7 Ways To Drink More Water
We all know that water is important. We literally cannot live without it. The human body can go weeks without food, but cannot survive more than three to five days without water.
Making up nearly 60% of our body, water plays many roles. It aids in:
Regulating body temperature
Lubricating our joints
Flushing out waste products
Carrying nutrients and oxygen to our cells
Dissolving minerals and nutrients to make them available to our body
Cushioning our organs and tissues
Maintaining electrolyte balance
Even a slight deficit in normal body water (as little as 1%) can cause fatigue, mild headaches, and negatively affect your mood, attention, and the brain’s ability to function. We constantly lose water through our breath, urine, feces, and sweat. Most healthy people regulate their body water just fine by drinking and eating when their body tells them to. But it’s exceptionally important to be aware of how much water your body is losing during exercise (especially in extreme heat) and when you’re sick.
How much water you should drink varies greatly from person to person and you should monitor your body to make sure you’re staying hydrated. The easiest way to do this is by looking at the color of your urine. Your urine should be clear or pale yellow. A darker yellow means you aren’t drinking enough water. Again, there’s no way to know exactly how much water YOUR body needs, but shooting for a half an ounce to an ounce per pound of bodyweight is a good starting point.
All beverages and food contain water. Drinking water, fruit juice, coffee, iced tea, sparkling water, etc. all contribute to your daily water consumption. Water is also great for regulating hunger. Unless you’re trying to gain weight, I would recommend sticking to liquids that are less calorically dense such as plain water, unsweetened iced tea, and sparkling water. Liquid calories aren’t as filling, so again, unless you’re trying to gain weight, stick to plain water whenever possible (replacing things like juice, coffee drinks, soda, shakes, etc.) and save your calories for food.
So what do you do if you don’t really like plain water or you just forget to drink it throughout the day? Try some of these tips to increase your daily water consumption.