You can live without food for a month or more, but only without water for a week. We, as humans, are mostly made up of the stuff, and it’s very important we drink plenty of it. That said, you may not enjoy water and find it a bit of a challenge to drink enough — a challenge you should overcome this weekend.
Photo by Gareth Haywood.
Know How Much You Need And What Type
First things first, you need to know how much water you need on a daily basis? Some say eight glasses, others say a little more and a little less. When we asked a doctor who took a closer look at necessary hydration, we found the numbers depended on sex. Men need about 3 litres (13 cups) and women need 2.2 (9 cups). If you exercise or spend a lot of time in the sun, you’ll need more. You don’t want to over-hydrate, as that can cause serious problems, but if you keep it around 13 or 9 (depending on your gender) you’ll be good to go. It helps to know the signs of dehydration, too, so you can listen to your body to know when you’ll need more.
As for the type of water, you may prefer the taste of filtered to tap but in most cases it doesn’t matter. Unless you have a specific health concern regarding the water in your corner of the world — in which case you probably shouldn’t bathe in it, either — you’ll be fine.
Make Sure You Get Enough
Drinking up to 13 glasses per day is easier said than done, of course. If you need some help, start tracking yourself! If you have a FitBit fitness tracker, you can use the built-in app to log your intake of H20. If you just want an app, you can get Waterlogged for iOS and Water Your Body for Android. Alternatively, the Trackthisforme webapp will track anything, so you can use that.
Some people use other methods to drink enough water because a reminder just doesn’t do the trick. It helps to make it a habit, so figure out where you can include water consumption throughout your day. Some people use it as a procrastination timer. Others use it as a way to get up and walk around during the day if they’d otherwise sit down too much. Pick a method that works and integrate it into your lifestyle so you never go thirsty.
Improve The Taste
Personally, I love the taste of water. Many people seem to hate it. Citrus fruits like lemons and limes, or herbs and spices such as ginger can all add a nice flavour without adding calories. If you experiment with additives, you can learn to love the taste of water and start drinking it regularly.
Have a a great, hydrated weekend!
Comments
8 responses to “Start Drinking More Water This Weekend”
Is… water the lifehacker version of the old weekly alcohol thing on Gizmodo?
This is at least 2 weekends now, guys!
Why are you guys flogging this old horse again…?
There is no evidence to suggest not drinking gallons of water is bad for you. I drink bugger all and have done so for many a year. You get most of the fluid you need from what you consume, and if your thirsty then drink…! Look it up fcs…
While we do get a lot of moister from the food we eat, supposedly drinking plenty of water helps to flush out toxins and whatnot from the body (or so I’ve been told). Though personally I think it all comes down to the individual and what’s best for them. Each to their own and all that.
Yeah, I think “sirsurfer” below, sums it up well enough. Basically, if your thirsty then drink, if not then don’t worry about it. For me personally, on a hot day, if I feel my lips getting a bit dry, I drink a glass of water and the problems solved. Twelve years in the Army, doing an awful lot of bush work as an Engineer, I never drank more than two or three flasks on the hottest and hardest working days. Others guzzled it like it was the last water on earth…. 🙂
As is often requested on Wikipedia: “[CITATION NEEDED]”. NOT ONCE SINGLE CONTROLLED STUDY IN THE SCIENTIFIC LITERATURE TO BACK YOUR CLAIMS IN THIS ARTICLE. STOP SPREADING NONSENSE. And BTW, “asking a doctor” does not substitute for good science. In fact, the majority of medical doctors do not have great training in scientific method and generally are not particularly good scientists.
As a matter of fact, there is even some evidence to suggest that drinking more water than necessary can actually be harmful — every liter of water that you drink has to be filtered by your kidneys, and all the minerals that have to be extracted from too much water can actually damage your kidneys unnecessarily. Drink when you are thirsty. This rubbish about “8 glasses a day”, or as you say here ‘9-13 cups’ — has no foundation in science that I can find.
http://ajpregu.physiology.org/content/283/5/R993
So go ahead–find some evidence:
http://scholar.google.com.au/
Citation needed
I think water is one of the best things in life that one can consume. The billion-dollar vitamin industry is largely useless and benefits rely mostly on the placebo effect, save for the small amount of people who actually have a deficiency and require them. Everyone else would benefit just from having more water and better food intake. I live in a fat town and everyone here mainly eats food products rather than actual food and drink sugary drinks and wonder why they’re fat. Water is basically free in this great county, turn the tap and take advantage of it.
No, no, and no.
We do not need to drink anywhere near that much water in an average day. While the human body does need around 2-3 litres per day, we can get a lot of that through food and other drinks. As someone else said, drink when thirsty. If I were to give a mostly uneducated estimate of how much water and other water based fluids you should drink to keep your body in the best condition it can be, I would say aim for 1 litre as a very rough baseline.