Water, Water Everywhere

Water is good for you.

Not exactly news flash material, huh?

Well, it is. But it isn't always the first thing on your mind. Sometimes I wake up with a strong craving for coffee, or other times I want to drink something with flavor, maybe something sweet.

But I try and do my duty and drink the water I'm supposed to, the water my body needs to get by. Exactly how much water is that? That varies, though. And with all the research and information out there, you could easily get lost with that simple question.

Water, though, was central for me losing weight. My trainer told big LB to drink 80-100 ounces of water each day, so about the equivalent of about six half-liter bottles of water. Recently, during one of our Loper meetings, a running coach told us to drink at least eight, if not 10 of those bottles a day as we prepared for the marathon. He likened water to oil in an engine, helping keep everything lubricated.

Still, no matter how you break it down, drinking enough water can be tough.

I would not recommend drinking bottle after bottle of water if you are going to be driving a lot, for instance. You will have an accident, and not the kind where you exchange driver's license information with someone else. I've absent-mindedly drank water before the long drive out to the stadium and had near-misses. I had to pull off the freeway and find a store on more than one occasion. And those were times when I went to the bathroom just before I left the house.

There was another time when I was almost there, literally waiting for the light to turn so I can go into the stadium and I thought I would have to turn around and go home because I was certain I was going to have an accident right then and there. I still don't know how I made it, but I found a bathroom. I would have taken a bush at that point, but I made it to a porta-potty (honey buckets for you Seattle peeps).

If I'm going to be at home for a while, then I try and drink as much as possible. Sometimes that means trips every 15 minutes to the bathroom, but it's worth it.

We go through so much water a day, it's ridiculous. We get water delivered to us because our tap water here is not the best. We used to use a water filtration system but that was at our old house; our area now doesn't exactly have the best water. We get five of the five-gallon waters delivered to us every four weeks or so, and we always run out. Our last delivery was about two weeks ago and we're already on our last gallon. I'm the biggest culprit for that, so I don't feel so bad getting water when I run out.

The color of your, um, well, I don't want to get too graphic but if it's light then it's good. I get upset when it's not because then I know I haven't been drinking enough water.

I've been up for about an hour and have drank about half of one water bottle. I'm taking Yvie to school in about another hour and my goal is to drink four times that by then, so I'll have two full bottles in me by about 7:30 a.m. That's a good start for me. I'll probably spend the next few hours alternating between drinking water and going to the bathroom, but that's fine with me. I probably won't have an accident here at home.