So today I am writing about water retention. It has become a recent issue for me since I decided to start drinking more water. On average, I probably drink about 8 oz. of water a day. I might have sips here and there throughout the day but I’m not a big drinker of any liquid. I don’t drink soda but on most days I do have one glass of iced tea. In other words, I’m probably dehydrated to some extent and don’t even realize it.
So one day I started drinking eight, 8 oz. glasses of water. It was much harder to do than I thought. I found myself using the bathroom every 20 minutes and then to my dismay, started putting on weight. Here I was eating less and I was told water would help with weight loss but it was having the opposite effect on me.
So I decided to do some research and found out that I am retaining water. Now there are all different reasons for water retention but what seemed to make most sense in my situation was that my body was actually dehydrated so when I suddenly started drinking all that water, it began to store it, conserving it in order to keep me hydrated. Eventually my body won’t need to store it and drinking water will actually help reduce water retention.
In other words, my body just needs to get used to it. I have read different opinions on how long that takes. The average answer I see is between 4 to 6 weeks…ugh. So I have decided to take a slower approach to introducing more water to my body. I can’t stand peeing every 20 minutes and I hate the idea of my scale going up, rather than down.
I think I shocked my body too much so I will start off with three, 8 oz. glasses of water and after a few days add on more.
Have you experienced water retention? Do you have any other tips for drinking more water?
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