Your body can’t send you an e-mail message or access your voice mail, so when it gets dehydrated, it lets you know in the only way it knows how: through unpleasant symptoms.
Here are some major signs you are suffering from dehydration.
1. Joint Pains and Arthiritis
Joint cartilage provides the smooth surface so that joints can glide easily during movement. Cartilage is about five times slicker than ice, and that cartilage is made up of 80 percent water. If the cartilage is robbed of fluid, the joint will eventually creak, crack, and pop, like a door on a rusty hinge.
2. High Blood Pressure
When the body is mildly dehydrated, it may restrict the flow of blood to nonvital areas and concentrate it instead on the vital organs. The immediate result: your blood pressure may rise. Picture a garden hose. Constrict the water flow with your thumb, and it increases the water pressure inside.
But drink enough water, and constricted blood vessels usually begin to open up, low ering blood pressure.
3. Digestion Problems
Are you a Pepcid -popper? Do you always have roll of Tums at your desk or in your purse? Water is the hero of the gastrointestinal tract. It is the basis of every fluid your body needs for digestion, including saliva, bile, stomach acid, pancreatic juices, and even the mucus that lines our GI tract. With out adequate water, the whole digestive system goes into emergency mode, and you may get heartburn, indigestion, constipation, hemorrhoids, and even ulcers.
The mucus layer in your stomach is 98 percent water.
4. Asthma
Asthmatics usually have high histamine levels. Histamine is a neurotransmitter that causes the muscles in the bronchial tubes to constrict, restricting the flow of air. Your bronchial tubes need adequate hydration to prevent constriction.
If you are an asthmatic or tend to have allergies, water may improve your symptoms. Besides, water is cheaper, too. As I say, “Health is cheap; disease is expensive. ”
ACTION STEP: If you are suffering from any of the health condition listed above, identify which ones, gradually increase the amount of water you drink each day, and eventually these symptoms may start to subside..
“TIME TO HYDRATE”
