A question on salt

[kurite]

My friend (a healthy SAD dieter) goes to a trainer and regularly cramps often. Apparently according to his trainer its do to low sodium intake. This made me think how are we able to maintain sodium levels on our diet? I know that when we sweat we lose quite a bit of salt. So just wondering how does this work? Is it low sodium intake or mineral imbalance or something else?

[TylerDurden]

People can get cramps for all sorts of reasons such as magnesium-deficiency etc. When I had adrenal burnout issues pre-RPD diet, I would get cramps all the trime, but not any more on this raw diet.

[cliff]

Supplement a couple pinches of quality salt thru out the day, along with meat and other animal products you will easily meet your sodium needs.

The salt fear in the raw community is comical, the only reason salt is bad is A. Chemical additives B. Doused on every meal in copious amounts.  Salts an easy and tasty way to meet your sodium and chloride needs.

[TylerDurden]

Supplement a couple pinches of quality salt thru out the day, along with meat and other animal products you will easily meet your sodium needs.

The salt fear in the raw community is comical, the only reason salt is bad is A. Chemical additives B. Doused on every meal in copious amounts.  Salts an easy and tasty way to meet your sodium and chloride needs.

 Actually, a number of RPDers, such as myself, get rather nasty reactions from salt, even in small amounts. Salt is not a palaeo food and was never needed in palaeo times. Salt is primarily a food used in post-cooking eras to help store raw meats for longer periods, otherwise it's useless.

[invisible]

Apparently the less salt you eat the more efficient the body becomes with it's sodium. Losing sodium via sweating is perhaps only because there is excess sodium in the body. I never eat salt and don't have cramps.

[kurite]

Apparently the less salt you eat the more efficient the body becomes with it's sodium. Losing sodium via sweating is perhaps only because there is excess sodium in the body. I never eat salt and don't have cramps.

Do you ever do very intensive exercise?

[invisible]

Do you ever do very intensive exercise?

Yes I lift weights. I definitely get muscle soreness but that's different to cramps.

[cliff]

  Actually, a number of RPDers, such as myself, get rather nasty reactions fron salt, even in small amounts. Salt is not a palaeo food and was never needed in palaeo times.

What sprt of nasty reactions to you receive from salt?  Why do you attribute it to the salt?  What is the difference between sodium chloride in natural foods and salt?

[Hans89]

Salt makes me feel "weird", makes me sleepy but then I can't sleep well, and it gives me headaches.

[Paleo Donk]

  Actually, a number of RPDers, such as myself, get rather nasty reactions fron salt, even in small amounts. Salt is not a palaeo food and was never needed in palaeo times. Salt is primarily a food used in post-cooking eras to help store raw meats for longer periods, otherwise it's useless.

Do you not consider the salt content of blood that was probably eaten with the meat during paleo times? Or is blood sodium different enough from land salt to not be considered paleo?

[TylerDurden]

What sprt of nasty reactions to you receive from salt?  Why do you attribute it to the salt?  What is the difference between sodium chloride in natural foods and salt?

  It's very difficult to describe. It was an extremely unpleasant nasty feeling in the mouth, as though I'd absorbed some toxins.  Plus, I think I had some blood-sugar- and adrenal-related-issues as a result etc.(that is, I got the  exact same reaction when I ate any pasteurised liquid honey from jars).

[TylerDurden]

Do you not consider the salt content of blood that was probably eaten with the meat during paleo times? Or is blood sodium different enough from land salt to not be considered paleo?

  Natural salts are quite different from land-salts. They are also in balance with the other nutrients in the meats. I drink raw blood quite often(when I eat my raw wild hares), and it doesn't affect me badly in the way that land-salt does.

[cliff]

  Natural salts are quite different from land-salts.

Natural salts are land salts, in water salt breaks into sodium and chloride ions.  The sodium and chloride in your blood are essentially salt, salt contains essentially the same as your bloods ratio of NA to CI

[TylerDurden]

Natural salts are land salts, in water salt breaks into sodium and chloride ions.  The sodium and chloride in your blood are essentially salt, salt contains essentially the same as your bloods ratio of NA to CI

  I would heavily disagree. There've been many pro-supplement adovcates , for example, who've claimed that artificial versions of vitamin c etc. were chemically identical to the natural versions thereof, so must be the same, and yet have been proven wrong time and again via anecdotal experience. Besides, one could argue that the amounts of natural salts within meats are in equilbrium with other nutrients, so that adding even more salt would unbalance the nutrients and cause ill-health.

[maxscan]

I read something in the Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions cookbook (yes I know, a cookbook! There's a lot of stuff in the first couple of chapters based on Weston Price's research...) about people not being able to digest meat easily potentially due to lack of chloride to make hydrochloric acid as a result of a low sodium diet (she does also give vit b6 and zinc deficiencies as reasons for low hydrochloric acid levels) and Weston Price himself does mention it as an essential part of 'primitive' diets...

Perhaps this applies mainly to cooked food diets and not raw? But then again, wouldn't paleo man have had access to salt crystals dried out on rocks / marsh near the sea, or rock salt in caves?

I have to say I quite like salt on food so I'm probably biased I am trying to not put salt on my raw meats but it's tough as I like the taste - managing about half the time, and only a small amount of salt when I do...

[Wolf]

Hm, I think salt is something of an important substance, though I never add to any of my foods anymore after one day when I was younger I was eating some wheat thins and finished off the bag, but still wanted more, so I poured the crumbs into my mouth and got a mouthful of salt.. it was disgusting and i never added salt to my food after that, however I do like the taste of things high in sodium like soy sauce and top ramen which I still ate a lot on SAD. (I've only just recently started trying to eat raw)

However, my reason that I think salt is important is from an experience I had, in which I had been crying constantly for an entire day.. I cried for hours and hours without stopping, and I think I lost a rather large amount of salt through my tears, because when I finally did stop crying, I suddenly had the BIGGEST craving for salt in my entire life.. in fact, also the ONLY craving for pure salt that I had ever had.  But I felt like I really needed salt very very badly, and it was very unusual.. when I finally did get some salt (regular commercial table salt) I poured it into my hand and ate it straight.. which was the only time I've eaten straight salt ever since my wheat thin incident.

I don't think salt should be added to anything you eat (unless you get some sort of craving for it like I did) though I am not sure how much sodium you get on a raw diet, but it seems to me like you would already get sufficient amounts from the food you eat.. but I'm used to a SAD diet which pretty much already has salt in everything.

[Ioanna]

in the beginning of my raw paleo days i added himalayan crystal salt sometimes, but a couple of months in and i just liked the taste of raw meat so i didn't use salt anymore.  a few months from that point i added salt again and it tore up the inside of my mouth. i haven't used any since, but i eat seafood on occasion or add the blood of the meat to my meal.

[actionhero]

Yeah, salt is often used by people to distract themselves from reality or the present moment. It numbs you from your emotions and can be placed in the category emotional eating. I, having been salt free for a long time, can notice what a disturbing effect it really has on the body and mind even in small amounts. But some people do need a tiny bit of salt to remain healthy and stay functional.

[Wolf]

I've never used food as "comfort" or as a distraction from reality; if I am upset I have no appetite whatsoever and thinking of eating would make me feel a bit sick akin to eating even when you are stuffed so full you can't eat anymore.  I would not even have eaten anything at all once I stopped crying if it were not for my huge craving of salt.
but, perhaps what it could have been was something more like an addiction to salt, where my body felt like it needed it only because I was so used to having it in my system from my SAD diet, and when I lost so much in my tears I got a bad craving for it.  I have never been addicted to anything before (other than to maybe a person) so I would have never thought of it as an addiction, but instead an actual need.