If a eat a high sodium meal in the evening, is it then best to drink water afterwards in other to prevent water retention, or avoid drinking water after to prevent water retention?

Because - I know that you must drink water in order to prevent water retention and that the water flush out sodium. However, when it is in the evening, I guess it is limimited how much you can flush out, and won't the water you drink then be retained and you will wake up all puffy?

As I see it, if you eat a high-sodium meal in the morning, then you have plenty of time to flush it out during the day, but isn't it different when it is in the evening?

I try not to drink past thirst in the evening, I don't want to spend too much time peeing during the night.

Water retention--in one episode of The Biggest Loser, Jillian Michaels had a contestant do a water retention hack that bodybuilders do sometimes. Basically, salt loading, a number of days of high salt, followed by salt restriction. The salt loading upregulates pathways that waste sodium, it takes a while to adjust to the lower salt intake that follows, so there's an overshoot with a temporary loss

So there's a catch-22 to avoiding salt to avoid bloating, as a low habitual salt intake can set a person up to be sensitive to salt the odd time that they do increase salt intake.

I think salt gets unfairly blamed for a lot of water retention that is really due to other food additives, carbs, allergens & inflammation. I only eat real, unprocessed foods and need to make sure I get enough salt. Then drink water according to thirst. I worry about fat weight, not water weight.

Ever wonder why animals love to lick your skin? Your sweat contains salt.
Get a hot bath to sweat it out or eat tomato.

Probably you'll need to experiment to see how your body behaves. Everyone is different but for me and many others, low carb has a pretty good diuretic effect so retaining water isn't a real problem. It's why you can lose a few pounds immediately and why a cheat can put a few pounds back on you so quickly. That's just water.

When I get past the first few days of low carbing I know the water is reduced because I just feel a lot less swollen. Like when I lock my fingers they fit together a lot better, my face looks slimmer by a bit, that sort of thing. Doesn't matter how much salt I take in, that doesn't change unless I eat carbs. It's almost like a gauge for ketosis for me, if I swell up I know I blew it and have to be strict for a couple of days.

Heck, I'd been on salt supplements for a couple of weeks because I thought my electrolytes might have been out of whack but I never saw water retention from it.