Can I count soup as fluid intake?

The following is designed to entertain and inform, not provide medical advice. Always consult your doctor before starting any treatment.

Welcome back to the Kidney Stone Diet podcast, the show about reducing your kidney stone risk and living your best life. I'm your host and fellow student, Jeff Sarris.

And I'm Jill Harris, your kidney stone prevention nurse. You know what I was thinking?

What's that?

So, the last episode, the caller also asked about poppy seeds and calcium and oxalate, and I didn't- so I didn't reply to her. Hopefully, she watches all the podcasts, or, you know what, the next one, we can just do poppy seed and

Okay..

Calcium. We could, why not? Go ahead.

All right, so let's go with whatever-

Yeah, and I feel like it ties in, too, because you did talk about, it was sort of if I'm having this and distributing my calcium throughout the day or all at once. So, yeah, it all sort of fits together. But, yeah, we could definitely do, exactly, like, directly a poppy seed one next.

So, yeah, stay tuned next week, but today we have a listener question, once again, who just so happens to also be named Joyce.

Okay. Joyce from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. "I'd like to know if I can count my cream of broccoli soup as a liquid cause I use chicken broth, and it would be helpful, cause over the winter, I eat probably more soup than usual.

Thank you." Good question.

Yeah.

It's a good question. So, Joyce from Pennsylvania wants to know, "Listen, I'm eating some cream of broccoli soup, and I like soup in general, and I'm using chicken broth for that. So, can I count that as a liquid?" Absolutely, you can.

Absolutely, you can. Absolutely. How much, precisely?

Well, you'd have to weigh out the liquid as opposed to what else is in that, right? So, you know, I don't know precisely how much, but there's a couple things I would- so, fruits, vegetables, that's going to increase- my vegetarians tend to have a little bit more fluid than my non-vegetarians cause they're eating a lot of fruits and vegetables.

So, that has a higher fluid content in those foods, so you will pee more. Absolutely. Now, now, and a lot of people are like, "Jill, I'd rather suck down some fruit and vegetables than drink water.

I hate it so much. It's gross." People hate water cause there's no flavor to it. People learn to love it because they also hate stents, but it can be very difficult for some people to, drink a lot of water.

So, yes, food can be hydrating depending on the food you're picking. Now, Joyce said, "cream of broccoli soup." I think, I think Joyce is making her own, but I'm not sure. The reason I think that is because she said, you know, she's using chicken broth.

So, I don't know if she's making it her own. So, but for people who have more soup in the winter, a lot of people do, is it a low-salt soup? Because soups tend to be very high in sodium, and that's going to make you not pee as much.

So, one of the best things about lowering your sodium is you are going to urinate more just because your body's not holding on to all that fluid. Sodium will make you retain fluids. That's why people who eat high sodium diets are also on blood pressure medications.

Okay, your body's retaining that fluid. It's harder for your kidneys to filter all that, harder for your heart to pump all that, and so lowering sodium is going to help. So, if you're having a lot of soups, I think that's awesome.

Who doesn't love soup? It's comforting. It's filling.

Please make- watch the sodium in those soups. It's very, very important. But overall, it should, as long as they're low sodium, increase your urine output, and you can certainly count them as fluids.

You would have to see, okay, this much of my bowl is fluid as opposed to chicken and rice in there, right? So, you're going to have to figure that out on your own, obviously. But, yes, it would help hydrate you as long as it's lower in sugar and salt.

Plain and simple. Fruits and vegetables are going to increase fluids, urine, most likely. Now, I also have a lot of vegetarian vegans that are eating high-sodium products.

So, just because you're a vegan doesn't mean you're on a healthy diet. A lot of my vegans came to me overweight, very high sodium, high blood pressure, a lot of things. Just because you're not eating meat or dairy doesn't mean you're eating a healthy diet, so I just want to put that out there, too.

But, otherwise, in general, soups are going to increase daily urine output as long as they're low sodium. What else, Jeff? I mean, fruits and vegetables, of course, you know, that's going to increase, fluids, and that's about it.

So, yes, you can chew and eat your water. Yes, you can. You can.

I like that. But, yeah, I mean, it goes along the lines with all fluids count. Water's best, but all fluids count.

So, even when the fluids come from our foods. And how much fluid do we need a day? One- just one more time for everyone.

We need to urinate 2.5 to 3 L a day. How you get there may be different than how I get there. I eat a very low sodium diet, so if it- just say somebody my size, everything else, we're eating- differ- we're we're drinking the same amount of fluids, but I eat a very low salt diet and they do not, I'm going to pee more than them.

If I exercise more than my partner, I may pee less cause I sweat more. Maybe I'm going through menopause, I'm drinking the same amount as somebody else, but I'm having tons and night sweats, I'm going to pee less. I may have to drink more.

So, people will say, "Well, Jill, how much should I drink in order to get 2.5 L out?" Everybody's different. Are you on a low-sugar, low-salt diet? Great.

You know, you may drink a little bit less than the average person that isn't. But I always tell people to measure your urine. Take a day and measure your urine.

If you've done a 24-hour urine collection, which is- if you are listening to me, I hope to God you have done a 24-hour urine collection. And I say that because that's the only way you're going to know what's causing your kidney stones. There's many things that you don't know that are only going to show up on a 24-hour urine collection that could be increasing your stone risk.

Get it done. If your doctor what- doesn't want to do one, find a doctor that will order. Your OBGYN can, your PCP can, your endocrinologist can.

Doesn't have to be your urologist or nephrologist. Get a doctor to order it for you and find out why you're making them. But if you have done a 24-hour urine collection, save that brown jug and once in a while, just to make sure you're on point, collect your urine for the day.

See where you fall. You'll be surprised. A lot of people are like, "I collected my urine the other day, Jill.

Wow, I thought I was still drinking enough fluids, but I came out really short. Freaked me out. I'm back on it," you know?

Cause the fluids are hard. Fluids are hard. I always have a cup next to me.

I'm pretty good at drinking cause I'm talking about it all day long, so that's my reminder. But it's real easy to do when you're not busy or you're at home, but once we're out and it's holiday season as we record, people are to and fro, traveling. They're not drinking as they normally do, so it can be very difficult for people to get enough fluids.

And that's why Joyce is saying, "I hope soup counts!" Because, and also if it's when it gets colder, people drink less. Okay? Lots of times in the winter, I will heat my water up.

I'll keep it warm, and, you know, I just drink it plain, sometimes put a little lemon in there or lime or whatever, gin, whatever gets me through the day. Kidding! But I'll warm it up because it's easier for me to get down cause it's cold here in Chicago, so there's different ways to do it.

There's all kinds of information on this podcast, also at kidneystonediet.com. But it's a great question, Joyce, I loved it.

Yeah, that is a great question. I like thinking about it that way, too, especially when it's more of a cream soup and just you might not think about it, innately. So, we really appreciate you, sending in that question.

And for anyone else out there with a question, the number again is 773-789-8763 or you can send a voice memo to [email protected]. So, thank you, everyone, once again for tuning in, sharing a little bit of your week with us. If you got value out of this episode, leave a comment down below, just sort of tell us what you found most interesting or if you have any other questions related to the topic of fluids and whatnot.

And if you want to dive deeper, go to kidneystonediet.com where you can get the weekly email newsletter, you can sign up for the- join the prevention- sign up for the Prevention Course, join the Prevention Group on Facebook. We have all these resources all over the place. You can find everything at kidneystonediet.com.

So, with that, we'll wrap. Thanks again, everyone, and we'll see you next week.

Thank you, Joyce, from Pennsylvania. Have a great day, everybody.