La doctora me dijo que comiera más salmón y menos pavo durante unas semanas.

Because la doctora is the subject of the sentence: the doctor.

In Spanish, when you talk about a specific person and mention their profession as a normal noun, you usually use the article:

• La doctora me dijo... = The doctor told me...

You would more often drop the article after verbs like ser:

• Es doctora = She is a doctor

So here, la is completely natural.

Because the doctor is female. Spanish nouns for professions often change form depending on gender:

• el doctor = the male doctor
• la doctora = the female doctor

In modern Spanish, doctora is the normal feminine form.

Me means to me.

So:

• La doctora me dijo... = The doctor told me...

Spanish often uses an indirect object pronoun with verbs like decir:

• me dijo = told me
• te dijo = told you
• le dijo = told him/her

Even though English just says told me, Spanish needs that little pronoun.

Dijo is the pretérito form of decir for él/ella/usted.

So:

• decir = to say / to tell
• dijo = he/she told, you told (formal)

Here it matches la doctora, so:

• La doctora dijo = The doctor said / told

The sentence is talking about a completed past event, so the preterite is the natural tense.

This is one of the most important grammar points in the sentence.

After a past verb like me dijo, Spanish often uses:

• que + imperfect subjunctive

when reporting an instruction, suggestion, or recommendation.

So:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera...
• literally: The doctor told me that I should eat...

It is not a simple statement of fact. It is what the doctor wanted the speaker to do.

Compare:

• Me dijo que comía salmón = She told me that I was eating salmon.
  
  • This sounds like reported information.
• Me dijo que comiera salmón = She told me to eat salmon.
  
  • This is reported advice/instruction.

So comiera is used because the doctor was giving advice or instructions.

Yes. Comiera is the imperfect subjunctive of comer.

This structure is very common:

• present/past reporting verb + que + subjunctive

Especially after verbs like:

• decir when it means to tell someone to do something
• recomendar
• pedir
• aconsejar
• querer

Examples:

• Me pidió que fuera. = He asked me to go.
• La doctora recomendó que descansara. = The doctor recommended that I rest.
• Me dijo que comiera más salmón. = She told me to eat more salmon.

Yes. Comiera and comiese are both correct imperfect subjunctive forms.

So these are both grammatical:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera más salmón...
• La doctora me dijo que comiese más salmón...

In Spain, both forms are used. -ra forms like comiera are generally more common in everyday speech.

Because Spanish usually leaves out subject pronouns when they are not needed.

In English, you must say I ate, I should eat, etc.
In Spanish, the verb form often already tells you the subject.

Here, comiera can mean I ate / he ate / she ate in form, but in this sentence the meaning is clear from context:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera...
  = The doctor told me to eat...

So Spanish does not need yo here.

Because the sentence is talking about these foods in a general, uncounted way.

• más salmón = more salmon
• menos pavo = less turkey

Spanish often omits the article when talking about food or substances in a general quantity sense.

Compare:

• Quiero más pan. = I want more bread.
• Come menos azúcar. = Eat less sugar.
• Me dijo que comiera más salmón. = She told me to eat more salmon.

If you added articles, it could sound more specific or less natural in this context.

Yes. In this sentence, pavo means turkey, the meat/animal.

That is the normal meaning here because it appears with food words:

• más salmón y menos pavo

You may also hear pavo in Spain in other meanings, such as slang, but in this sentence there is no doubt: it means turkey.

They mean more and less.

So:

• más salmón = more salmon
• menos pavo = less turkey

They are being used to compare quantities of food the speaker should eat.

This is very common:

• más agua = more water
• menos azúcar = less sugar
• más verduras = more vegetables

In natural English, you would probably translate it as for a few weeks.

Literally:

• durante = during
• unas semanas = a few weeks / some weeks

So the phrase means that this eating advice should be followed over that period of time.

In many everyday contexts:

• durante unas semanas ≈ for a few weeks

It does not have to mean during in the narrow English sense of being inside a specific event. Spanish durante is often used for duration over a span of time.

Unas semanas means a few weeks or some weeks.

Here, unas is the feminine plural form of the indefinite article:

• un = a
• una = a
• unos / unas = some / a few

Because semanas is feminine plural, it becomes:

• unas semanas

So the idea is not one exact number, but an approximate short period.

Sometimes you may hear similar ideas with por, but durante unas semanas is very natural and clear here.

• durante unas semanas focuses on the span of time
• por unas semanas can sound more variable depending on context and region

For a learner, this sentence is a good model to remember:

• Haz esto durante unas semanas. = Do this for a few weeks.

So while other options may exist in some contexts, durante is a very solid choice here.

Not necessarily. It is more like reported speech.

Instead of repeating the doctor’s exact words, the speaker summarizes them:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera más salmón...

If you wanted direct speech, it might look like:

• La doctora me dijo: Come más salmón y menos pavo durante unas semanas.

So the actual sentence is an indirect way of reporting the doctor’s advice.

A likely direct version would be:

• La doctora me dijo: Come más salmón y menos pavo durante unas semanas.

or perhaps more formally:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera más salmón y menos pavo durante unas semanas.
  
  • indirect reported speech

In direct speech, the doctor might use the imperative:

• Come más salmón
• Come menos pavo

In indirect speech after a past verb like dijo, Spanish shifts to the imperfect subjunctive:

• que comiera

No. It depends on the meaning.

Use indicative if the speaker is reporting information as a fact:

• Me dijo que estaba cansada. = She told me she was tired.

Use subjunctive if the speaker is reporting an order, request, advice, or instruction:

• Me dijo que descansara. = She told me to rest.
• Me dijo que comiera más salmón. = She told me to eat more salmon.

So the key is not just the verb decir, but what kind of message is being reported.

Because the written accent shows where the stress falls:

• salmón

Without the accent, Spanish stress rules would suggest a different pronunciation.
The accent tells you the stress is on the last syllable: sal-MÓN.

This is just a spelling feature of the word itself; it is not caused by the sentence grammar.

The sentence uses a very normal Spanish word order:

• La doctora = subject
• me dijo = told me
• que comiera... = what she told me to do
• durante unas semanas = time expression

Spanish word order is somewhat flexible, but this version sounds natural and standard.

For example, you could move the time phrase:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera más salmón y menos pavo unas semanas.

But that sounds less natural than:

• La doctora me dijo que comiera más salmón y menos pavo durante unas semanas.

So the original is a good, idiomatic model.

The big ones are:

• Article with profession as subject: La doctora
• Indirect object pronoun: me
• Preterite of decir: dijo
• Reported advice/instruction: dijo que...
• Imperfect subjunctive after a past reporting verb: comiera
• Quantity words: más, menos
• General food nouns without articles: salmón, pavo
• Duration expression: durante unas semanas

So even though the sentence is not very long, it contains several very useful patterns for everyday Spanish.