Too much water?

are you urinating more frequently now that you have increased your water intake? if no, then something is wrong...
also look at your sodium intake..

Drinking water isn't going to make you lose weight alone.

I really don't think you should be weighing yourself everyday.

Weighing yourself every day isn't productive or accurate.

Did you know that your weight can fluctuate up to 5 lbs a day?

Did you know that the scale can't tell the difference between muscle, fat, water, and glycogen storage?

Try cutting your sodium intake in half.

Wow, I'm seeing a mix of good advice and bad.

If you are drinking a ton of water, do not decrease sodium in half. Water is a diuretic and can cause hypovolemic hyponatremia (which can kill you):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyponatremia

Eight glasses a day? Myth busted. Some need more, some need less:
http://www.snopes.com/medical/myths/8glasses.asp

Of course, water has weight. Weigh yourself after you use the restroom right when you wake up. Water will not make you gain or lose any significant amount of fat. Calorie intake does that. Water has no calories.

--Measure your food with a digital food scale. No tasting things or licking the spoon. Meauring cups are very inaccurate.

--Log EVERYTHING! Supplements, gum, medicines...etc.

--If you haven't figured out your TDEE, do it. You can't be sure you are eating at the right kind of deficit unless you know what your current maintenance calories are.

Is there such a thing?

I have been upping my water since Monday for 2 reasons:
1 - to flush out the booze bloat I have going on
2 - I have stopped drinking diet lemonade, so water has naturally replaced that.

Here's my issue - the scales are not budging! I weigh daily (don't lecture me, its what I do ok?) and this week I have gone like this

Mon 80.6
Tue 80.1
Wed 79.9
Thu 80.2
Fri 80.3

WTF? I am drinking around 4 litres of water a day - is this too much? Or will it eventually all come out (within the next 3 days....)

Your body excretes excess water very quickly.

We, as a species, have a need for water and we, over the 5 million years since we left trees and started chasing food on the ground, have developed an excellent mechanism for getting enough water. It's called "thirst".

Water can be valuable in the dieting process. When people change their diet, especially if they increase their protein, they sometimes experience constipation. By drinking more water, they may be able to reduce the level of constipation. In addition, water, if ingested before a meal, tends to make people eat less since they already have "something" in their stomach. For me, that's just trading one addiction for another but, heh, if it works, do it.

Other than that, there is no medical need to ingest more water than your thirst mechanism tells you to. And I say that as someone who has spent time in the US Army in desert environments, who spent their youth in a tropical climate, and who runs year round in Souther California (once described as "a desert with irrigation")

But, as we know, "the plural of anecdote is not data" so all the personal stories are…personal stories.

In this case, a very talented doctor has weighed in on water consumption. Well, two, Docs.

Here's a link to the only medically researched article I have ever seen here on MFP:

http://www.dartmouth.edu/~news/releases/2002/aug/080802.html
http://ajpregu.physiology.org/content/283/5/R993.full

From the first para:
"Despite the seemingly ubiquitous admonition to “drink at least eight 8-oz glasses of water a day” (with an accompanying reminder that beverages containing caffeine and alcohol do not count), rigorous proof for this counsel appears to be lacking."

This article has 100 footnotes to other medical sources and was written by an MD on the staff at Dartmouth who happens to have written a book on how the kidneys function.

While I'm sure that there's a lot of great advice here on MFP, I'll stick with Dr. V and his research assistant.

The other Doc is Dr. Tim Noakes whom I've only learned about in the past few months. In addition to being the inventor of the energy gel (1971) and an experienced marathon and ultramarathon runner, Dr. Noakes has been involved in sports medicine research for decades. His book "The Lore of Running" is a treasure trove of information and, in the last few days, I've been reading parts of his book that deal with water as well as heat regulation during endurance exercise.

Dr. Noakes recently published a book on the dangers of over drinking during endurance events. Here's a magazine article that discusses the book:

http://www.outsideonline.com/blog/outdoor-adventure/tim-noakes-on-the-serious-problem-of-overhydration-in-endurance-sports.html


Again, I have no qualms with people drinking water. It can be helpful in weight loss but, as with any other substance, it's not the poison, it's the dosage.

So drink to thirst and don't eat yellow snow.

If you're not losing weight, my suggestion would be to "eat less, exercise more". My standard challenge to people who are in maintenance (if you're neither losing nor gaining weight you no longer have a calorie deficit you're and you're considered "in maintenance") is to go to my diary of early 2011 and eat the calorie levels that I ate while burning the calories that I burned. Do that for a month and see how things work out (I lost 95 pounds in 7 months in the 2011).

Losing weight is simple but not necessarily easy. We marshall up a staggering number of justifications for why we're not losing but time and time and time again it comes down to burning more calories than you eat*. Do that and the weight will come off.


*My fiancée has run on of the 44 Lindora clinics here in SoCal and she tells me that the folks who start the program but don't lose weight are the ones who are not compliant on the program.

Simply put...sedentary female 9 cups per day...active female...10-16 while adding sodium and electrolytes to avoid hyponatremia.....sedentary male 13 cups per day...active male 14-24 cups while adding sodium and electrolytes to avoid hyponatremia. This is from latest research from National Academy of Sports Medicine... I can tell you mist people including athletes are NOT properly hydrated. I can tell you from personal experience...it makes a huge difference when you are. I can also tell you it IS possible to drink too much...so you need to make sure you are in the range mentioned earlier. Hope this helps.