Cause of Osteopenia: Sodium

Too much sodium can be a cause of Osteopenia. I did not know that when I started my quest to reverse my bone loss. In fact I did not learn it until several years into my efforts to increase bone density.

Here is what happened. When my dexa scans were showing that I was not gaining bone density and had begun to lose more bone density, I started researching to figure out what I could be doing that was causing this bone loss. After all I was taking calcium and exercising with weights. I figured that there must be some things in my daily routine that were a hidden cause of Osteopenia.

That is when I discovered that there were a lot of things I was doing that undercut my efforts to increase my bone density. And the area of diet was one of the biggest areas.

My research had shown that one the many causes of Osteopenia was excess sodium.

The research showed a negative effect on bones with more than 2400 mg of sodium a day

At first I dismissed this as something NOT applicable to me. After all, I had removed the salt shakerfrom my table years ago when first diagnosed with hypertension.

But then I began to read food labels and I was shocked.

Many fast food meals contain 2350 mg all by themselves! Then, too, frankfurters (1010 mg), processed cheese (1000 mg), salad dressing (900), commercial cereal (900), bread (500) and a slice of cheddar (600) can all add up quickly. I even found that many of the Natural Spring Waters that I was buying had lots of sodium. Amazing!

Now sodium is important for our health. And it would not be good to completely eliminate it from our diet…nor would that be really be possible BUT if you want to increase your bone density, you might examine you daily sodium intake.

For a few days, read the label on everything you eat. Write down the sodium content. If you eat out, ask the chef….or go home and check one of the food charts for sodium content and estimate your meal intake – including that of any alcoholic beverages.

Colorado State University offers a helpful chart on their web site. True, they write about hypertension on the page but if you scroll down you will find amounts of sodium in various foods and you can make sure that you do not Sodium as a Cause of Osteopenia: sodium

If you want to read about items related to this topic go to Causes of Osteopenia