The Low Sodium Lifestyle

I first heard this term last year when I was entering my first "holiday" season after my cardiac event and being on a low sodium diet. I was at my, what seemed like daily doctor's visit, when I started asking some questions about socializing and eating at the big holidays coming up, Thanksgiving and Christmas. I barely knew how to do a low sodium diet, let alone these big feasts probably at someone else house. He told me that the ER he worked in had a term for these holidays and they called it "Holiday Heart". He said that meant people would be admitted in higher numbers for different types of edema the day after a holiday, most notable Pulmonary Edema or water on your heart and lungs.  I thought, "Oh great, now there's that!" What really surprised me as we continued talking about what Holiday Heart was, was the fact it...

For me, I love soups year round, but, nothing is better then hot soup on a cold day. Growing up my Mom always had a giant pot of either vegetable, chicken noodle or chicken rice soup on the stove. Or tomato soup from the can served with a grilled cheese sandwich. If you were out playing in the snow and got warmed up by a hot tasty bowl of soup it had a special place in your belly. As I grew older I still loved soups, but I started to diversify my pallet. I began to try new soups Mom never made, and that even farther intensified my love of soup. Oh my God, there was all the cream of soups, like potato and broccoli, corn chowders and the like, then I found the oriental soups so delicate and flavorful, yeah I love soups! Fast forward to 2018 post cardiac event....

I've never been on a diet before my cardiac event. I have heard of different ones, and had people in my life explain theirs to me. 95% of the people I knew who were on a diet were trying to lose weight. The other 5% were folks I knew who were on a medically necessary diet, as one would be if they had diabetes. Then came my turn and now I must be on a medically necessary diet to keep my sodium intake under a certain level. So I started researching the lifestyle for myself and as I did, a lot of other medical diets presented themselves as I was researching. I'm not talking about fad diets or the trend of the week. The diets I seem to cross paths with were also all medically necessary diets as well. I got bombarded by great information. What really surprised me was, I watched...

No doubt, you must first learn what a LoSo diet is and how sodium effects you. Plus, you really should be learning the levels of your basic ingredients for meals. Such as just knowing that the mayonnaise in your fridge is 65mg per tablespoon and so far, the lowest you have found. It took me a bit to just get the "hang of it" with a Low Sodium Diet. Heck, I have never been on a diet in my life, let alone one that was so critical to my health, so yeah I was a bit intimidated. Once I started getting familiar with the entire Low Sodium thing. I started to look at meals a different way. Instead of just sticking with or looking for "Low Sodium Meals", I started thinking, "Meals that are Low Sodium"! Sounds the same right, yeah kinda. However they really are 2 completely different ideas. Let me...

NO more salt...WOW! Now what do I do? Your brain goes right to foods you love and you start to compile a list in your head of what was once your favorites and is now off limits. Soups, Fast Food, Cakes , Bread, Ham, Bacon the list goes on and on!Your list keeps growing and with each addition to it you become more depressed. Growing up in PA Dutch country I absolutely loved Ham and String Beans, a big ole bowl of it with a little apple cider vinegar. Yea that is/was absolutely delicious comfort food. But no more. Almost made me cry. I did understand when I was told "no salt" It was for my own good and to keep me out of the hospital. I didn't like it, but understood full well what a Low Sodium diet was to do for me. What I didn't understand was how to...