I should have known that fate would somehow punish me for my much-younger self's tendency to cringe when I saw women with "cankles."
Cankles is, of course, the impolite term for a condition in which "graceful ankles thicken and the calf appears to merge with the ankle," as DoctorOz.com explains it.
Years later, lo and behold, I found myself with cankles sometimes. ... Sigh. I retained water after eating salty stuff. Barring heart disease, kidney disease or other serious problems, this was simple fluid retention, also known as water weight gain, swelling or bloating.
It wasn't just my ankles. Sometimes it seemed that what size I wore depended on how bloated I was or wasn't. And the problem wasn't restricted to a monthly cycle. That monthly cycle ended in 1999 due to surgical menopause. And yet the water retention did not.
What's with that?
Fluid retention, or edema, occurs when fluid isn't removed from the body tissues, including the skin, according to the Better Health Channel in Australia. Symptoms include swelling and aches in affected body parts, such as feet, ankles and hands; rapid weight gain; and weight fluctuation. Causes include standing for long periods of time (which "allows fluid to 'pool' in the tissues of the lower leg,") and hot weather as well as menstrual cycles, pregnancy, birth-control pills or high sodium intake.
Medical experts warn that hypertension and heart, kidney and liver disease can easily be lurking behind water retention, especially in those who are middle-aged or older. But for the otherwise healthy, bloating can also show up as an uncomfortable, inconvenient and certainly aesthetically displeasing problem.
Women are more likely to suffer edema because it has to do with hormones ... the fluctuation of hormone levels throughout the menstrual cycle that starts the swelling before a period, as well as much of the swelling women see during pregnancy. It is "what makes them women," says Dr. Mark T. Jansen, an associate professor in the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences department of family and preventive medicine.
But among the most common water-retention triggers are "the hidden sources of sodium in our diet," he says.
Like so many, I have battled a taste for salt since long before I knew I was in a battle. I didn't realize that a big part of the reason I was so fond of things like dill pickles, canned and pickled artichokes, olives and yes -- cheese dip and tortilla chips -- was their salty taste.
According to the American Heart Association's website, most people consume about 3,400 milligrams of sodium a day, which is more than twice the 1,500 milligrams recommended by the association.
The reason eating high-sodium food causes tissues to swell is the body is going to try to keep a balance between its sodium content and the amount of fluid in the body, Jansen says. If you eat a lot of salt, you'll have temporary water retention -- swelling -- because of it. "The body's going to have to balance that salt intake with water intake, and so you're going to have temporary swelling."
This swelling usually shows up first in eyelid tissue, he says.
"The other thing ... water's always going to run downhill," and that's one of the reasons your face and your eyelids swell at night, particularly when you had a lot of sodium the evening before.
"Your face and your eyelids are going to swell just because you're lying in bed." (If such swelling is sudden, and if it persists over the next days or weeks, it could be an indicator of a more serious problem, Jansen warns. It would be wise to be checked by a doctor.)
But back to that sodium intake.
A GRAIN OF SALT
"Everybody knows that putting salt on something with a salt shaker" is adding sodium to food, Jansen says. What people don't realize is that the biggest sodium culprits aren't normally considered salty, such as bread and rolls. Other common sodium sources include processed meats such as hot dogs, Spam and cold cuts, which are prepared with the preservative sodium nitrite. Anything that's in a can or packaged in a box also could be loaded with sodium.
"If it's soup, if it's meat -- all of those products will have quite a bit of salt, [and] if it's in a can, you need to be thinking there's salt in it somewhere," Jansen says.
Cheese is high in sodium, as are many snacks. When you go to the Mexican restaurant and pile queso or salsa on tortilla chips -- or fix that beloved Velveeta-and-Ro-Tel cheese dip to eat with said chips -- "you're getting a sodium bomb, unfortunately," Jansen says.
Asian foods tend to contain monosodium glutamate, or MSG. Restaurant foods in general tend to be sodium-rich.
Even some diet drinks contain a fair amount of sodium. "You need to be a little bit of a label reader to see how much sodium is in your soft drink," he says.
Holly Dixon, a registered dietitian who works with Baptist Health, says the first piece of advice she usually gives to those with water retention is "keep your body hydrated."
The certified diabetes educator and consultant says that many times, the reason people retain water is they're failing to hydrate their bodies sufficiently, forcing them to work to conserve water. The best thing to do is drink six to eight glasses of water a day. Gradually, the body will start to release the excess fluid and then maintain a more comfortable balance.
"Our bodies are a lot smarter than we are," Dixon says.
EASY DOES IT
Dixon and Jansen give these tips for battling mild water retention:
• Avoid salty foods, particularly when it comes to the evening meal.
• People trying to eat a low-sodium food should look for about 140 milligrams of sodium per serving. "That's actually considered a low-sodium product," Dixon says. "And for a low-sodium diet, we look at 2,000 milligrams a day."
For a regular diet, 3,000 to 4,000 mg of sodium is considered normal. (In the past, the American Heart Association's sodium recommendations set the limit at no more than 2,300 mg per day for the general population and 1,500 mg for those with hypertension, blacks and adults in middle age or older. But the association changed its recommendations in 2010 in response to data from the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that nearly 70 percent of the U.S. population is made up of those who would benefit from being restricted to 1,500 mg a day.)
• Read labels to see how much sodium is in a given food.
• When you do indulge in salty food (only on occasion), follow it up with lots of water to balance it out, Dixon suggests. "Everything in moderation," she says.
If you enjoy sodium-rich food, you could manage it by backing off your sodium intake the rest of the day. "That helps with those numbers." So if you want to have a "salt day," plan for it, Dixon urges. Drink a bit more water before and after the sodium-rich food. You'll still have retention but "maybe, possibly, not as bad as ... if you went into the situation dehydrated," she says.
Jansen advises people attending special events to stand back and survey what's on the buffet table before blindly starting to serve themselves and ending up with way too much potentially salty food at the other end. "Plan your attack."
• Try propping your head up on a couple of pillows to keep facial swelling down. If you have puffy eyes and don't have an allergy or medical condition, try the pillows and in addition, use a cool compress on the eyes ... frozen green tea bags, for instance. The coolness will help reduce swelling.
• Over-the-counter water-retention medications that might help include Diurex, a bloating-relief medicine whose main active ingredient is caffeine. Common side effects of taking Diruex tend to be mild and include trouble sleeping, irritation of the stomach or intestines and feeling nervous. Infrequently, it causes heartburn or stomach cramps. "The amount of caffeine in the Diurex is the same as you would find in three cups of coffee," Jansen says. "So you could buy a pill or you could go and buy three cups of coffee." When they wake up in the morning, "most people are going to try to be finding a cup of coffee anyway."
Other common suggestions: exercise, which helps get rid of fluid through sweating, and for those cankles, elevating one's feet higher than one's heart.
PASSING WATER
As is suggested in the arena of child discipline, positive reinforcement should help. A number of foods can be included in the diet to help a person pass water, Dixon says. Again, there's water itself ... to which lemon can be added. Lemon has been considered a natural diuretic, as it increases urine output.
Other natural diuretics include asparagus and ginger root.
Most fruits and vegetables will help -- "some more than others," Dixon says. Especially helpful are the juicier fruits, such as watermelon and oranges. In addition, Dixon recommends nuts, seeds, Brussels sprouts, cucumbers and eggplant.
As for seasoning food, the best salt alternatives are herbs, such as basil, dill and ginger root, she continues.
Again, if you're a healthy person who decides to pig out on a holiday or special-occasion meal of ham with cream of mushroom soup, salted fried onion rings, cheesecake, pickles and deviled eggs ... no tragedy.
"We abuse our bodies on a pretty regular basis most of the time," Jansen says. "It can bail us out of a jam if we have problems -- but not always."
ActiveStyle on 03/16/2015