What is the health benefit
of water?
All my life, I heard that "your body is
about 70% water" - but that didn't mean a dang thing to
me. I thought, "Well, isn't that special!" I had no clue
about any health benefit of water or that drinking water
to improve and maintain my health was something I should
even do!
Why should you be drinking water for your
health? Well, water is the second most important
thing that our bodies need to survive, oxygen being the
first. The body could survive for some time without
food, but deprive it of water and it would only last a few
days. Virtually every job that the body performs
requires water. It would seem then, pretty logical
that a health benefit of water would be to drink it!
Here are only a few of the health
benefits of water:
- Water is required for digestion and
absorption of food
- Water is needed to regulate body temperature
and blood circulation
- Water in the bloodstream carries nutrients
and oxygen to cells
- Water is necessary for the kidneys
to remove toxins and other wastes
The
health benefit of water is very powerful, but for a long
time has been undervalued. Unfortunately, we generally haven't
been very well educated about it. The main point
of this article is to offer a basic understanding of why
it's vital to be drinking water for your health.
I will point you to more information about the health benefit
of water at the end of this article.
What is dehydration?
The body uses about 10 - 12 cups
of water a day, through such things as breathing,
digestion, elimination and perspiration. So we need to replenish
it daily or our bodies will become dehydrated.
"Dehydrate" means "to lose water,
become dry."
I always thought I was dehydrated only
when my lips started cracking and my mouth got super dry.
Wrong answer! Those are signs that your body is extremely
dehydrated. It only takes a small deficiency of water to
throw the body into "dehydration mode."
"Dehydration mode" makes it necessary
for the body to ration an insufficient amount of water to
run properly. The body must economize on its use of water
to prevent it from being lost. Dehydration can definitely
aggravate many health conditions.
Improve many conditions by drinking water
for health
A health benefit of water would be the
improvement of many conditions by drinking water for your
health, such as:
- Exhaustion
- Constipation
- Asthma
- Headaches
- Diabetes - blood sugar level management
- Heartburn
- Angina (chest pain)
- Hypertension (high blood pressure)
- Joint and muscle pain
- Immune diseases
- Depression can be helped by ensuring
that you drink enough water for your health.
I've had (or have) several of the health
conditions listed above and from my personal experience
and observation, all of them have been improved or alleviated
when I drink enough water. When I found out that angina
(chest pain) is at least partially caused by dehydration,
I drank some water the next time I experienced mild angina.
I was very pleased that the chest pain subsided and eventually
vanished rather quickly!
Drugs and drinking water for health
If you take prescription and/or over-the-counter
drugs, it's even more essential to drink enough water for
your health. Not only are many drugs dehydrating (they need
to suck up some water to work don't they?) but all drugs,
no matter how well they appear to work, are toxic to the
body. Your kidneys need plenty of water to help them flush
out toxins, especially when it's getting overloaded with
them.
The secret to fat metabolism
Another health benefit of water is its
role in fat metabolism. The secret to fat metabolism
is to drink adequate amounts of water! Why? The
kidneys need water to filter out waste and toxins from our
bodies. If we don't give our bodies the water it needs,
the kidneys "dump" some of their workload on the liver.
One of the liver's jobs is to assist in
fat metabolism. If the kidneys can't do their job due to
insufficient water (dehydration), some of their work is
given to the liver. You may know what it's like if you have
to do someone else's work. You can't do all of your own!
When the liver is doing some of the kidney's
job, the liver can't do its own job of metabolizing fat
very well.
So one specific health benefit
of water is that you will have more energy from fat being
metabolized or "burned" - and a lot of people would
like some spare fat metabolized!
Increasing your water intake gradually
If you gradually increase the amount of
water you drink every day, it's a lot more realistic than
trying to "shoot for the moon" and go from a little bit
of daily water consumption to at least 64 ounces (in other
words, 2 quarts or half a gallon or about 2 liters). That's
the minimum amount we're advised to drink per day. If you
are overweight, your body needs more than that in order
to "burn fat" and flush out the additional toxins from fat
metabolism.
The actual amount of water each person
needs does vary and there is some dispute about it. Well,
here's a simple check. If your urine is very light or clear,
that's a good sign that you are drinking sufficient water.
It takes a little bit of determination
to increase your water intake if you're not used to it.
However, discovering the health benefits of water is totally
worth it! I speak from personal experience.
We all have reasons why we don't drink
enough water - a lack of education about the health benefit
of water is probably one of the main reasons.
Things that stop us from drinking water
for health
It helps if you can take a look at what
ideas you have that might be getting in your way of drinking
plenty of water. For example, one of my friends said that
she "hated water." That would get in your way!
Actually, when you are dehydrated,
you lose your natural sense of thirst. As you get
your body more and more hydrated, your "natural thirst"
will return. I have definitely experienced that! And not
all water is the same.
Tap water from the faucet contains all
kinds of stuff that makes it not quite enjoyable to drink.
(I've had some very enjoyable water actually!) Tap water
can also defeat the purpose of drinking water for your health
due to chemical additives and other toxins.
Try different types of water and find
one that makes you happy! This includes water that you filter
at home of course.
Water retention and bathroom attacks
Another one of my friends said that she
couldn't be running off to the bathroom every 10 minutes
- that problem was keeping her from the many health benefits
of water. She had also been losing some weight but was on
a plateau.
She solved the bathroom problem by deciding
to drink a small amount, just 1 cup, at the beginning of
each hour. That helped her a lot! The addition of sufficient
water to her weight loss plan got her going in the right
direction again.
The body will "let go" of the
water it's been retaining during dehydration when it starts
getting what it needs - so going to the bathroom frequently
is only temporary until the body adjusts to being
hydrated.
Yes, water retention, contrary to what
I thought for years, isn't from too much water. It's from
not having enough, causing the body to "hang on" to the
little water it has. When you drink enough water, the body
can let go of what it has been retaining.
Substitutes for water?
A myth about drinking water for
your health is that coffee and sodas "count" as drinking
water. Sorry Charlie! Any drink that isn't
just pure water has a different chemical structure than
water and thus reacts differently in the body.
But some great news is that that the
water in fresh vegetables and fruits does indeed contribute
towards hydrating the body. Hmmm... maybe that
celery is healthier than just being "low calorie!"
I used to be a diet soda junkie
until I found out that artificial sweeteners are toxic,
and discovered that I needed to drink water for good health.
I have a Brita® water filter pitcher and I get a 16
- 24 ounce bottle and fill it up with filtered water 3 or
4 times a day. I've replaced diet sodas with water now,
and it was not difficult because I did it little by little
and just kept at it.
I also found that it's easy to drink the
amount that my body needs when I keep the water bottle at
my desk and just take a swig every once in a while. And
I am definitely experiencing that I really want water now,
my natural thirst has returned.
Don't take my word for it, test
this information for yourself! If you drink less than 8
cups per day, find out for yourself if increasing your water
intake improves your health and energy levels.
Make drinking enough water fun...
Have
some fun with this aspect of improving your health and energy.
Make it a game for yourself to drink enough water,
maybe get your friends or co-workers together and create
a water drinking club, find a water drinking buddy... heh
heh heh, you get the idea!
This article is by no means a complete
look into every health benefit of water. My goal is to provide
enough information to demonstrate that water is absolutely
vital to good health.
For more information,
have a look at "The
Healing Power of Water" - an eye opening
and enlightening interview with Dr. Batmanghelidj M.D about
the health benefit of water and why we don't really get
this information from conventional doctors.
The late Dr. Batmanghelidj was a pioneer
in researching and clinically testing the health benefits
of water and is the author of "Your Body's Many
Cries for Water" and "Water for Health,
For Healing, For Life."
To our health! *clink*
Return
to Food, Nutrition and Health from The Health
Benefit of Water
[Return
to the top of the page]
