Too much potassium

[Myca]

Went into the breakroom at work with a bag of 4 or 5 bananas. Dayshift coworker wanted to know what I was going to do with "all those bananas". I told her I was going to eat them. She told me I was going to ruin my kidneys with all that potassium. I didn't know what to say so I didn't say much

[kevin1986]

I have heard too much potassium can be harmful for kidneys..

[journeyman]

I've gotten this a few times.

You're not going to get too much potassium from a whole food like bananas. SAD eaters come up with some strange things against non SAD diets.

[MysticTree]

Went into the breakroom at work with a bag of 4 or 5 bananas. Dayshift coworker wanted to know what I was going to do with "all those bananas". I told her I was going to eat them. She told me I was going to ruin my kidneys with all that potassium. I didn't know what to say so I didn't say much

I suppose she has a degree in nutrition and eats perfectly herself! 4 or 5 bananas is nothing to worry about. Eat what you want as long as it's raw you are doing the best you can :)

[The Sproutarian (Mr Raw)]

From what l can gather, having too much potassium in the diet from natural foods isn't a problem because the excess leaves the body. The main thing is to balance it out with a favourable ratio of sodium, phosphorous, sulphur, chlorine and vitamin B6.

[The Forager]

It's a problem if you're a kidney failure patient. My step-dad was doing dialysis for years and years for a failed kidney and his doc always complained his potassium was too high. He recently got a kidney transplant. Same thing. He has to watch his potassium.

[MysticTree]

It's a problem if you're a kidney failure patient. My step-dad was doing dialysis for years and years for a failed kidney and his doc always complained his potassium was too high. He recently got a kidney transplant. Same thing. He has to watch his potassium.

I don't think Myca is in renal failure though. She hasn't said as much in any case.

[The Forager]

Yeah I know. I guess the point of my post was that if you're otherwise healthy, it should be fine :P

sorry.

[MysticTree]

Yeah I know. I guess the point of my post was that if you're otherwise healthy, it should be fine :P

sorry.

hey, don't apologise :)
I don't eat many bananas really. Maybe 3 a week! It's not that I don't like them. I just don't fancy eating them much.

[Mikeoffoco]

I have been logging my food on a virual software program for only half of a day now, it it says I have 980% of the daily potassium dosage . So by the end of the day it will probably be twice as much! I havent even put logged in any bananas. Just stuff like kale, nuts, fruits, etc. It got me kind of worried.

[Norie]

I remember this same discussion from my first year at uni... I did a chemistry class and they talked about toxicity and potassium and stuff. You have to eat 500,000 bananas in one sitting to get the lethal dose of potassium. And by lethal I mean L50 which means only 50% of people would die after having that much potassium. The rest? Probably would die from eating 500,000 bananas!

Of course that doesn't mean that if you eat say, 100 bananas a week, that you won't necessarily have any health issues. You just won't die from potassium overload. But you'll probably get indigestion.

That being said, if you have renal failure, stay away from them!