A TRICKLE MORE WATER

Remember my eighty four year old friend who is still climbing mountains? She has taken Dr Batman’s book seriously, and also worked quite hard to keep herself in good shape, as well as drinking copious amounts of water. Dr Batman said that once your mouth is dry, you are already in a state of dehydration. Don’t wait to feel thirsty. Often, hunger pangs, according to Dr Batman, are a sign of thirst. Meeting hunger pangs with a glass of refreshing water will dispense with out of bounds hunger, very good for the figure! Another point that it is important to take in is that as we get older, we actually lose our pre-emptive warning system for water need. The older a person is the less likely he or she is to feel thirsty. This is another reason to do the math and practice drinking enough water.

Excuse me? How do I practice drinking water? Well once you have taken the weight of your body in pounds and figured half that amount as the ounces of water you should drink per day (and then I would say add another 50% to that) I would urge you to take a day when you can give a little time to this process. Fill up large containers with as much water as your calculations tell you that you need on a daily basis, and set yourself the task of drinking that amount of water over your day. If you figure out that you need one gallon of water, you might want to divide that amount by the hours that you expect to be awake over the day, and drink the divvied up portions at set times, tapering off a little before bed, so as to have as restful a sleep as possible.

Of course, to begin with you will probably be rushing to the loo a lot more than you are used to, but there are a couple of effects of practicing water drinking that might surprise you. As your body remembers how to store and use water, the restroom visits will slow down to a more normal rate. You may also find that even though you thought you were drinking plenty of water before starting this, once you start, you will suddenly notice how much you want that water! All this will probably not happen in just one day of practice. The more you can do this, the healthier your body will become, and I believe the more it will remember to remind you to drink.

Once we are drinking water, it is important not to negate all its benefits by using the wrong container. Numerous scientific research studies have suggested that hard plastic (No 7) bottles, such as those used for baby milk and as water bottles, leach out bisphenol A, or BPA, an estrogen mimicking chemical which has raised concerns amongst scientists that it can alter development of the brain, the prostate, and behavior in children and fetuses. Further evidence suggests that the harm just keeps on coming even as you mature: heart disease and breast cancer has been linked to BPA, as well. So, besides the indisputably atrocious effect plastic bottles have on the environment, they can also have an atrocious effect on you!

When at home, fill a glass or ceramic jug with water and drink from that in a glass glass. If you use a Brita water filter jug, try not to let the filtered water sit in it for any great length of time, or purchase the type of filter which fills from the tap. When on the move, a stainless steel water bottle is one of the best ways to carry drinking water. I keep a one gallon apple juice bottle in my car for refills when on the road. If you set it in a small box, the bottle won’t roll around, but remember to take it inside at night during the winter in case it freezes and cracks. If you must use a plastic water bottle for a short term, drink out of Number 1 plastic, and don’t freeze, heat, scratch, crack, or reuse it… just to be on the safe side.

Well, this trickle of water has reduced to a drip, drip, drip. Do read Dr Batman’s book, Your Body’s Many Cries for Water, stay aware of our environment, and stay well.

A Happy and Joyous New Year. Namaste.

GUSHING ON ABOUT WATER

Last month in our discussion on Water, we examined how important water is to your existence and maintaining good health; considered in a general fashion that it is vital to all life on a molecular and cellular level; spoke briefly about Dr Batmanghelidj’s work on the medical applications of water to cure already dis-eased bodies; and talked about the practical aspects of consuming water, such as don’t drink unfiltered city water (at least on a regular basis) and do drink lots of the good kinds of water.

Why is unfiltered city water so diabolical? As mentioned previously, this has to do with the treatment the water receives before it comes along your pipeline. Most cities and towns “purify” water with chemicals such as chlorine, fluoride, and chloramine.

While chlorine is well known to be the stuff that turns our hair green and our laundry white (go to a natural food grocer for good alternatives to putting more chlorine in our water table!), its effects on the body and the earth are highly questionable. Chlorine’s main purpose in water is to kill off bacteria in city water pipes, and, although chlorine is known to be a toxin, very little information is available about what long term low level consumption will do to the body. Another interesting fact about chlorine is that when it comes into contact with decaying organic matter, such as leaves, it turns into a family of chemicals known as trihalomethanes (THM). The most infamous of the THMs is chloroform. All of these THMs are carcinogenic in even the smallest amounts: don’t drink the pool water.

Fluoride still persists with even the many health conscious individuals as a mythical health hero. Some of its effects on the body have been known since a 1992 Canadian study by Dr. Harry Limeback, but have been ridiculed by the scientific establishment and media. After more than a decade of corroborating studies, it is now being linked with very serious disorders, including cancer, affecting teeth, bones, the brain and the thyroid gland, as well as lowering IQ. More evidence is coming forth on a regular basis that fluoridation of our water and our toothpaste is a very poor idea. We will be visiting fluorides again on our journey to good health.

Chloramine is the third of the big three popular chemicals used in municipal waters. This is often used in addition to chlorination. When used as an alternative to chlorination, it does not have the distinctive chlorine odour that water treated with straight chlorine has and so water is more palatable. It does, however, turn water green, as can be witnessed by filling a white bucket with chloraminated water. It is a compound of ammonia and hypochlorous acid (which is created when chlorine dissolves in water). It is highly toxic to fish and many other animals, and must be removed before adding tap water to aquariums. Is it toxic to us? Well, at least not immediately. It is allowed in public water pipes at a level of 3ppm. Whereas chlorinated water can be boiled or left standing in a jug for twenty four hours to allow the chlorine to outgas, chloramine treated water is much more stable and has to be treated with another chemical to remove this chemical.

Well water can also contain chemicals as chemicals used at ground level drain into aquifers. This is from water that leaches off industrially farmed fields and sometimes from industrial plants, such as coal powered power plants, paper production factories, etc. Bacteria also often show up in well water, some of them harmful. Test your well water to be safe. If you live in a town, test your tap water.

And what if you find your drinking water is full of chemicals and / or bacteria? Filter or distill it! Water filters and distillers come in many forms. The most affordable filter is probably the Brita water filter, which you can purchase at many supermarkets. There are also filters and distillers by companies such as New Wave and Waterwise that are excellent. The distillers from Waterwise range from stove top to whole house. The filters attach to your kitchen tap and can be mounted above or below sink level. They need to be changed much less often than the Brita, but are more expensive. Beyond that there are whole house filters and distillers, but do avoid softening your water with salt. While reverse osmosis, another filter method, produces really lovely tasting water, I find the process problematic. A large proportion of water treated by reverse osmosis is expelled as waste water, which unless you use a gray water system is gone, as the Raven might have said, forever more.

It is said that the most delicious and nutritious of waters with exactly the right balance of minerals is rainwater. If you have a “clean roof”—one made of metal or coated with certain safe elastomeric paints--and a means of collecting rainwater from said roof into a clean container, go for it. Remember to test it first with a home kit or through a laboratory. Did you ever think that drinking water could be so complicated, but well worth it!

Namaste.