Water – Make Wise Choices

If anyone had told me ten years ago that I would spend $2.50 for a quart of water (do the math… that is $10 per gallon!!!) I would have laughed. Now, I shake my head in wonder at how many people do just that. People will not spend three measly dollars per day on providing their bodies with the best nutrition on the planet, but they will buy WATER that is virtually free at the conservative cost of $5 per gallon. I was appalled when I did research to get up to date figures for my recent class. 60 MILLION plastic water bottles per day are tossed into the trash in the United States. Stop and think about that for a minute. Do a little simple math 60,000,000 x 365 = 21,900,000,000 or to write that out 21 BILLION, 9 HUNDRED MILLION bottles per year. Is that not insane?!!!!

I could camp out on the detriment to our environment that the bottle water industry has caused, but that isn't the purpose of this post. My goal is to help educate folks so they will drink the proper amount of water to hydrate themselves, and to help them make wise choices in choosing their water sources. Hopefully the opening paragraph is a clue that bottle water would not be the wisest choice, but if that isn't enough there is much more evidence to incriminate. There really aren't any redeemable qualities to offset the many detriments to drinking bottled water. First we addressed exorbitant expense, and environmental cost. Now let's look at the price we are paying with our health.

Plastics are full of toxins. No one will even attempt to deny that. Those toxins leach from the bottle into the water we drink. No one will deny that either. The arguments are all around how much leaches, and how much is "safe." I will leave the experts to nit-pick over nano-particles, and I will save myself hundreds of dollars per year by drinking tap water which has tested just as clean or cleaner than bottled water.

But, wait! Tap water from a city municipal source is full of chlorine, and often is "enriched" with fluoride – neither of which are good for you. If you don't believe me, have a look at this.The simple solution is to find a good filter, not to pick up a couple of cases of bottled water every week. While I was doing my research I ran across this site, and felt like it was worth sharing this comparison chart.

Once you choose your water filter and have a clean source of water, find yourself a BPA free water bottle, or even better drink out of glass or stainless steel. Then measure out the optimum amount your body needs so that you can better gauge if you are drinking enough. The simplest formula to use is to take your body weight and divide it in half. That number is the number of ounces of good clean purified water you should be drinking each day. If you are also consuming caffeine you should compensate by drinking more water. (Caffeine is a diuretic and will dehydrate instead of hydrate you.)

Adding a lemon wedge or two will add in some flavor, without negating the benefits of drinking water. Don't use the flavored water packets or additives. All the ones I have seen are full of artificial sweeteners and colors. If you aren't sure why those are bad… go back a few posts and read The Fatal Five.