A Low-Sodium Kick-in-the-Pants

Years ago, I got the low-sodium spiel from my doctor. Blood pressure, as it relates to your kidney is circular.

Your kidney regulates the amount of sodium, and hence water, in your system; this regulates your blood pressure. As your kidney function declines, your blood pressure increases.

From the other side, increased blood pressure also makes your kidney work harder and is the leading cause of kidney disease.

Bottom-line is that keeping your blood pressure under control is super-duper important! To do that, you can’t go around drinking big gulps of coke and eating bags of Cheetos.

The amount of sodium recommended for the average American is 2,300 mg, a scant less than 1 teaspoon full per day. However, if you have kidney disease, like me, or diabetes, or heart disease, or high blood pressure, or are over 51 you should be limiting that to 1,500 mg, ever so slightly more than ½ a teaspoon (a.k.a. barely any) per day. Most people are eating in excess of 3,400mg…way too much. (Mayo Clinic: Sodium)

I’ve known this, for years, and thought I was doing pretty well. To limit sodium, I…

• Stopped drinking soda
• Cut out processed foods (including frozen meals which are loaded with salt)
• Made my own salad dressings
• Eventually cut out dairy (as part of the vegan thing)
• Never added salt to my food at the table
• Scantly seasoned food as I was preparing it

I never actually put in the effort to take a peak and see how much salt I was eating, I just assumed “good enough.” Until I met Jessica.

Sodium Girl

Jessica Goldman Foung, a.k.a. Sodium Girl, has been spending years getting health-conscious patients like me to limit the sodium in their diets while still enjoying a flavorful life.

Jessica was diagnosed with Lupus, an autoimmune disease, in her early 20s that mounted an attack on her brain and kidneys which left her on dialysis and waiting for a kidney transplant. She set aside her prognosis and took action to improve her health by eating very, very low sodium (just 500 – 1,000 mg/day). With the changes she made and a talented medical team, her kidney function partially regenerated and she was no longer in renal failure…no dialysis, no transplant, all inspiration.

Since Jessica and I live in the same half of California, I reached out to connect over lunch. This girl means business. She is all about taking ownership of our health. We gabbed about how important it is to control what you can when you’re coping with an illness. It gives you a way to participate with your care and a place to focus on something other than worry.

After our time together, I read the intro to her cookbook, Sodium Girl’s Limitless Low-Sodium Cookbook. Powerful. Turns out I wasn’t as hot-to-trot as I thought regarding limiting sodium.

Jessica is a personable and honest writer who beautifully shares her story and outlook for changing her diet. She had me all revved up to look at grocery store labels, think about how I order at restaurants and consider the sodium inherent in fresh foods (yes, broccoli does have sodium).

That weekend at Trader Joe’s I was stunned to see how much salt was in items I normally don’t think twice about: canned beans, hummus, rice milk, and bread…oh, the sodium soaked bread! I read somewhere once that anything less than 5% of your DV of sodium in a product was considered low, definitely not so according to Jessica.

She is disciplined about making things from scratch and creatively replacing salt with other flavorful spices. This I can do more of.

So, I got curious, how much sodium was I eating?

The Sodium Diary

I decided to track it for one full day. Before I did my sodium chart, I did make one change. I had been having a sandwich most days for lunch. I knew that was pushing my salt intake higher than I wanted, so I switched out the sammie for steamed veggies over brown rice or a salad.

It is intensive to keep a food diary where you have to look up and calculate the sodium in everything that you eat, but if you’ve been told to limit your sodium, it is an exercise you should do, at least once. It will give you a gauge on what you need to eliminate, what is a-okay and what will push you way over.

Here’s what I ate that day with sodium counts:

Breakfast

• Shredded Wheat Cereal, 0mg (this was surprising – oatmeal also has 0mg)
• ⅔ c. Rice Milk, 66mg
• ½ Peach, 5mg
• Green Tea, 0mg

Lunch

• Brown Rice, 0mg.
• 1 c. Steamed Broccoli, 48mg
• 1 c. Steamed Cauliflower, 14mg
• 7 Steamed Asparagus Spears, 15mg
• ¾ c. Steamed Cabbage, 6mg
• Lemon Juice & Olive Oil, 0mg
• ¼ c. Unsweetened Cranberry Juice, 5mg (added to my water)

Snack

• ½ Raw Pear, 1mg
• Jelly-filled Cupcake from Veganomicon, no frosting, 150mg (yea, this just sounded too good)

Dinner

• Whole Wheat Spaghetti, 20mg
• Tomato Sauce, 265mg (I really should make my own)
• Vegan Parmesan Cheese, 48mg
• Trade Joe’s Vegan “Meatballs” 3 Total, 280mg
• 1 ½ c. Lettuce, 4mg
• 2 tbs Diced Red Bell Pepper, 0mg
• 2 tsp Diced Red Onion, 1mg
• 2 tbs Diced Carrot, 9mg
• 2tbs Diced Cucumber, 1mg
• Lemon Vinaigrette made with Dijon Mustard, 37mg

My total for the whole day was 975. Fortunately under the 1,500mg mandate. It was also a good day of food. I never felt deprived and everything had great flavor. By being stingy with sodium at breakfast and lunch, my 665mg dinner didn’t put me over the top. A sandwich at lunch or baked good at breakfast surely would have.

The expanded awareness Jessica blessed me with has been wonderful. I’m a much more discerning shopper and realize the vital importance of cooking at home.

Last Observation

Jessica and I got together again last week for dinner before I joined her Writing Through Illness class to guest lecture at Stanford (which was a blast!)

I was in awe of the way Jessica ordered her dinner. She made the cashier aware of her past kidney issues and was clear and friendly about requesting a sodium-free meal.

When you have dietary restrictions it is easy to feel that you are inconveniencing the staff. I never thought to specifically request a low-sodium meal. I do the vegan request thing all the time, but always assumed that it would be too hard to extend that to low-sodium. Her lead-by-example grace empowered me to feel that I could continue my low-sodium efforts at restaurants.

I highly recommend Sodium Girl’s blog and cookbook. They will both give you a low-sodium kick-in-the-pants.

What are you tricks for limiting the sodium in your diet?

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