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Get Healthy De Soto

…having a long-lasting positive impact on the health and safety of the De Soto community by encouraging healthy lifestyle choices, through programs promoting physical activity, healthy nutrition, community involvement, and disease and injury prevention.

Homeostasis equals balance

In our quest for improved physical wellness, hydration needs to be part of the conversation.

How much water do you consume in a day? Do you think it is too little or too much? Staying hydrated is important for your body because it allows your kidneys to more easily perform their function of keeping a balance of water and nutrients in your blood. That’s what kidneys do, but a proper intake of water makes it easier.

So…what’s a proper amount of water to drink each day? That depends. It depends on your level of physical activity, weight, and food intake. It also depends on things you can’t control; like humidity. Your kidneys perform this other cool function too. They let the brain know when there are slight decreases in the amount of water in the blood (or increases in sodium in the blood), and the brain makes you realize that you’re thirsty. You drink water, the water level in your blood returns to normal, and you’re no longer thirsty! It’s pretty amazing how our organs work to regulate our bodies.

About that 8 cup recommendation

The idea that you need 8 glasses of water a day is just a rough guide. You might need more on some days and less on others. It really depends. Age is a factor too, and as we age, our kidney’s ability to signal our brain to signal our thirst can be degraded. This makes it easier for the elderly to become dehydrated.

It doesn’t just apply to the elderly though. I had a friend in college who had kidney stones because she was constantly dehydrated. Those little signals from her kidneys to her brain didn’t function properly, so she never felt thirsty. It was a real problem while going through PT in the Army in the south during the summer!

Since there isn’t a magic amount of water to drink, what should you do?

The best thing to do is pay attention to when you’re thirsty. And if your environment, diet, or lifestyle changes, pay attention to your pee. It is easy to become dehydrated when traveling or getting out of your normal routine. Add a glass of water or cup of tea if your urine becomes darker than a Budweiser, and talk to your doctor if it doesn’t improve. (No, don’t get confused and drink the beer in an effort to rehydrate, although serious dehydration can cause confusion.) You should also limit your intake of caffeine, which can act as a diuretic and make you lose fluids at a faster rate.

Water makes up a good portion of your body, and being properly hydrated makes everything function at optimal levels. Your brain works better. Your kidneys work better. Everything works better. It is because cells with the right amount of fluid create pressure in the cell. This makes the cell membrane (outside of the cell), which is selectively porous, stretch out to just the right thickness to work properly. If the cell lacks sufficient water, it becomes a bit like the jacket on an old potato. It is wrinkled and slightly folded upon itself. That makes things passing through the membrane unable to do so. And overhydration of a cell isn’t good either. Then, the membrane gets stretched too much, and it can’t hold onto the items that it needs within the cell to function properly. They just leach out.

It is all about balance. Proper hydration depends on you listening to your body’s cues and knowing where to stash your Nalgene bottle to rehydrate. With some exceptions (breastfeeding mothers and the elderly, for example), you probably don’t need to monitor your fluid intake. If you’ve been doing fine for 30 years, increasing your water intake might make your skin more supple…or it might just make you have to pee more!

Check out the Ted Talk video below about hydration.

Small Steps

Can a water bottle change your life?

Yesterday, something unforeseeable and awful happened. I was gathering up items to carry to another room, and I dropped my Nalgene® bottle. It was early in the day, so it was still fairly full. I knew in the moment it hit the floor that something wasn’t right because about three drops of water hit me as I was reaching to scoop it up.

My first reaction was to check the lid; perhaps it had loosened in transit to the floor and leaked a bit. Nope! It was still tight. Next, I checked around the bottle for any water. That’s when I found the crap. It ran from the middle of the bottom, a couple inches up the side, and across like an odd crescent. I paused…and looked again.

The damage was fatal.

Now, for mere water bottles that you keep for a while and discard or recycle, this might not be such an uncommon occurrence. But for my Nalgene® bottle! I’ve had this glow green, 32 ounce, wide-mouth bottle for longer than I’ve had my husband! It is so old it isn’t even BPA free and has survived multiple lid transplants. To say I was stunned is an understatement.

This thing has traveled to multiple countries with me, fished rivers, lakes, and two oceans with me! How could this happen, and on my birthday? That bottle has been strapped to 4-wheelers along the Rio Grande, hiked all over the place, camped in too many state parks to count, and been a daily companion on my commute to work. It was very sad, and it made me think about that water bottle and all the places it has been over the years.

Can a water bottle change your life? Well, maybe.

You see, I purchased that Nalgene® bottle in an effort to drink more water; attempting to reach that 8-cups per day recommendation. That meant that I filled it twice a day, and eventually, I got into the habit of doing that on a daily basis. It probably took 2-3 months for me to form that healthy habit though, so it wasn’t instantaneous. That purchase is what set me on that path though. I was trying for a small win with a moderate cost. (Moderate because I was broke all the time in college, and that’s when I purchased my Nalgene® bottle. They are known for not growing funk though, so it was a wise purchase for a college student.) It worked! I now consume what my husband considers an obscene amount of water, and my body (and skin, in particular) thanks me.

That was just one small step to being healthier, and small steps like that, where you can celebrate a “win”, also give you the confidence to try other things; bigger steps even.

I don’t advise that you become as emotionally attached to anything as I am to my Nalgene® bottle, but some obsession is bound to happen along the way in life. Try to make them happy, healthy ones!

*Note: Nalgene® bottles have a lifetime guarantee, so I’ll be receiving a new one (BPA free too) in a few weeks. If you have suggestions for what to make out of my old leaky one, I’d love to hear them.

Staying Hydrated

I have a nerdy love of water. It fascinates me! The idea that the bond angle between the two hydrogen atoms creates a slightly positive charge on one side of a water molecule and a slightly negative charge on the other side means that water sticks to stuff. That makes it really cool!

Okay, so your lack of love for water might lead you to underestimate how cool water is. But think about water sticking to stuff. Think about trees! They don’t have a pump to get water from the roots to the top. They don’t need a pump because water sticks to the xylem (basically small tubes) in trees and moves upward as it sticks to xylem a little higher…and a little higher…and a little higher. You get the idea, right? Water rocks, and we all know that it is important. This week, we’re focusing on how you know you’re getting enough water and how to re-hydrate if you find yourself in a deficit.

As spring approaches and the weather warms, we should all be spending more time outside. After the long winter months, it is easy to get a little behind on water intake. The amount of water that you need to take in depends on your age and activities, and you might find that you need to increase your consumption of fluids as you head outside more often this spring.

Common signs of dehydration are

  • an increased thirst
  • dry mouth
  • bright yellow pee (not a good indicator for elderly folks)
  • dizziness
  • dry skin
  • headache

Serious dehydration needs to be treated by a doctor. However, for your run-of-the-mill slight water deficit, there are some easy ways to get back on track and make your body happy.

First, dehydration is a lack of water, so an easy thing to do is…you guessed it, drink some water. There are other options too though. You can also give low-fat milk a try. It was the added bonus of providing some vitamins along with re-hydrating your body.

Another option is to consume some fresh fruit, which has a high water content. Again, the additional vitamins in the fruit can help your body as well.

Surprisingly, drinking a cup or two of coffee can help. We always think of coffee as being a diuretic, and it is. However, a small amount of coffee can help you re-hydrate and give you a little boost from the added caffeine. So remember, as you head outside this spring, you have options for staying hydrated and healthy!

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