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Drinking water is associated with all sorts ofhealth benefits: more energy, fewer headaches, better sleep and improved athletic performance and brain function.Not getting enough H2O,on the other hand, can have the opposite effect—making you feel tired, mentally foggy, headachy and moody. And there’s evidence that being dehydrated may cause your workouts to feel harder than usual, as well as tank your performance.
Why Drink Water? How Water and Health Are Connected
I like water, but I can definitely be lazy about it. I’ll generally keep a mug (my preferred drinking vessel for most beverages) of water at my desk and sip it while I work. And I always bring a water bottle with me to workout classes. Before starting this “experiment” I never really tracked my water intake, but like a lot of people, I knew that I probably wasn’t getting as much as I should every day.
For the record, theInstitute of Medicinerecommends that women sip around 91 ounces (about 11 cups) of water a day, and men aim for 125 ounces (about 16 cups) daily. If you’re super physically active or live somewhere hot, you will need to up your water intake even higher. That’s more than the recommendation I’ve heard all my life about drinking 8 cups of water per day, because you actually get a lot of the fluids you need from the foods you eat—about 20% to 30% of your total water intake (who knew?). So, to keep things simple, my goal was to drink at least 8 cups of water a day for a week and see if it made a difference in the way I felt.
5 Beliefs About Hydration—Fact or Fiction?
Here’s What Happened When I Drank 8 Glasses of Water Each Day
I Peed a Lot
This came as no surprise. I was drinking more water, so of course I went to the bathroom more often. Interestingly enough, the number of trips to the loo I had to make during the first two days wasn’t as high as I expected, which I took to mean that perhaps I was a bit dehydrated at the start of the week. Since I work from home, my frequent bathroom breaks weren’t a big deal. I only had to walk a short distance from my desk to the bathroom, and I didn’t feel self conscious about the number of trips I was taking (like I might have if I had co-workers other than my dog). If anything, it made my day a little bit more active and gave me small pauses from staring at my computer.
The weekend was a different story. On Saturday, I started my day with a large iced latte and was out and about. The combination of caffeine and drinking a lot of liquid at once had me constantly looking for a bathroom. At one point, my husband and I met some friends for brunch and I had to pee before we sat down and twice during the meal. Not fun.
I Drank Less Coffee and Alcohol
How Much Water Should You Drink, By the Numbers
Here’s WhatDidn’tHappen
I Didn’t Always Hit My Goal Each Day
On Saturday, after I had my coffee and then a glass of rosé later, I felt like I was peeing almost nonstop. It was the one day of the week that I didn’t drink 8 cups of water, though I suppose if you counted the coffee and wine I would have met my goal. It was easier to keep track of my water intake and hit my goal of 8 cups a day during the week when I was at my desk and always had water next to me. On the weekends, having a less structured day and being out of the house (and anxious about where the closest bathroom would be) meant that I drank less water. To try to meet my water goal, I’d drink at least 2 to 3 cups before heading out, kept a water bottle with me at all times, and made an effort to catch up once I got home. This sometimes involved drinking my last 2 cups close to bedtime.
I Didn’t Lose Any Weight
You may have heard that drinking more water could help you drop extra pounds. I had, too, so I was curious to see what might happen. Because I don’t own a scale, I went to my local Publix (which has one right at the exit) on day one and day seven. I weighed myself first thing in the morning, before eating, and was the exact same weight at the beginning and end of the week.While drinking water can sometimes be a helpful weight-loss strategy, including minimizing mindless snacking—say, when you aren’t actually hungry but are just bored or are mistaking thirst for hunger—a 2019 study published in the journalPhysiology Behaviorfound that increasing your water intake doesn’t significantly decrease the amount you eat.
It Didn’t Change My Life
Drinking 8 glasses of water a day is supposed to come with all kinds of health benefits, but for me a week may not have been long enough to notice bigger changes. And that’s OK. Living a healthy lifestyle, which includes drinking plenty of water, consuming a nutrient-dense diet, exercising and decreasing stress, doesn’t happen overnight—or even in a week. That said, sipping those 8 cups of water a day was easier than I thought it’d be, and is something I’ll continue to aim for.
The Bottom Line
There are many benefits of drinking water, from keeping your brain healthy to keeping you cool when you exercise. And if you don’t drink enough water, you may experience low energy levels, moodiness and headaches. Drinking the recommended 8 cups of water per day for a week didn’t do much more than make me go to the bathroom more, but that won’t keep me from chugging down water as much as I can.
Hitting the recommended amount of water per day was easier than I thought, and having water at my desk serves as a helpful reminder and motivation. Throughout the week I refilled my 16-ounce Bkr water bottle, which I only had to refill three times to hit my goal. My husband, who also took part in the challenge, drank from a 32-ounce Nalgene water bottle, which he only had to refill once a day. If you’re looking to increase your water intake, drinking from a larger water bottle can make it easier to keep track of your water consumption. Making this small change and seeing how simple it was encouraged me to try other small changes to help improve my overall health and mental well-being, like meditating every day or decreasing the number of sweets I eat.
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