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In Celebration of Hydration

It ruffles my feathers when people say “I don’t like to drink water, it’s boring.” Water is not boring. Stop saying that and go drink some right now.

Your body is 60% water; not Coke, not sport drinks or lattes. Everything in the body revolves around water: it carries oxygen and carbon dioxide to keep the breathing thing going, it helps regulate electrolytes, it transports the hormones that make you happy, sad, mad, deal with stress, it dilutes toxins, it… you get it now, right?  Water is super important.  We’ll call it the OG of super nutrients.

If you were to stop eating, you could survive off your body’s stores of carbs, fat, and protein for about two to three months, depending on the conditions, before you died. However, if you stop drinking water, you will die in about three to four days. Yes, yes, technically you could drink coke all day every day and technically you wouldn’t die, but your blood would flow like maple syrup, you’ll have kidney stones, develop diabetes, and you’d slowly corrode from the inside out like an old battery.

You may get that water is important but still find it’s boringness too much to bare. To that I say, why does everything have to be a super pleasurable experience? I’m sure you’ve watched bad TV just because that bad TV show was better than no TV. Water is the same, it’s necessary and doesn’t need to be fancy, it just likes to be its plain ol’ self keeping you alive. If you must have a taste experience with everything, go ahead. Be fancy and add a fresh fruit, like sliced oranges or strawberries, or a fresh herb like mint to your water. Please, no Crystal-Lite packets or flavor drops, it’s like slapping that water in the face.

So, how much water should you drink for radiant skin, nails and organs? Take your body weight in pounds, divide by 2 and that is number of ounces to drink per day. Keep in mind that’s just your base water needs. If you exercise or are in a humid, hot, or dry climate you have to up the ante to make up for those extra losses of water. Your urine should be a nice pale yellow. We don’t want clear urine either. If you take certain vitamins (like multis), you may have neon-ish looking urine, so that should be a pale/light neon color, whereas, dark neon is dehydration.  

Jessica and I have become religious about our reusable water bottles. They are our favorites out of the collection of water bottles. Get one! It’s good for the environment and sturdy reminder to get all your ounces.

Cheers to hydration!