The Importance Of Water In The Diet
People spend a lot of time and energy focusing on food and exercise, with little thought given to water, something that’s just as crucial.
That’s because a lot of people (including yourself) don’t know the importance of water in the diet. It’s important whether you’re trying to build muscle or lose weight. Fuck, the shit is important even if you’re not trying to do either!1Trust me, I’m as stumped as you are why anyone wouldn’t want to build muscle or lose weight, like there’s more to life than just your appearance and doing shit to improve it. But whatever. For your own sanity, I’d suggest that you stop putting so much thought into an answer and just accept that there are crazy people all around us.
How important?
So important that you should get serious about adding it to the mix if you’re serious about doing whatever the fuck it is that you want to do with your body.
So important, in fact, that you should start doing that not tomorrow…
…or the day after…
…or next week…
…BUT PRON-MOTHERFUCKING-TO!!!
Here’s why…
We’re nothing but a sea of water.
The stuff makes up 45-70 percent of the average adult human body. 2The great degree of variation comes from differences in age, sex, health, weight, and body fat levels.
More importantly, 83 percent of the blood consists of water, the vehicle by which nutrients like carbs and proteins, for example, get transported into the system and metabolized for use before they’re shuttled into the bloodstream for distribution.
It’s for this reason that proper hydration is critical, for water plays a role in nutrient absorption and the biochemical reactions that take place within the body.
So yeah, you might be meeting your macros in alignment with whatever your goal is…but if you’re not washing them down with God’s saliva, then you’re not getting the full benefit of them as a result of impaired digestion!
Water is vital to the body due to its role in nearly every function. This is why you can survive for much longer without food than you can without water.
But what happens when you don’t have water?
Like, what happens before you die?
Well, when the body doesn’t have enough water, dehydration occurs. As a protective measure, the body then begins to hoard water subcutaneously, or beneath the skin.
And what does that have to do with anything?
Well, considering that 70 percent of skeletal muscle is water, it has a lot to do with shit from a vanity point of view!
You see, lack of water from fluid loss during exercise or by way of a water-deficient diet has a tremendous impact on muscle size, as you begin losing muscular definition and appear smoother with the storage of water in the extracellular spaces in response.
But hey, if you have zero qualms about walking around looking soft and puffy with tiny, under-inflated muscle, then, by all means, keep refusing to make water a central part of your plan!
Not sold on the importance of water in your diet yet?
Cool, that’s your prerogative!
However, I bet you’ll reconsider after this…
Poor water consumption leads to reduced oxygen delivery by the blood, which translates into less energy to do shit. One of the ways this loss of energy presents itself is in decreased physical strength, with research suggesting that a moderate dehydration level of as little as 3 percent impacts muscular endurance and power output so much that training in that state will have you performing at only 80 percent of your full potential.
Still not convinced?
Boy, are you obstinate!
Okay, here are some more benefits for your consideration, this time of the fat-burning kind.
*ahem*
Not only does insufficient intake of water cause poor circulation that robs you of the ability to perform 1-2 more reps than you normally could but less oxygen in the bloodstream also has an effect on body fat. For reasons that are beyond my scope (and my give-a-fuckness to Google and find out), the body has a habit of burning fat for energy when the body is properly hydrated and there’s an adequate supply of oxygen. That’s not the case with lowered oxygen levels.
Dehydration and the ensuing water retention also affects fat burning. As stated before, the body observes that water is in short supply and proceeds to hold on to it when you don’t drink enough.
Now, the job of the kidneys is to filter out waste and toxins. They become very inefficient at that job if there isn’t enough water for them to make the contaminants less concentrated and easier to process. During those situations, the kidneys recruit the liver to assist with waste management. Talk about teamwork! But before you do, consider that the liver’s humility in helping to process waste eats into its ability to perform its normal function of metabolizing body fat.3Yes, exactly, this is yet another example why working as a team sucks!
Need more?
Then let’s also add that drinking cold water can amount to about a 25-30 percent increase in the body’s use of calories. The reason has to do with cold water having to be warmed up to body temperature when consumed. This heating process is what’s known as “dietary induced thermogenesis” and it raises the basal metabolic rate (BMR). If you remember, BMR refers to how much energy the body uses at rest to perform vital functions, like pump blood, think thoughts that are too base to share, and undergo the chemical reactions responsible for the noxious fumes you’ll crop dust an area with and have someone else get blamed for.
I betcha now understand the importance of water in the diet!
Shhhhhhiiiiiittttt, I’m sure you’re ready to go chug down a Fanta. Or crack open a Redbull. Or maybe plow through a Capri-Sun.4That is, until you realize you’re not in the goddamn mood to get hopelessly frustrated at trying to insert that goddamn straw into that goddamn pouch, if there’s even a straw still glued to it, which there never fucking is!!!
Fuck, you might even want to painstakingly nurse a Starbucks latte macchiato for hours on end while your cheap ass leeches off the free bandwidth to check your email and illegally download the double disc special edition of Teenage Fat Booty Nurses #15.
Much like it’ll thrill you to find out that Teenage Fat Booty Nurses #15 is among the best in the series (trust me, it’s stellar), it’s going to make you ecstatic to know that you can indeed meet your daily water requirement by drinking coffee, soda, and juice.
That, unfortunately, doesn’t give you license to forever shun water — or, as some might like to think of it, boring in liquid form.
Nope.
Those flavorful beverages shouldn’t be your primary source of hydration because of the added sugars and calories.
Instead, the bulk of your water intake should come from 100 percent, unadulterated H2O.
Total bummer!
Glossary: calories, diet, exercise, goal, muscle
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