Too Much Liquids?

TeaRex14

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When it comes to liquids the most important factors are how much sodium you're dumping and how low is your metabolic rate. When I first started out I couldn't handle much fluids, even mineral rich fluids like milk and fruit juice would send me into a freezing state of stress. I ate a lot of dry, carb rich, salty foods like homemade tortilla chips and pancakes made from powdered milk to cure this. I only drunk about 8oz of fruit juice with my meals while doing this. Honestly it was hard to do considering I like drinking most of my calories, just more satisfying and goes down easier. After I raised my metabolic rate I was able to include more liquids provided they were rich in minerals and sugar. I also typically add salt to my beverages or take a salt capsule with my beverages. I'm still hesitant about too much plain water though. Milk, coffee, orange juice, apple juice, grape juice, cherry juice, soda, red bull, gatorade, and bone broth are great choices.
 

Cirion

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Jack Kruse has some interesting thoughts on water that may explain why too much liquids starting off may be detrimental. (Emphasize that this is JK's thoughts and NOT ray peat's)

The first thought is that if you have lots of body fat, that supposedly your body can "Make" water using your body fat (I'm still trying to wrap my head around how this works, so don't ask me how it works haha) and so minimizing forced water intake may make you lose body fat easier (and you actually see this reflected on these forums as well - a lot of people fail on the liquid diet, and only lose weight and feel better once they ditch most the liquids).

Just looked up the chemical composition of body fat. It is carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. Because water is hydrogen plus oxygen, theoretically, yes you can make water from body fat.

If this is true, if you're fat, I wouldn't worry too much about drinking water. Drinking water probably becomes more important as you lose body fat.

The other thing is, that most water is contaminated by detrimental substances such as fluorine (and other fun things like BPA, random drugs) which can dramatically impact your health in a negative way.

Well water, distilled water, reverse osmosis water are the only 3 ways to be sure your water is safe probably.
 
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stevrd

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I think one of the reasons people with low metabolisms can't tolerate fluids that much is because in a hypometabolic state our cells are more hydrophillic, mostly due to the fact that in a hypometabolic state we often have tissue-bound estrogen, even if our blood work shows estrogen in the normal range. In addition, the lack of CO2 production from poor metablic health causes fluid retention as well. When people get their CO2 production up, they start to lose water weight. This is one of the reasons for weight loss during administration of thyroid hormone.

Jack Kruse is only half-right when it comes to solid food helping people lose weight. Overweight people do not need less water, they need more water. The bigger the person, the more fluids are needed to remain adequately hydrated. Bigger people often lose more water through exhalation or perspiration, regardless of thyroid status. Solid food helps with weight loss because of two reasons, (1) it produces a higher specific dynamic action than liquids, making it easier to lose weight on the same amount of calories, or more calories (2) it is more satiating than liquid calories, inhibits ghrelin, essentially stops hunger faster than liquids, thus solid food cause us to eat less calories by default. Most of the time forcing fluids isn't a good idea, but there are some times where we need to force fluids or force feed ourselves. Many of us have lost our intrinsic impulses to drink or eat when appropriate or regulate how much is needed. If this weren't the case, then we wouldn't need calorie trackers to help underweight people eat enough. This is especially apparent in elderly people, who often lose the ability to sense thirst, making dehydration much more common.

Salting liquids is one of the easiest ways to help the problem, but as I stated in on of my posts above, there are specific benefits to eating solid foods, that our bodies need to function optimally. Liquids alone will not provide this.
 

Cirion

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If overweight people need more liquids and not more, how do you reconcile that fact with drinking too much water makes losing weight difficult to impossible when overweight?

Also what about the fact that unhealthy/overweight people need even more minerals than a healthy person, so if you drink diluated water it could make this issue worse? Sure you can salt liquids, but you still have to consider other minerals such as magnesium, calcium. Especially magnesium, which hypothyroid people are usually low in.

Any comment on the body being able to "make" water from body fat? I don't say I believe it (it sounds ridiculous) but I admit I don't understand the supposed mechanism behind it, so I can't fairly judge something unless I do.

Any idea why I still continue to have edema even though my pulse and temps are mostly pretty good finally? Doesn't a good pulse and temp indicate a healthy metabolism?

Sorry for all the questions just trying to learn.
 

stevrd

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If overweight people need more liquids and not more, how do you reconcile that fact with drinking too much water makes losing weight difficult to impossible when overweight?

The words "fact" and "impossible" are very strong words. I know it's just semantics, but just think about the above statement for a minute. Does water have calories? If I drink an extra pint of water a day will I gain weight like I would eating an extra slice of pizza?

Why does drinking more water make losing weight "impossible" when overweight? What makes an overweight person special? Does this mean an underweight person just needs to drink more water? I am certainly open to new ideas, but the idea that drinking water can prevent one from losing weight sounds asinine. Nothing against you personally, but wherever this idea came from, be it Jack Kruse or whoever. Drinking water does not escape the laws of thermodynamics.
 
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Cirion

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Lol I know it sounds a little weird. I always like to keep an open mind though, no matter how outlandish the idea, because usually there's some nugget of truth even if it's not quite true. I'll post here if I learn more

Anyway, I'm just quoting you here:

Jack Kruse is only half-right when it comes to solid food helping people lose weight. Overweight people do not need less water, they need more water. The bigger the person, the more fluids are needed to remain adequately hydrated. Bigger people often lose more water through exhalation or perspiration, regardless of thyroid status. Solid food helps with weight loss because of two reasons, (1) it produces a higher specific dynamic action than liquids, making it easier to lose weight on the same amount of calories, or more calories (2) it is more satiating than liquid calories, inhibits ghrelin, essentially stops hunger faster than liquids, thus solid food cause us to eat less calories by default. Most of the time forcing fluids isn't a good idea, but there are some times where we need to force fluids or force feed ourselves. Many of us have lost our intrinsic impulses to drink or eat when appropriate or regulate how much is needed. If this weren't the case, then we wouldn't need calorie trackers to help underweight people eat enough. This is especially apparent in elderly people, who often lose the ability to sense thirst, making dehydration much more common.

After looking at it, ok yeah I think I misinterpreted. I thought you mean all liquids (including empty calories like water). My bad. I see now you clearly do state "liquid calories".

Still, doesn't even water clog up the digestive track? I think the ayvurdic folk say that, if I'm not mistaken. Anything that can clog up the digestive track and isn't easily digested could easily make you gain weight on less calories. Calories in calories out is a very simplistic system that rarely works in reality. If liquid calories cause this effect, I see no reason why any liquid (including water) would not. Just my 2c though. I certainly could be wrong. edit - quick search suggests that water is OK at meals as long as it is warm or hot. cold liquid like OJ or milk straight from fridge would definitely clog digestion according to them. that means water also must be warm or hot. so milk would be fine if it was warmed up first.
 
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stevrd

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Also what about the fact that unhealthy/overweight people need even more minerals than a healthy person, so if you drink diluated water it could make this issue worse? Sure you can salt liquids, but you still have to consider other minerals such as magnesium, calcium. Especially magnesium, which hypothyroid people are usually low in.

Hypothyroid people need more minerals, because as you said, hypothyroidism tends to make people lose minerals. You're right, drinking plain water can make this issue worse. In fact, as Peat said, there was a study that showed drinking a large amount of plain water increases prolactin, a sign of a stress response. But it's important to understand why hypothyroidsm makes one lose minerals to get a grasp of the mechanism. Hypothyroidism causes hyperactivity of the adrenals, you rely on adrenaline for energy as opposed to oxidative metabolism. Through this process you lose the ability to effectively oxidize glucose for energy, while simultaneously losing the ability to store glycogen optimally. There are many reasons for this that could be a whole discussion in and of itself, but let's just say lack of steroid hormone production downstream along with poor water regulation cause this to happen, from a broad point of view. So you become a "fat burner" and also increase cortisol secretion to break down muscle tissue in a futile attempt to bring glucose levels up in spite the mal-adaptive state. Adrenaline, (and probably cortisol and estrogen) activate the RAAS system which cause the body to hold onto water, diluting sodium and other minerals in the process, while also causing losses in magnesium and probably potassium, as peat says. Paradoxically, because the hyperactive RAAS system causes excess fluid retention, blood pressure tends to increase, the very thing that sodium restriction enthusiasts are trying to avoid, by promoting sodium restriction.

Increasing sodium intake during a state of RAAS hyperactivity prevents further losses of magnesium and potassium, because sodium stabilizes the osmolarity of the extra and intra-cellular environment. Furthermore, what's important to understand is that when you improve thyroid function the RAAS system is quieted down, so that losses of minerals do not happen. This improves your ability to handle fluids.

But there is nothing particularly special about an overweight individual, because as you know, hypothyroidism comes in all shapes and sizes. You could be overweight or underweight, and hypothyroid.
 

stevrd

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Any comment on the body being able to "make" water from body fat? I don't say I believe it (it sounds ridiculous) but I admit I don't understand the supposed mechanism behind it, so I can't fairly judge something unless I do.

Any idea why I still continue to have edema even though my pulse and temps are mostly pretty good finally? Doesn't a good pulse and temp indicate a healthy metabolism?

Sorry for all the questions just trying to learn.

I have honestly not read about body fat being turned into water. If you have a source for this I'd love to read it. A cursory search on google came up with nothing for me. But I can say for certain that if this is in fact true, it would not occur at any significant degree in the context of fat loss. We lose fat through beta oxidation, utilizing fat for energy. Yes, the hormonal milieu plays a role in fat distribution and nutrient partitioning, but at the end of the day we have to create a caloric deficit to cannibalize and lose a significant amount of fat through beta oxidation. Preferably this would be a slow process, over the course of months so as to avoid an increase in the stress hormones, which would cause more muscle tissue loss than desired.

You could have edema for a number of reasons. Because edema tends to increase blood pressure, it could cause a false-positive elevation in pulse. Lowering blood pressure tends to lower pulse, but not always. Where is the location of your edema? Ankles, arms, face? Face fat is often confused for edema. It's easier to believe that we're holding excess water than fat tissue.

I work in medicine, where edema is often caused by diabetes, vascular disease, along with other co-morbidities. Outside of the main medical causes of edema, hormones play a large role. Estrogen and cortisol are one of the main culprits in edema for otherwise healthy individuals with no co-morbidities. Reducing stress is one of the main things we can do to decrease edema. Because we live in a busy and stressful world, meditation, sunbathing, and sleeping without an alarm clock (my three favorite ways to decrease stress) are not possible all the time. Because of this, supplementing with some thyroid and pregnenolone can often reduce the formation of cortisol and estrogen to a larger degree. I think of thyroid and pregnenolone as "adaptogenic" in this way.
 

stevrd

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After looking at it, ok yeah I think I misinterpreted. I thought you mean all liquids (including empty calories like water). My bad. I see now you clearly do state "liquid calories".

Still, doesn't even water clog up the digestive track? I think the ayvurdic folk say that, if I'm not mistaken. Anything that can clog up the digestive track and isn't easily digested could easily make you gain weight on less calories. Calories in calories out is a very simplistic system that rarely works in reality. If liquid calories cause this effect, I see no reason why any liquid (including water) would not. Just my 2c though. I certainly could be wrong. edit - quick search suggests that water is OK at meals as long as it is warm or hot. cold liquid like OJ or milk straight from fridge would definitely clog digestion according to them. that means water also must be warm or hot. so milk would be fine if it was warmed up first.

Yes, I apologize if I wasn't clear enough. What I meant was, for example 200 calories of solid food would likely cause more weight loss than 200 calories of liquid food. The reason for this is multi-faceted. Liquid food escapes much of the specific dynamic action (thermic effect of food) that solid food goes through. Thus, since liquid calories don't require as much energy for the body to digest, there are less calories "burned" in the process, and also less heat produced. Remember, heat, in any form, be it wearing a sweater, or eating a hot meal, is good for metabolism. I'm not saying the difference between 200 calories of liquids vs solids would be much. It could even just be by a difference of 5-10 calories, but if you do do this for an extended period of time, it adds up. And on top of this, as I said, solid food has a more profound inhibitory effect on ghrelin than liquids. Couple this with the fact that solid food is more satiating and you have a perfect recipe for reducing perceived hunger on fewer calories. This causes you to eat less by default.
 

Cirion

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Found this quote from RP:

Most foods contain a considerable amount of water, usually more than 70% of their weight, and some water is produced in cells by metabolism. The function of water in the organism has been mystified and neglected because of some deeply rooted cultural images of the nature of organisms and their cellular make-up.

Unfortunately, he does not go into detail as to how "water is produced in cells by metabolism".

Water: swelling, tension, pain, fatigue, aging
 

stevensmith

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Found this quote from RP:
Unfortunately, he does not go into detail as to how "water is produced in cells by metabolism".

Water: swelling, tension, pain, fatigue, aging

Yes, water is produced in cells by metabolism. However, all cells do this, this is NOT unique to fat cells. To re-quote you:

The first thought is that if you have lots of body fat, that supposedly your body can "Make" water using your body fat (I'm still trying to wrap my head around how this works, so don't ask me how it works haha) and so minimizing forced water intake may make you lose body fat easier (and you actually see this reflected on these forums as well - a lot of people fail on the liquid diet, and only lose weight and feel better once they ditch most the liquids).

Just looked up the chemical composition of body fat. It is carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. Because water is hydrogen plus oxygen, theoretically, yes you can make water from body fat.

Once again, not sure if this came from Jack Kruse or not, but wherever it came from, it's misleading and only a half-truth. Here is how I interpret what you're describing: Overweight people need less water because their fat cells can make water on their own, supplying the body's water needs. Water supplies fat cells in overweight people with oxygen and hydrogen, which prevents fat loss. If an overweight person simply decreases their water intake, they will have less oxygen and hydrogen to store, so they will lose body fat.

Here's where this theory is wrong. We don't create fat cells from individual atoms of carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen. Fat tissue is created from the food we eat, and in the form of triglycerides and phospholipids. These are large multi-carbon molecules that are created from glycerol and fatty acids. Drinking water has nothing to do with the deposition or elimination of stored triglycerides.

The idea that overweight people need less water than thin people is factually incorrect. All cells produce water, and there is nothing unique about adipose tissue. Also, you stated that minimizing forced water intake may make one lose body fat easier. This is incorrect. Water has no calories. Therefore it does not provide anything to store body fat.

Now if you want to talk about isocaloric diets comparing diets of liquid calories vs solid calories, there MAY be a slight edge to solid calories, because of the mechanisms I described in my posts above. But the difference would be so small that it probably wouldn't reach statistical significance. We're talking about a difference of 50 calories or so, a day.
 

Antonello

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I have honestly not read about body fat being turned into water. If you have a source for this I'd love to read it. A cursory search on google came up with nothing for me. But I can say for certain that if this is in fact true, it would not occur at any significant degree in the context of fat loss. We lose fat through beta oxidation, utilizing fat for energy. Yes, the hormonal milieu plays a role in fat distribution and nutrient partitioning, but at the end of the day we have to create a caloric deficit to cannibalize and lose a significant amount of fat through beta oxidation. Preferably this would be a slow process, over the course of months so as to avoid an increase in the stress hormones, which would cause more muscle tissue loss than desired.

You could have edema for a number of reasons. Because edema tends to increase blood pressure, it could cause a false-positive elevation in pulse. Lowering blood pressure tends to lower pulse, but not always. Where is the location of your edema? Ankles, arms, face? Face fat is often confused for edema. It's easier to believe that we're holding excess water than fat tissue.

I work in medicine, where edema is often caused by diabetes, vascular disease, along with other co-morbidities. Outside of the main medical causes of edema, hormones play a large role. Estrogen and cortisol are one of the main culprits in edema for otherwise healthy individuals with no co-morbidities. Reducing stress is one of the main things we can do to decrease edema. Because we live in a busy and stressful world, meditation, sunbathing, and sleeping without an alarm clock (my three favorite ways to decrease stress) are not possible all the time. Because of this, supplementing with some thyroid and pregnenolone can often reduce the formation of cortisol and estrogen to a larger degree. I think of thyroid and pregnenolone as "adaptogenic" in this way.
Dry fasting can turn fat into water.
I'm doing it myself after destroyed my health with too much OJ and milk.
Even a tiny bit of liquid can makes me cold and hypo but as long as I keep my eating dry I'm warm! Cheese is the best tool here.
 

jzeno

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@Antonello
@stevrd

Can't be too sure, but I think what Ant was trying to say is that dry fasting can take the Hydrogen in fat to make water. Ant might want to clarify on this, but it sounds like he was just generalizing when he said "dry fasting can turn fat into water" because that doesn't sound right.

I had never heard of dry fasting, so I found a short video that explains it:



Video is mainly about how to break a dry fast, but he gives a very brief explanation of what a dry fast is before going into how to break one.
 
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stevrd

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@Antonello
@stevrd

Can't be too sure, but I think what Ant was trying to say is that dry fasting can take the Hydrogen in fat to make water. Ant might want to clarify on this, but it sounds like he was just generalizing when he said "dry fasting can turn fat into water" because that doesn't sound right.

I had never heard of dry fasting, so I found a neat video that explain it:



Video is mainly about how to break a dry fast, but he gives a very brief explanation of what a dry fast is before going into how to break one.


Agreed with that not sounding right. Of course through the process of beta oxidation, the fat can donate hydrogens to make H202, and then later H20. This is incontrovertible. My argument is not that we can't make water from fat, my argument is whether it is physiologically meaningful in the context of weight loss or something to actually think about when trying to lose body fat. And my case is, water doesn't contribute to fat gain in any way, it has no carbon in it, therefore cannot become adipose tissue. Drinking water or fluids is not the limiting factor when it comes to weight loss. However, I will concede that maybe people who carry more body fat tissue might possibly require less H2O than predicted based on body weight alone, but their requirements would still be higher than smaller people.
 

jzeno

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@stevrd

"Anything that makes you cold decreases metabolism. Too much fluids is part of it..."

Question: Cronometer's suggestion for daily intake of water is 3700 g (125 oz) or just about 1 US gallon of water per day. Do you find this reasonable?

I thought I was getting a lot of liquid and when I checked I was only getting 50% of the RDI and I thought: Well, maybe I have a problem! But, I felt like I was getting enough liquids. I guess the only way to find out, is test it and see if I feel better or worse, but I would like to get your opinion on 1 gallon of liquid per day. That seems like a huge amount of liquid! And for someone who is recovering from hypo-t wouldn't that just be disastrous? I won't know unless I try, but I'm just curious was Cronometer has such a huge amount for the RDI of water content.

For the record, I'm currently getting roughly 2,200 g of water per day, which is 74 oz from the following: 18 oz coffe, 44 oz OJ, plus another 12 oz from food. Sometimes I also get a cup or two of milk which adds 8 oz or 16 oz, but it's inconsistent because I'm afraid I'm allergic to casein so it's not consistent.

Thanks for sharing your input
 

stevrd

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@stevrd

"Anything that makes you cold decreases metabolism. Too much fluids is part of it..."

Question: Cronometer's suggestion for daily intake of water is 3700 g (125 oz) or just about 1 US gallon of water per day. Do you find this reasonable?

I thought I was getting a lot of liquid and when I checked I was only getting 50% of the RDI and I thought: Well, maybe I have a problem! But, I felt like I was getting enough liquids. I guess the only way to find out, is test it and see if I feel better or worse, but I would like to get your opinion on 1 gallon of liquid per day. That seems like a huge amount of liquid! And for someone who is recovering from hypo-t wouldn't that just be disastrous? I won't know unless I try, but I'm just curious was Cronometer has such a huge amount for the RDI of water content.

For the record, I'm currently getting roughly 2,200 g of water per day, which is 74 oz from the following: 18 oz coffe, 44 oz OJ, plus another 12 oz from food. Sometimes I also get a cup or two of milk which adds 8 oz or 16 oz, but it's inconsistent because I'm afraid I'm allergic to casein so it's not consistent.

Thanks for sharing your input

So "too much fluids" also depends on the temperature of the fluids. I have stated this before, when you heat fluids up it does make them more tolerable for a hypothyroid person. I think your question of how much water per day is dependent on metabolism and activity level. The more active you are the more water you need. A sedentary person with a low metabolic rate will not need much water at all.

Textbook standards of care for nutrition is 25ml H20 per kg body weight. However there are many factors that could affect fluid needs. People with CHF for example have to be on fluid restrictions because their body stores more fluid than normal. Elevated estrogen levels during menstruation can make a woman store 5lbs of extra water. Chronic high estrogen levels are going to make fluid needs lower. Since hypothyroidism often decreases the ratio of progesterone/testosterone to estrogen, this can make fluid needs lower. Also hypothyroidism makes one perspire less and thus fluid needs would be lower. Seasonal changes can alter fluid requirements. Since we sweat less in the winter we don't need as much.

In a clinical setting, the main way to know if someone is dehydrated is to measure their BUN levels. If it is very high they are likely dehydrated. I have seen people who drink very little water and have normal BUN levels. So what this tells us is that we can't just go by what the RDA says, because the RDA is just a statistical analysis based on the average plus two standard deviations. It doesn't take into account multiple factors that could go into individual needs.

Urine should be slightly yellow. You don't want it to be clear, because you could be diluting minerals in your body. So you will have to play around with fluids and how you feel on more or less fluids. I happen to be one of those people who does very well on less fluids. Much of my fluids come from hot beverages in the winter.

Personally I'm convinced that keeping body temperature up is one of the most important strategies for improving health and if you need to decrease fluid intake for that to happen than so be it. You'll know if you need fluids or not based on your thirst.
 

jzeno

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@stevrd

"You'll know if you need fluids or not based on your thirst."

Duh. I forgot that famous Peat quote: "Thirst is the best guide to the amount of fluid needed." (Water: swelling, tension, pain, fatigue, aging)

"Personally I'm convinced that keeping body temperature up is one of the most important strategies for improving health and if you need to decrease fluid intake for that to happen than so be it."

Thanks for clarifying how important maintaining body temp is when comparing it to fluid intake. Can't forget that. I thought fluid intake might be equally as important if not more, but I agree with you at the end of the day the body temp needs to be good and high in order for us to feel good, and we should aim for whatever amount of fluid intake does not interfere with that homeostasis.

Thanks stevrd
 

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