No, I have not had my sodium deficiency formally diagnosed, but I have taken
a six-hour glucose tolerance test which definitely indicated hypoglycemia.
Many hypoglycemics have weakened adrenals (partly due to the stress of
regulating blood sugar level, especially in carb-intolerant individuals).
Another hypoglycemic found the extra salt to be helpful and recommended the
technique.  He believes that he needs the extra salt because his
hunter-gatherer ancestors used a lot of salt to preserve their meat; I'm
inclined to disagree, and think that the need for a huge amount of salt is
pathological.  My glucose tolerance curve was chronically low (though it
still had the classic shape); i.e., there wasn't an enormous rise in blood
sugar followed by a dramatic crash.  I think that chronic low blood sugar is
an indication of weak adrenals; in extreme cases, the curve is a flat-line.
Incidentally, I tried a bizarre cleansing diet last summer which involved
drinking a quart of salt water every morning.  The salt water was supposed
to go right through me, providing a kind of "internal enema" (I hope that I
haven't disgusted anyone), which it more or less did the first couple of
days.  Later in the programme, however, my body seemed to absorb much of the
water; now, I understand why.

Cheers,

-- Aaron Wieland

-----Original Message-----
From: Mahesh Shah <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Date: Monday, March 16, 1998 2:11 PM
Subject: Re: [P-F] salt


Hello Aaron!

have you been diagnosed for this? Is there a medical term for this
condition?