Hyponatremia

Has anyone else ever heard of this? It's a rather rare ocurence, specially in this day and age of processed foods and salty snacks.

I found the term in the Fasting: the Ultimate Diet book by Allan Cott, M.D. Basically, it happens when you have low levels of sodium (salt) in your system, so that you can't hold water. It can happen sometimes when someone goes on a fast, but it's not that common.

But then, we never really know which of us is common.

I was around nine when my mother was diagnosed to be hypertensive, and was told to go on a low-salt diet. Being my mom and in charge of our kitchen, she decided that we would all benefit from a low-salt diet.

So I have basically been on a low-salt diet since I was nine.

One thing it gave me was a rather sensitive palate. I learned to appreciate the different tastes and smells of food, and the wonderful way they combine. Whenever I try a new dish with a recommended condiment, I always try it out first by itself. I enjoy doing this specially with pizza, savoring how the vegetables, meat, cheeses, sauce, pasta crust combine for its unique taste. I would tell Irl that my palate is sensitive enough to find taste in foods others would find bland.

So if I say it's bland, it really must be bland!

But it does have a drawback. During my first pregnancy, we took Childbirth Preparation classes, and learned that  an expectant mom should have just the right level of salt. Too much would cause bloating.

And so would too little.

I would be crying as Irl forced me to add more salt to my meals. Believe it or not, our final compromise was chips, but even then it was still too much for me. But the therapy worked. My legs started to shrink back to normal. It wasn't a nice time for me, but the chips were actually the healthier option at the time.

But my real bout with hyponatremia happened several years later.

We had joined a church that encouraged fasting and prayer as a discipline, and every start of the year, we would have a church-wide fast for one week. It was on the third year that I spent one morning going to the bathroom almost every 20 minutes, unloading what felt like an extremely full bladder. And because I was "losing" that much water,I made sure I would drink after every bathroom trip.

But it was too uncomfortable and tiring and inconvenient -- and I'm already a stay-at-home mom! -- so I broke my water fast and ate a small meal. I also stopped drinking for the rest of the morning. I felt better, and the running to the toilet stopped so I was finally able to concentrate on praying.

It made me curious, but it was another year or so, after I'd found the book and read the term, that I understood what happened to me.

Hyponatremia.

I read somewhere that it was also referred to as water poisoning, but I think that's extreme. Because the real problem is not the water, but the low salt levels.

So I had to be watchful during my first week on belletoday's program. Good thing I realized that my water intake had been down, so the first few days, water was truly welcome. But then the day came when I felt the familiar bathroom urge from having had too much water than I had salt to hold it. I didn't want to give up the water -- I really needed it now -- but I had to make sure it wouldn't be in and out of my body too much.

So I heated up some corned beef from a can, fried an egg, and topped them in a bowl with about half a cup of rice. Then I washed it down with about two glasses of water.

This was a semi-regular part of my diet for the first week.

So imagine my surprise when I weighed in and found I had dropped the predicted one pound.

Wow!

I'm keeping my corned beef, egg and rice combo as a semi-regular meal now, because it's the only salty combination I really enjoy. For the most part, I eat canned tuna in oil and rice, which isn't as salty, but like i said, I've learned to appreciate subtle tastes. When I eat out, I have no problem with the salt content of the meals, but I'm a stay-at-home mom, so I need to be watchful. Irl actually has to remind me sometimes to add salt when I cook. Lately, though, I've been using the bouillion cubes for flavoring. It seems to work. I'm working on weaning myself from the habits my mom instilled in me, because I'm not hypertensive like she was.

The only thing I'm keeping is her adobo, which is a bit more on the vinegary than the salty side (my sister-in-law thought it was paksiw), which has won Irl's approval too. He actually LIKES it with more sourness!

I'm looking forward to losing more weight here. Maybe I'll get to my target weight in time to make the next kids...

I'm keeping in mind the tip we learned in childbirth class: salt to taste, water to thirst. And I've found that when you obey those urges, it's truly a healthy combination!

'scuse me while I have a drink...