Hold the Salt!

 

Do you eating too much salt? I do, and when I eat anything salty I feel awful the next day. I really am being conscious of salt because I have to take high blood pressure medicine. I am working to lose weight and to reduce my sodium intake in order to lower the dosage of my blood pressure medicine or to get off the medicine all together.  

Salt causes so many problems health wise. It contributes to hypertension, kidney disease along with dehydration and swelling, and that is only a few of the side effects. Medical experts are finding that salt is causing many other problems as well. According to Harvard experts, too much sodium can make you prone to osteoporosis.

One day a few years back I ordered large fries at a fast food restaurant. When I got up to the window to get my food the lady handed me my food, and I saw that there wasn’t any salt in my bag. I ask the fast food worker if I could have a couple of packets of salt. She replied to me “Ma’am do you know how unhealthy eating all that salt is for you?” I’m not even kidding; she actually said that to me. I drove off, and I was shocked that someone would say that to a customer, but sometimes in life we have to hear something that we think is negative that we do not want to hear at the moment in order to learn from that moment. When I think about it now, that lady really was right about the salt. I really do not think that she should have said that to a customer, but it sure was a wakeup call.

Another thing that I have learned is that the saltier the dish the more you want seconds; and you know what seconds helpings of food causes – weight gain.

You should also to read labels in grocery stores before you purchase an item. You might be surprised at some of the food items that have added sodium. A lot of companies add salt to food to heighten the flavor without adding any calories. Most of the sodium that we consume comes from processed foods. So even if we use lite salt or sodium free salt, we could still be going over the recommended daily allowance of sodium just from eating food that does not even taste salty. Try to find low-sodium alternatives or stick to unprocessed food, which is healthier anyways.

A couple of months ago, I started using “lite” salt. Lite salt has half of the sodium of regular salt, and you can purchase this at most grocery stores. I mixed half regular salt to half-lite salt. I started liking the lite salt, and now I only eat lite salt. I did not like it at first, but now I am used to it. I try not to salt things as much, but I do like my salt. I am now mixing lite salt and sodium free salt. We will see if I can kick the salt habit all together.  If you sprinkle on too much salt, try lite salt and cut down on your salt to feel better today!

Julie