How much salt?

[kpfleger]

Thanks Dean. 1000mg in roughly how many calories? Are you still doing that high burn high consumption thing where you went up to 3000cal/day or are you back down to something much lower?

[Dean Pomerleau]

Still 3000+.

 

[kpfleger]

BTW, this article: https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/6-dangers-of-sodium-restriction has several links directly into the primary literature on the topic of 5 specific potential harms caused by too-low sodium intake, but I haven't had time to dig into any of them yet. I suspect some suffer from some of the issues Michael pointed out up-thread, but do they all? It may be worth one's time if one's consumption is <1500mg/day to convince oneself that these are not actual issues.

[Saul]

My blood serum salt level is low.  According to my nephrologist, I am slightly below the minimal recommended blood level for Na+.  however, the nephrologist says that that is my salt "set-ponit", and that is fine for me.

  --  Saul

[Ron Put]

On 8/27/2022 at 11:20 PM, Saul said:

My blood serum salt level is low. 

Low compared to what though?

If to the "normal" range prevalent in the US, Europe and elsewhere where they have discovered fast food, consider yourself lucky.

[pwonline]

I was consuming 6 litres of water a day!

My urine after 12pm (every hour peeing) was almost fully clear! I felt light headed, was consuming 1500mg Salt (total), Now I supplement with pink salt, in total I'm consuming 3900mg Salt a day. I feel SO much better, also reduced my water intake to 4 litres.

I actually follow OMAD, consuming all my meal in 75 minutes and the rest of the day I drink tap water with dissolved pink salt and potassium citrate.

all nutrition is context based, what diet you are on, how healthy is the diet in general, how different macros interact.

My understanding of the literature is simple, if you are healthy (I'm extremely healthy), active and eat in moderation with plenty of rest for your body to rejuvenate (23 hours intermittent fasting), then your kidneys will have ZERO problem balancing excess minerals. Most if not everyone in the forum are super healthy as far as I can see. Do you really need to concern yourself with Salt intake when some of the worlds longest living groups consume way more Salt than the advertised 1500mg. 

I was constantly constipated and now that I've added more electrolytes I'm regular again. Low salt is very dangerous long term, more so than too much salt (though the damage is picked up longer term basis)

 

[Ron Put]

On 8/30/2022 at 3:19 PM, pwonline said:

Low salt is very dangerous long term, more so than too much salt (though the damage is picked up longer term basis)

Do you have any support for this statement?

For most of human history, low salt was the norm, and there is considerable evidence that high salt intake is detrimental for most people.

[pwonline]

20 minutes ago, Ron Put said:

Do you have any support for this statement?

For most of human history, low salt was the norm, and there is considerable evidence that high salt intake is detrimental for most people.

please watch this video

let me know if it's arguments are sound. I'm not an expert but my constipation has improved since adding Salt.

[Todd Allen]

On 9/2/2022 at 3:21 AM, pwonline said:

let me know if it's arguments are sound

The arguments in the video can be found in the book mentioned in the video "The Salt Fix" which provides more reasoning, evidence and references to support the claim that the US RDA for sodium is too low for most people.

The main reason people worry about sodium is the belief that it aggravates hypertension.  My blood pressure is good and I add quite a bit of salt to my food.  If I had high blood pressure and restricting sodium prevented or reduced the need for medication then I probably would.  After making sure I was getting enough potassium.

Edited September 3, 2022 by Todd Allen

[mccoy]

6 hours ago, Todd Allen said:

After making sure I was getting enough potassium.

Yes, ratio of NA and K is sometimes underestimated. I go with the body intelligence (neurological feedback) and adopt the minimum amount which makes food (vegetables for example) agreeable. My body intelligence usually tells me immediately if there is too much Na in food, potentially detrimental. I simply dislike that food, discard it or try to dilute the salt concentration.

[Ron Put]

On 8/30/2022 at 4:19 PM, pwonline said:

Low salt is very dangerous long term, more so than too much salt (though the damage is picked up longer term basis)

Thanks. I watched the video and I believe that I identified the article he uses as the basis for his claim and below are some relevant bits of it:

Why do older patients die in a heatwave?

"A diagnosis of heat stroke requires a core body temperature of >40°C and central nervous system dysfunction to be present. Symptoms of altered consciousness and disseminated intravascular coagulopathy are frequently profound in the setting of hyperthermia. Subsequent multi-organ dysfunction and failure contributes to mortality in heat stroke.. ..

Older subjects have a lower threshold for the development of renal failure, and diminished renal tubular conservation of sodium and water during periods of dehydration. ...

Thus, we postulate that many of the older patients who succumbed in the recent heatwave were dehydrated, hypernatraemic and hyperkalaemic, with evidence of renal failure. Resultant thrombo-embolic disease and malignant cardiac arrhythmias, as well as the consequences of heat-induced sepsis-like shock, would be the most probable causes of death in this scenario. ..."

IMO, his claim, at least as is applies to most of us, is grossly misleading, as is much of the rest of the video.

There is quite a lot of accumulated evidence that high salt intake causes numerous issues in the majority of people. Here is a recent study:

https://www.foodnavigator-asia.com/Article/2020/01/29/High-salt-intake-linked-to-increased-mortality-rate-in-new-Japanese-study
 

[pwonline]

On 9/4/2022 at 12:54 AM, Todd Allen said:

The arguments in the video can be found in the book mentioned in the video "The Salt Fix" which provides more reasoning, evidence and references to support the claim that the US RDA for sodium is too low for most people.

The main reason people worry about sodium is the belief that it aggravates hypertension.  My blood pressure is good and I add quite a bit of salt to my food.  If I had high blood pressure and restricting sodium prevented or reduced the need for medication then I probably would.  After making sure I was getting enough potassium.

Yeah I've heard the SALT fix book is the bible to read about this stuff. I'm also on low carb high fat diet Carbs(93g), Protein(75g), Fat(127g) and OMAD (23:1) and so my body is using more ketones and I heard we need more salt. I consume

4g Sodiumn and 3.1g potassium a day though will be increasing my potassium soon.

What levels of sodium and potassium are you consuming?

[pwonline]

17 hours ago, Ron Put said:

Thanks. I watched the video and I believe that I identified the article he uses as the basis for his claim and below are some relevant bits of it:

Why do older patients die in a heatwave?

"A diagnosis of heat stroke requires a core body temperature of >40°C and central nervous system dysfunction to be present. Symptoms of altered consciousness and disseminated intravascular coagulopathy are frequently profound in the setting of hyperthermia. Subsequent multi-organ dysfunction and failure contributes to mortality in heat stroke.. ..

Older subjects have a lower threshold for the development of renal failure, and diminished renal tubular conservation of sodium and water during periods of dehydration. ...

Thus, we postulate that many of the older patients who succumbed in the recent heatwave were dehydrated, hypernatraemic and hyperkalaemic, with evidence of renal failure. Resultant thrombo-embolic disease and malignant cardiac arrhythmias, as well as the consequences of heat-induced sepsis-like shock, would be the most probable causes of death in this scenario. ..."

IMO, his claim, at least as is applies to most of us, is grossly misleading, as is much of the rest of the video.

There is quite a lot of accumulated evidence that high salt intake causes numerous issues in the majority of people. Here is a recent study:

https://www.foodnavigator-asia.com/Article/2020/01/29/High-salt-intake-linked-to-increased-mortality-rate-in-new-Japanese-study
 

I'm done with trying to optimise every little thing and trying to extend my life by a few years.

I do OMAD and fast for 23 hours a day. Consume whole foods with 800g of raw broccoli+collard greens. All my carbs are complex (pot barley) and under 100g. I add 1 teaspoon of Salt to my water (4 litres a day) and have 7 gulps every hour. never drank alcohol and never done cigarettes or drugs. Consume 1850 calories a day with 17 BMI. And my salt is taken in when not consuming carbs so insert some science article saying salt on its own diluted in water sipped slowly throughtout the day isn't really damaging to the body. If I don't have one of the best none vegan diets known to man then I'd like to see someones diet and lifestyle that bests mine in terms of living healthily 

[mccoy]

PW, in the other thread you didn't mention the 800 gr of vegetables 👎

[Todd Allen]

On 9/6/2022 at 9:29 AM, pwonline said:

What levels of sodium and potassium are you consuming?

Very roughly cronometer suggests my daily food directly contains 2.5 g potassium and 1 g sodium.

In addition I have a salt shaker on the table with 2 parts of a mined ancient sea salt to 1 part potassium chloride.  I also have a jar which currently has roughly 3 parts of my salt shaker mix to 2 parts potassium citrate, 2 parts magnesium citrate, 1 part calcium citrate, 1 part sodium citrate and trace amounts of zinc, boron, manganese and iodine.  I use enough of the jar mix to keep my urine PH in a range of 6.5 to 7.0.  I use the salt shaker mix for cooking where the citrates would scorch and when I desire more salt and don't need more citrate. Lately I average daily about 2.5 teaspoons of the jar mix and 1.25 teaspoons of the salt shaker which I guesstimate adds about 4 g sodium and 3 g potassium to that which is in my food.

[pwonline]

On 9/6/2022 at 6:04 PM, mccoy said:

PW, in the other thread you didn't mention the 800 gr of vegetables 👎

I was consuming 720 I believe, I've changed it dramatically since then, cut out the eggs. I also was on 1600 calories on that thread and a BMI of under 16! Also I wasn't on OMAD then, I did 2 meals a day. I feel amazing on this current diet I've optimised. My goal is to increase my BMI slowly to 18 or 18.5. I first want to lower carbohydrates and protein down, currently ingesting 100 gram barley, 100 gram lentils. My goal is to get 80 gram barley and 80 gram lentils and make the calories up with EVOO. Each week I drop 5g each (barley/lentils). At that point my Macros will look like

carbohydrates = 80g (22%)
protein = 70g (14%)

Fat = 137g (64%)

 

I'm vegan+sardines, OMAD, CRON,
my omega 6 to omega 3 ratio will be 11.8g Omega 6 to 10.13g Omega 3

I consume 0.69g DHA and 2.4g EPA (Omega 3 fish oil from sardines for the brain)
fibre intake is 40g which helps to flush out my 22g saturated fat
 

I don't cook my barley, I leave it soaking over 15 hours.

My protein is 1.46g per kilogram of body weight, good compromise though higher than some reasearches say you should be consuming but since I consume all my meal in one sitting, my MTor only gets spiked at that interval which is ideal since it's after my weight training.

I walk for 15 minutes brisk walk with weights on my back straight after my meal then have a 20 minute nap

I sleep for 7 hours 45 minutes and do 30 minutes weights cardio

My routine is the same every day. I'm planning on reaching the age of 90-100 with this diet and lifestyle

After I hit 18.5 BMI my goal is to reduce my calories slowly while keeping my weight stabilised, would love to do 1800 calories and have a lower metabolism but I doubt my body will let me. I won't decrease from 1850 if I lose weight, 17 BMI isn't ideal. spent 1 year to get to this stage of my diet, very happy with how I react to it.

not easy to consume 98g of EVOO in one sitting without having to go to the toilet LOL

[pwonline]

13 hours ago, Todd Allen said:

Very roughly cronometer suggests my daily food directly contains 2.5 g potassium and 1 g sodium.

In addition I have a salt shaker on the table with 2 parts of a mined ancient sea salt to 1 part potassium chloride.  I also have a jar which currently has roughly 3 parts of my salt shaker mix to 2 parts potassium citrate, 2 parts magnesium citrate, 1 part calcium citrate, 1 part sodium citrate and trace amounts of zinc, boron, manganese and iodine.  I use enough of the jar mix to keep my urine PH in a range of 6.5 to 7.0.  I use the salt shaker mix for cooking where the citrates would scorch and when I desire more salt and don't need more citrate. Lately I average daily about 2.5 teaspoons of the jar mix and 1.25 teaspoons of the salt shaker which I guesstimate adds about 4 g sodium and 3 g potassium to that which is in my food.

damn that's a whole lot of citrate, didn't know you can evaporate it after boiling..nice

I level out at

4.4g sodiumn

4.4g potassium

I found this video to be helpful 

 

He recommends 5-6 g potassium 

I think if you are healthy with healthy kidneys consuming below 5g sodium or 5g potassium isn't anything to worry about.

I use to worry I'm ingesting to much but I make up for it with my other habits anyway and I doubt it affects longevity and lifespan more than 1% in red or 1% in black. Just focus on my other goals in life. I want to forget about my diet and do to maintain what I do in automatic mode.

 

Edited September 8, 2022 by pwonline

[mccoy]

PW online, sorry if I'm dumb but still I can't understand your average daily meal. Are you tracking your intake with cronometer? In such a case, can you paste the average weekly intake (calories, macros, micronutrients).

[kpfleger]

On 9/3/2022 at 4:54 PM, Todd Allen said:

The arguments in the video can be found in the book mentioned in the video "The Salt Fix" which provides more reasoning, evidence and references to support the claim that the US RDA for sodium is too low for most people.

The author of this book, James DiNicolantonio, appears to be controversial. See for example this page about him: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/James_DiNicolantonio

It's always hard when someone defends an idea by referencing a book or a video. In both cases it's not a quick operation to find a specific published scientific paper that defends the idea and shows the data it's based on. Such strong criticism of the author as above makes me less motivated to try to dig in. 

It seems clear that CronOMeter reports that a ~2000-3000 calorie diet of varied whole/unprocessed plant foods (veggies, fruit, whole grains, legumes, & nuts) provides roughly 2/3 to 1 gram of sodium. This seems roughly in agreement with what I've read humans consumed for most of the species evolutionary history before the advent of added salt for food preservation. It's clearly the case that humans can have too little sodium as a result of excessive sweating and maybe deficiency can happen as a result of eating a disproportionate amount of non-whole foods that have less sodium than whole/unprocessed plant foods (like consuming a lot of sugar and/or unsalted butter, etc.). I'm not sure what kind of diet one would have to construct to get sodium per day down below say 500mg/day or lower, but maybe one can. But it's harder for me to buy the idea that the sodium amounts that occur naturally in foods that we evolved eating provide an amount that is somehow so low that it creates a dangerous deficiency, especially if blood tests show sodium levels within the normal range.

There's still the possibility that a higher intake that this WFPB-with-no-added-sodium amount may be more optimal for longer-term health, but what's the main argument for that? What's the best paper showing good data for why added sodium above and beyond that naturally occurring in real food is helpful (other than for food storage/preservation)?

Edited September 12, 2022 by kpfleger

[Ron Put]

On 9/12/2022 at 11:28 AM, kpfleger said:

But it's harder for me to buy the idea that the sodium amounts that occur naturally in foods that we evolved eating provide an amount that is somehow so low that it creates a dangerous deficiency, especially if blood tests show sodium levels within the normal range.

This makes sense (but quoting or relying on (without verifying rationalwiki) doesn't 🙂

I was curious when I posted earlier above, and did not find a single study suggesting that a whole foods varied diet without salt supplementation is detrimental to health or longevity. On the contrary.

This is just one example:

The science of salt: a systematic review of clinical salt studies 2013 to 2014

"The authors provided a systematic review of the clinical and population health impact of increased dietary salt intake during 1 year. Randomized controlled trials or cohort studies or meta-analyses on the effect of sodium intake were examined from Medline searches between June 2013 to May 2014. Quality indicators were used to select studies that were relevant to clinical and public health. A total of 213 studies were reviewed, of which 11 (n=186,357) were eligible. These studies confirmed a causal relationship between increasing dietary salt and increased blood pressure and an association between several adverse health outcomes and increased dietary salt. A new association between salt intake and renal cell cancer was published. No study that met inclusion criteria found harm from lowering dietary salt. The findings of this systematic review are consistent with previous data relating increased dietary salt to increased blood pressure and adverse health outcomes."

[mccoy]

My first reaction is this: what would happen if I had to drastically cut my salt intake? I would probably eat less because of lesser palatability. In overweight people this would constitute a distinct advantage. In anorexic people this may decree their ruin.

[IgorF]

A curious review, no idea if it is not a kind of "eat more" conditioning:

https://journalofmetabolichealth.org/index.php/jmh/article/view/78/242#CIT0060_78

Sometimes I think about pendulum, since it has moves "to the right" and "to the left" then a lot of things without a careful quantitative analysis (e.g. there are 40 studies that proves "a" without saying that there are 4000 studies that proves "non a" - who knows how many of them are in reality and what power they have in total, e.g. not just plain quantity but with weight coefficients) could be easyly used as manipulative language constructs (it moves to the left! it moves to the right! more research is required!) and this is heavily used in marketing of almost all we anyhow consume.

From my observation I sometimes have acne after sudden evening overeating of carbs-heavy meal but I never tried to link it with salt, given a hard possibility to assess its real consumption. Generally, the stricter I am with evening energy - the less chance for acne to appear.

On the other hand - I assume there should be a large group of people that do not benefit from low salt diets and for them perhaps it makes no sense to try to go down far from 3g/day for the sake of "safety", who knows to which levels their ancestry was tuned long time before (but 7g is also a bad idea, no natural tuning for such a value seems ever happened with homos).

Br,

Igor

Edited May 16 by IgorF

[Jim Pearce]

https://scitechdaily.com/how-a-single-gram-of-salt-can-aggravate-your-eczema/

For over 20 years the skin on the palm of my hands wouldn't thicken up like a normal person's. It would start to, then start flaking, peeling, and leave me with paper thin skin with some raw spots. 

Then I found the above article in SciTechDaily in June 2024.

Doctors and dermatologists had been unable to help me for two decades. "It's called hyperkeratosis. We don't know what causes it, but here's some cream to try to keep it at bay by trying to keep it from drying out."

I started really limiting my salt and I've had normal hands for months now.

Now with the help of the app I downloaded that goes with my Samsung watch, I usually keep my sodium under 2000 mg/day. 

Edited Tuesday at 06:52 PM by Jim Pearce

[Saul]

I have the opposite problem:  I don't consume enough salt.  To the best of my knowledge, I don't seem to have any problem for that.  (But my nephrologist doesn't agree (K+/Na+ balance is too low, I guess.)

  --  Saul

[Jim Pearce]

It was so strange. I had never had any problem like it in my whole life. I was 46 years old in 2003. I was climbing trees for a local company that trims around power lines.

One day in 2003 I was going up a big tree that had rough bark. This day, for the first time ever, the rough edges of the bark were kind of hurting my hand. 

From that day on, I could not find a solution to why the skin on the palms of my hands kept getting thinner and thinner, first turning dry and scaly then peeling off.

Until June 2024 when I found the article I posted a link to.

It's finally over. It was SALT!!

Edited Wednesday at 04:53 AM by Jim Pearce