Drinking too much water Here’s how it affects your body.
Drinking enough water is extremely important for us, as it operates all the functions in our body. It flushes out all the toxins from our body, helps the body to absorb minerals, provides oxygen to our brain and does several other activities, which keep us alive. But as too much of anything is bad; drinking more than 5 liters water on a regular basis causes water intoxication and leads to several health problems.
Drinking too much water makes you overhydrated, which results in decreasing sodium level in your body. As sodium helps in many functions throughout the body, this condition leads you to several problems such as vomiting, nausea, fatigue etc.
When you drink water, your kidneys filter it throughout your body and maintain the fluid levels in your blood. But, drinking excessive water creates a pressure on your kidneys, which leads to kidney damage. Consuming excessive water decreases the plasma level in your arginine vasopressin and causes acute kidney injury. Also, kidney stones are another side effect of drinking excessive water.
When you drink too much water, your kidneys become overloaded and the excess water stays in your body. Also, overhydration lowers the level of potassium ions in your body. These two conditions finally result in diarrhea.
Consuming excessive water decreases sodium level in your blood. The excess water enters into the cells and ends up swelling them up. This leads to headache, speech disability, disorientation and causes damage to the brain tissues, which results in serious brain injury. Constant drinking of too much water may develop the risk of coma, which can finally lead to death.
Overhydration drops your electrolyte levels and hampers the fluid balance in your body. This restricts the body muscles to function properly and leads to muscle spasms and cramps.
When you drink more water than the required amount, it keeps your kidneys functioning all the time and causes frequent urination. If you need to go to the washroom once in every 15 minutes, then it’s a sign that you are drinking too much water.
Drinking excessive water that contains iron in it, causes several problems in your liver. So, drink purified water to avoid this problem.
Filling up with too much water creates extra pressure on the blood vessels and heart. It affects the overall performance of your heart and leads to heart failure.
We use chlorine to purify water and drinking too much water causes an overdose of chlorine in our body. This condition increases the risk of bladder and colorectal cancers.
So, avoid drinking excessive water and live a healthy lifestyle.
