Is it possible to drink too much water?

Newaglish

Simple enough question - is it possible to drink too much water? I drink about 6/7 litres per day. I have a reasonable amount of sodium in my diet (in or around RDA) and I'm not running any marathons on a regular basis so I don't sweat out excessive amounts of water bar an hour or so per day of exercise.

Someone mentioned to me that this could be bad for my kidneys but I think that's probably a little over-cautious?

Scanlas The 2nd

Yes numerous people have died from drinking too much water, I think it causes your brain to expand or something like that.

Antomus Prime

I dont know the full ins and outs of it but I was told by a trainer on my old gym that 4-5 is more than enough for a workout day. I would imagine that 6-7 is too much, it could result in water retention which would cause you to put on weight....

But like I said I'm not expert

EileenG

Yes, it's possible to drink too much water. Normally, I'd say it's not a concern, because you need to drink a lot, but there seem to be a lot of weird detox diets which involve eating celery and drinking endless amounts of water. People have died doing this.

Drink to thirst and a bit extra when exercising. Take a look at your urine. It should be a pale colour. If it's too dark, you can drink more. If it's colourless, you are probably drinking too much.

Amantine

why are you drinking 6 to 7 liters of water a day? If it is to stop yourself feeling hungry then you need to stop and we could find easier and healthier ways to keep you slim.

Newaglish

No it's not that at all. I really just like drinking water! I have a 2L bottle at my desk and I would drink 3 fills of the bottle during the day. Then I'd usually have some water in the gym in the morning and a glass or two in the evening. It's not some sort of crazy diet or anything like that. I'm guessing I should cut back a little. It's weird to be in a position to be trying not to drink water!

Edit: I'm getting a smaller bottle.

Khannie

6-7L a day = too much IMO. I'd bet money you're waking during the night to pee.

What Eileen said is spot on IMO. From what I've read your pee should be a "light wheat colour".

Bruthal

Too much water causes the salinity in the body to go too low, which can cause disturbances in brain function when its at the extreme end of water intake.

seamus

High-profile case here:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16614865/ns/us_news-life/t/woman-dies-after-water-drinking-contest/

It's the extreme end of the scale, definitely. However, it says they were only given 8-ounce bottles (250ml) to drink every 15 minutes. Though other reports say that she'd drunk about 2 gallons (7 litres) of water.

In that case, it was how quickly the water had been drunk on top of how much of it, but it gives an idea of how much (little?) water can cause serious problems.

corkcomp

I find I drink up to 5L a day especially when working out / running hard, its a fair bit but I add salt to food to compensate. be careful of 6/7 litres if your not taking enough sodium, other than that im sure its ok. I found I had to start adding salt, because if your eating whole foods mainly there wont be much salt.

msg11

To answer the thread title.

Imagine this.

You want to grow a plant,
But the soil has no water it won't grow.
The soil has the correct mix of water it will grow.
The soil is water logged it won't grow.

Body is much the same, Dehydrated, Hydrated, Waterlogged. Too little can cause issues but so can too much. I generally have a few pints of water a day, even if I am not thirsty.

Amantine

If you are drinking that much because of thirst you might want to talk to your doctor, excessive thirst can be a sign of diabetes amongst other things. And drinking that much much washes out other minerals from your body not just sodium, so it's not as simple as adding salt to your diet.