What you should know about the benefits of staying hydrated
There are a number of different things that you should know about the benefits of staying hydrated and why it's so fundamentally important to drink the amount of water that your body truly needs-which is a whole lot of water.
Some specialists in nutrition and diet have said that 80% of Americans are chronically dehydrated. That's a whole lot of people without the water that they need to function in a healthy manner. The problem is that as a country, we don't drink enough water as it is. On top of not drinking enough water, we also drink far too many drinks-such as coffee, tea, and carbonated drinks-that contain caffeine. Caffeine is a diuretic, which means that it actually causes your body to lose the little water that it actually has. And your body needs a lot of water: almost 2/3rds of the human body consists of water weight. Here's a breakdown of how much water is part of different systems within our bodies:
83% of blood is made up of water
75% of muscles are made up of water
74% of the brain is made up of water
22% of bone is made up of water
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See why staying hydrated is so important? Staying hydrated is absolutely central to the proper functioning of every different part of your body. Here are some of the important bodily functions that water is central in ensuring happen correctly and regularly.
Water is absolutely necessary for your body to be able to first digest and then absorb the vitamins and nutrients that are central to proper physical and mental functioning. In addition, the liver and the kidneys need a lot of water in order to be able to detoxify the body and remove waste from the body. Also, while you might make sure that your body has tons and tons of fiber, without water, no amount of fiber will be able to ensure that you will be able to digest the food that you eat. Without water, too much fiber will lead to constipation, rather than a healthy and functioning digestive system.
In addition, drinking the right amount of water will ensure that your blood can circulate more easily. Because having little water decreases the ease of circulation of the blood, the brain becomes less active. You become more sluggish, it becomes difficult to think and to concentrate on the tasks at hand, and you grow in fatigue and exhaustion.
In addition to being central to your body's ability to function correctly, staying hydrated and ensuring that you have enough water per day can also help your appearance. Water is central to having glowing, fresh, and pure skin. Also, drinking a proper amount of water can help you lose weight. You can cut down on your headaches by staying hydrated and drinking the right amount of water.
Water is good for your heart. In 2002, the American Journal of Epidemiology published the results of a study that lasted over six years and studied over 20,000 healthy men and women from the ages of 38-100. The results of the study showed that women who drank over five glasses of water each day had a 41% better chance of not dying from a heart attack than those women who only drank 2 glasses of water per day. And the numbers are even better for men. So drink your water for the sake of your heart.
Also, water naturally suppresses your appetite. If you drink water often and regularly, you can help control your cravings and thus control your weight. Also, many doctors say that when you think that you are hungry, you are really just thirsty. The thirst mechanism is so weak that it is easy to mistake it for hunger, so we end up eating a candy bar rather than drinking a couple glasses of water, which is what our body really wants.
