Try and stick with chicken, meat or seafood combined with vegetables and steamed rice. Fortune cookies actually have very little salt (or calories or fat) so enjoy!

Other than Chinese, choose a restaurant where the food is freshly prepared and ask the server what dishes can be made without salt. Of course anything with a marinade would probably be out.

Good luck with your low sodium diet. In my case, my bp has dropped to the point where my low sodium diet is able to replace some bp medications. Needless to say, check with your doctor before making any changes in medication.

-- James

Shrinkinmel: as I work to reduce my bp and triglycerides(which I know I'm getting from processed food as I already naturally consume low cholesterol).
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Yes, exercise and weight loss can both help with bp, although in my case the only thing that helped (other than medications) was a change in my sodium consumption.

As to cholesterol, the major culprit is usually not low cholesterol foods but a diet high in fat, which is the typical American diet. Exercise and weight loss can help here as well but heredity plays a very big part.

-- James

Previous poster: that is probably the reason of my pre-hypertension I looked at mfp and I had like 0 potassium alot of the time wow!

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It's doubtful you have "0 potassium" intake, but much more likely that many food labels do not provide potassium numbers and therefore they will be entered into the mfp database as zero. A more accurate figure would be to look up each food in your daily diary and find out the exact postassium levels using other sources. I would also do some research into potassium supplements before diving in, as they can have side effects. In general, better to get your potassium from potassium rich foods.

Stop eating processed food: it's full of salt and the amounts make you go over your daily recommended intake. By cooking more and eating more fresh food your sodium intake will drop dramatically.

exactly what I was going to say...

I also use more basil, parsley, oregeno and other spices to spiff things up.

I use garlic powder in place of sodium for my stir fry veggies. I also use lots of onion and garlic when I make my own chicken stock.