What if I told you that the average American is chronically dehydrated? These symptoms listed below might help you with your mild discomfort, and could even save your life!
1. Itchy Skin
Skin is the largest organ of the body and it protects you from outside influences like bacteria. Dehydration may lower your body’s immune support and leave you more susceptible to damage and discomfort of the skin. Face shadows, dark under circles, dull skin, redness, and itchiness are all symptoms of dehydration.
2. Constipation
If you aren’t drinking water, your stool can be affected too! Your water intake doesn’t just leave the body via urine, absorption, and sweat; it leaves through your bowel movements as well. Less water in your stool can decrease movement in your bowels and will make the waste shrink, thus creating more opportunities for your waste to pile up. No thanks!
3. Fevers
Water regulates your temperature. When the body doesn’t have the water available to cool down the system it can overheat. Toxins in the bloodstream can run rampant when there is a deficit of water and the body will develop a fever. If you imagine yourself as a tea kettle that is empty and left on a burner; the results are disastrous!
4. Bad Breath
Your mouth relies so much on water. Saliva glands regulate the PH of your mouth and when you drink something dehydrating like soda or coffee, you can develop a musty smell. Saliva also flushes out food odors that you have eaten recently, so if you are dehydrated, your breath will smell even after brushing your teeth!
5. High Blood Pressure
Your heart pushes blood throughout your body and could have a hard time if the blood has less water in it than usual. The brain will tell the capillaries and smaller veins to close off if it is too low. This increases the blood pressure to the main arteries of the body. With this sudden change, the heart becomes more sloppy and can increase cardiac risk.
6. Digestion Problems
The acids in your stomach also rely on your water intake. If the stomach isn’t balanced with enough calcium, magnesium, and water, the body won’t be able to develop enough digestive acid to process your food. This can later create ulcers and acid reflux. If you have ever felt these, you know they are truly uncomfortable!
7. Joint Pain
All of our bones are cushioned with cartilage and connective tissues that rely on water. When we are moving about with dry joints, friction increased to the arms and legs sound excruciating! Cartilage absorbs shock in everyday movement and water makes the cartilage less dry and soft cushioning to the bones is what we expect of our joints.
8. Fatigue/Dizziness
This symptom is closely related to the blood pressure suffering from lack of water. The equilibrium of the brain relies on your heart to pump blood efficiently, and dehydration can throw that system off. Fatigue at 3 pm is a classic sign. This can also be complicated by dizziness. The brain can detect gravity, and the average person might experience vertigo, dizziness or a heavy-headed feeling when there isn’t enough water in the body.
9. Dehydration and Sugar Cravings
It’s fascinating to learn that in an evolutionary setting, our bodies didn’t always find water in the wild that was clean enough to drink. However, water was and still is found in food, and dehydration could result in a strange form of hunger. The combination of dehydration and an imbalance of serotonin in the brain might communicate easy snack food. In America, this easily translates to sugar consumption.
10. Headaches
Dehydration headaches usually happen when a person is severely dehydrated. The brain might shrink from lack of water and will tug away from the skull as a result. Ouch!
Considering how much our bodies are made of water, it’s strange to see that plenty of people develop these symptoms without realizing they simply haven’t had enough water. Drink up!
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