75 oz of Water? You've got to be kidding!

When I was told to drink at least 75 oz of water per day, my first (and many more after that) response was no way.  It's surprising my organs aren't shriveled up like prunes.  I have gone through periods of drinking water, marking my cup at work so I could keep track, schlepping to the bathroom every 10 minutes and waking up 5 times during the night to pee.  But like most things I started, it didn't take long to find enough excuses to justify stopping.  Not until recently did I really understand the importance and value of drinking half your body weight in ounces of water.  Example:  If you weigh 200 pounds, you should drink 100 ounces of water per day.

Now I'm not going to get technical on you, and go into excruciating detail about how our bodies work.  But here it is short and simple.  Up to 60% of the human body is water, the brain is composed of 70% water, and the lungs are nearly 90% water. Lean muscle tissue contains about 75% water by weight, as is the brain; body fat contains 10% water and bone has 22% water. About 83% of our blood is water, which helps digest our food, transport waste, and control body temperature. Each day humans must replace water, some through drinking and the rest taken by the body from the foods eaten.

So in order to have a fully functioning body, we need to replenish the water.  Plain and simple.  To put it in lay man's terms, if you don't drink enough water, you will be starving your organs, including your brain.  I don't know about most of you, but I did enough damage to my brain when I was young that I need to take care of it today.

But here is the kicker!!  Drinking water can raise your metabolism up to 10%.

That's enough to get me to the water cooler.  My metabolism can use some serious help.  Let me see if this sounds familiar to anyone.

     *The "starvation" diet - eat nothing during the day and have ground
       round and tomatoes for evening meal.  An amazing 200 calories, per
       day, and that's stretching it.
     *The Cabbage Soup Diet
     *The grapefruit diet
     *The Atkins diet
     *The 800 calorie/day liquid diet (but I thought it would work better if
       I only had 400 calories).

Yes, I tried them all.  And the result, rapid weight loss, followed by rapid weight gain, usually exceeding the original starting point.   Metabolism?  What's that?  Mine was wrecked.  But there is hope for you if you recognize yourself here.

Drinking water is a requirement in the 60 day challenge.  So just start with that, and you will begin to increase your metabolism immediately.  Just by increasing your water consumption, you will begin to shed pounds.

Well, I have to sign off...just finished two glasses of water, and....well you know.  :)


Cheers,
Sue