Salt Series: Pregnancy

After releasing our Salt - How You've Been Misled and How It Can Change Your Life blog, I realized there are a number o niches that are particularly effected by the intake of salt or lack therefore. 

This piece of the series will cover the importance of salt in pregnancy and how it effects children in the womb for the remainder of their life. 

We all know that the food and nutrients that expecting mothers eat during their pregnancy can have damaging effects on their unborn children. One of those things that is often missed it the intake of salt and how this dietary factor creates a salt thermostat for children as early as their time in the womb. 

If your mother ate too little salt while you were in the womb, following the guidelines for high blood pressure she has been led to believe, you would develop in a salt-deprived state. This would lead to the dopmaine receptors in your brain to become highly sensitive to salt, and you would receive additional satisfaction when eating it. In fact, studies have shown that low salt intake in pregnant mothers leads to their children craving and eating more salt throughout their childhood and adulthood. This helps to ensure the survival of the offspring during dehydration events. 

However, the consequences go far beyond a craving for salt for the rest of your life. When a pregnant mother has low salt intake, her offspring can develop increased fat mass, insulin resistance, and raised levels of "bad cholesterol and triglycerides, which can carry into adulthood. This suggests that low salt intake during pregnancy (and lactation for breast-feeding mothers) can lead to children developing abnormal blood lipid levels, diabetes, obesity, hypertension, and chronic kidney disease.

In addition to this, low salt intake during pregnancy can also create a predisposition to the addiction of substances of abuse - salt, sugar, and even drug additions. Not exactly a mother's dream..

Okay, so what about the idea that too much salt can lead to preeclampsia, a condition characterized by hypertension that can be dangerous for both mother and unborn child?  

In 1958, a study was published that compared a high salt diet to a low salt diet in pregnant women. The results showed that extra salt dosage treated preeclampsia rather than causing or worsening it. In fact, low-salt diets in pregnancy led to muscle weakness, particular in the legs, which was treated with more salt. The authors summarized the results by stating that extra salt in the diet is "essential for the health of a pregnant woman, her fetus, and the placenta." 

Here's a list of possible negative side effects from a low-salt diet during pregnancy:

• Increased chance of miscarriage

• Increased risk of premature delivery

• Increased risk of infant mortality

• Increased risk of bleeding in the mother

• Increased risk of preeclampsia

• Increased risk of low-birth-weight babies who will become chronic salt carvers/addicts with higher risk of obesity, insulin resistance, hypertension, and compromised kidney function

So how much salt do you need? 

It's simple, eat to taste. If you're craving salt, add it to your meals. A good range of salt intake daily is between 3-6 grams per day (or about 1 1/3 to 2 2/3 teaspoons of salt) for healthy adults). The Council for Responsible Nutrition also recently recommended that dietary supplements intended for pregnant and lactating women include 150 micrograms of iodine.