It happens even to the best of us and no matter how intelligent we think we are, sometimes we forget to be careful enough and completely fail to watch over our bodies. Yup, happened to me today and it was not fun. Not fun at all. Two days ago, I spent the whole day at the beach and no, I did not use any protection against the Sun so I had some skin burns. Nothing serious, just a red face and it even looks good on me. During those 12 hours on the beach, I had 3 cups of coffee and one glass of water. That is it.
Yesterday I went out with my friends and had some alcohol, not much. I did not get drunk or anything like that but alcohol dehydrates and besides shots and coffee during the day, I had nothing else for a drink. Today I went to the store in the middle of the day and had a 20-minute walk in the Sun. Somewhere around the middle of my walk, my body finally decided to tell me that I am stupid and should drink more water. It told me that with a headache so severe I thought my brain was going to explode, fatigue, shakings, elevated heartbeat and lack of energy. I managed to get home and my first reaction was to get all my clothes off, put cold towels on my skin, take a pill for the headache and start sipping water. This is not my first rodeo guys, I get stupid like this once a year, every year. So, to wrap things up, 3 days of Sun + alcohol + physical activity + coffee - water = dehydration. Some people never learn...
Dehydration happens when more water is moving out of individual cells than it is being taken into the body. When a person has lost enough fluid, the body begins to lose its ability to function normally and starts to produce symptoms related to the fluid loss. We lose water all the time in the form of urine, sweat, stool, tears and our breath even, while we exhale. With water, we also lose electrolytes which are critical in allowing cells to generate energy, maintain the stability of their walls, and to function normally.
There are many things that can accelerate our water loss beside the obvious not drinking enough water. Some illnesses like diabetes, vomiting, diarrhea, and infections can make us lose water and there are also these:
- alcohol
- coffee
- too much sweating or peeing
- salty and sweet foods
- too much Sun exposure
The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism confirms that alcohol is a diuretic. When we drink too much of it, our bodies lose their ability to absorb water in support of hydration and an electrolyte imbalance is created. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, an adult man drinking up to two drinks per day and a woman drinking one drink per day are within the limits of moderation and should be fine as long as their health is otherwise ok.
Liquid does not mean hydration.
Drink water.
Coffee has a similar effect on our bodies. Drinking some is good, drinking too much is not. When we drink two or three cups of coffee each day, we take in approximately 200 to 300 milligrams of caffeine and according to MedlinePlus.com, that amount is safe for us but if we exceed it, there is a great chance of dehydration.
Salt and sugar are the tricky ones. It is not always easy to recognize them in our food. Sure, in french fries and popcorn we can taste the salt but there is a lot of sodium in fast food meals, canned foods, deli meats, frozen dinners, processed baked goods and bottled condiments, and the sodium is the thing we have to watch carefully. There is a great way, and an easy one to make sure you do not get dehydrated:
Drink water, regulary, slowly
and without sugar or salt.
That is all we have to do, drink water. There is no super secret formula here, only water. Why do we always forget about those simple things that make us healthy?
Depending on whether the dehydration is mild, moderate or severe, there are a number of symptoms you can have. Some are pretty expected and some not so much. In severe instances, dehydration can lead to death because we all know that the human body can not survive without water for long. A study in Archiv Fur Kriminologie concluded that you can’t survive more than 8 to 21 days without food and water.
"In a very hot environment, an adult can lose between 1 and 1.5 liters of sweat an hour. A child left in a hot car or an athlete exercising hard in hot weather can dehydrate, overheat and die in a period of a few hours."
Randall Packer, a biologist at George Washington University in Washington, D.C.
We often hear how a human being can not survive more than two days without water but that is just a rough estimate. Every body is different and two days is not really a precise time period, it can be much shorter for some people. According to National Health Service guidelines in the United Kingdom, severe dehydration starts when a person loses about 10 percent of their total weight to water loss.
Symptoms of dehydrations include:
- Extreme thirst
- Less frequent urination
- Dark-colored urine
- Fatigue, dizziness, and confusion
- Dry mouth and skin
- Severe headache
- Sleepiness
- Muscle cramps
- Fever and chills
- Bad breath
“If you’re not producing enough saliva, you can get bacteria overgrowth in the mouth, and one of the side effects of that is bad breath”
John Higgins, MD, an associate professor of cardiovascular medicine at the University of Texas in Houston and the chief of cardiology at Lyndon B. Johnson General Hospital in Houston
So, as you can see, the list of symptoms does not look like something you would like to have. I experienced the chills, cramps, severe headache, thirst, fatigue, dizziness, confusion, and dry mouth. I have no idea what my urine was like because I have not peed for the entire day but when I finally did, it was fine so no worries there. Conclusion? I was stupid and I will try to be smarter in the future.
Depending on what your symptoms are and how severe they are, you will have to choose between taking care of yourself at home and visiting the doctor. The best approach here is to give yourself a couple of hours and if your symptoms do not go away then you are not in the mild or moderate area but in the severe one and the doctor is the way to go. This works for symptoms that do not involve you passing out or having a high fewer, of course. Here is what you can do to help yourself:
- cool yourself down
- take a shower
- have some medication to ease your pain
- drink a lot of water but by sipping it
- remove excess clothing or loosen it
The best advice is to have better prevention and avoid getting dehydrated in the first place. Sometimes we are just to busy to remember that we did not drink enough water. We should be careful with what we bring to our bodies and always drink plenty of water. I wonder, will I ever learn to follow my own advice? Hm... Time will tell. Speaking of time, I think it is time for me to have some more water...
