Thursday, March 10, 2016

Low Sodium Diet

I have to have a test done on my thyroid next week.  It will be using a radioactive ultrasound.  It's pretty routine.  But the hard part about this test is that I have to be on a low sodium diet until after the test.  I never realized before how much sodium is in every food!  I decided to write this post so that I can share some tips with others who might have to do this diet.

So the diet prohibits:
--sodium
--milk products
--chocolate
--red dye
--egg yolks
--soy beans, soy products

Once I started looking around at labels, I found that almost everything has sodium in it!  It has been really hard to figure out what to eat.  Here are some things I've had success with so far.

BREAD
Every loaf of bread I looked at in the store had 120g of sodium in each slice.  Bagels are almost double that.  I did find that corn tortillas have only 10g per tortilla, but my diet says it should be below 5g.  But the first day, when I had nothing else to eat, I did eat two corn tortillas.
The diet mentioned that homemade bread and muffins are okay.  I made 3 large loaves of bread and put in only 1/2 tablespoon for the entire batch.  So now I have something to eat!

MILK
I love milk!  Going without milk has been difficult.  I thought I would buy almond or rice milk, but they all have about 60g of sodium per serving.  Finally I found a coconut milk that doesn't have any sodium.  It's a little chunky, but it satisfies my craving for cow's milk.

SALT
I don't think there is such a thing as a non-sodium salt substitute.  But I read online that red wine vinegar only has 1g per tablespoon.  I've been using red wine vinegar instead of salt on meats, salads etc.
Here are some foods that I have had success with:
--Oatmeal (old fashioned). I put in some cinnamon and banana
--salad with a dressing made from red wine vinegar and olive oil
--chicken sauteed with a sauce made of red wine vinegar, olive oil, basil, and honey.  I also put a little bit of the sauce on the potato wedges I boiled.  That tasted pretty good.
--Green beans with garlic, no salt.
--Tonight I made Chinese food for the family.  I ate some of the rice, but cooked my vegetables and meat separate with some vinegar and honey.

SNACKS
I went to the whole foods market here and got some unsalted snacks.
---unsalted sunflower seeds
--unsalted pumpkin seeds
--unsweetened dried banana chips
--unsalted almonds

So far I am getting enough to eat, and it tastes pretty good.  I bought some peanut butter without salt. It really lacks something without the salt, but if I put a little honey on top it tastes good.

I decided that I really just have to make myself a different meal from what I feed my family.  If I plan it just right, I can use most of the same ingredients, just season it differently.

My one hope is that with this diet I might actually lose a little weight!  That being said, I'm already thinking about what I want to eat once I can eat salt again.  :)


2 comments:

Becky said...

In his early 30's Wayne was diagnosed with high blood pressure and told to go on a low-sodium diet. It's tough! (Good thing he didn't have to give up dairy at the same time.) No-Salt is made with potassium chloride, so he switched to that. It took a good two years, though, before he got used to the new taste. You're right that sodium is in everything you buy, so we don't use many processed foods. I cut the amount of salt I used in baking (to half the amount called for in the recipe) and didn't use salt when cooking (the rest of us added it at the table). That diet worked for many, many years to control his blood pressure, but now that he's taking medication to do that, he figures he can go back to sodium chloride!

Inklings said...

Ugh, I am so sorry and hope the time passes quickly!