Friday, February 13, 2009

Get The Most Out of Your Drinking Water

There is a lot of confusion out there regarding the best drinking water. The basic waters available are tap water, spring water, purified water, distilled water, alkaline (bubbly or carbonated) water, and water with increased oxygen.


Tap water is the least pure of all drinking water. It’s up to you to decide if you want to put impure water into your body. Spring water is usually weakly purified, but may have the added benefit of minerals. When you drink any water, the water will generally carry minerals, vitamins, and other nutrients out from your body along with waste. Spring water contains many of the minerals you lose when you drink water, so it is a good idea to drink spring water for its ability to replace lost minerals. These minerals may or may not be worth the impurities, but personally, I prefer to take a high quality multivitamin to replace any minerals I lose daily from drinking non-mineral water.


Purified water has many toxic substances removed via a filtering system. This is much healthier water with fewer impurities. Distilled water is water in a chamber that is heated to steam, which is then moved into an adjacent chamber where it is condensed and turned back into water. This distillation process leaves the water almost totally pure. This is the most pure of waters and almost any toxic substances are left behind in the first chamber when the water is turned into steam and rises into the final chamber. The main argument people make about distilled water is that you lose a lot of minerals when you drink it. Once again, I suggest a mineral supplement to replace those lost minerals, rather than drinking less pure water that contains minerals, such as spring water.


Alkaline water, such as Perrier, club soda, and other waters that are advertised as high alkaline, may or may not be filtered. The common denominator between these beverages is the presence of carbonation. Usually the process that makes the water alkaline also kills germs, although it would still need purification from toxic chemicals and the like. Regrettably, there is a large drawback in that alkaline water can interfere with digestion. Your digestion requires stomach acid and the alkaline quality of the water can interfere with stomach acid, thereby preventing it from properly breaking down food. People who drink alkaline waters and even bicarbonate sodas right before meals or during meals are interfering with their digestion. An easy rule to remember (which I’ve mentioned in a prior post), is to always drink these beverages at least 20 minutes after meals in order to allow your stomach acid time to work on your food. Do not drink them before or during meals if you care about proper digestion.


You may remember a previous post wherein I discussed Anemia, a disease which results when a person is too alkaline. It is important that a person know if they are too alkaline before drinking alkaline drinks. If your body’s pH is alkaline, stay away from carbonated beverages and alkaline water. Refer to my post on acid/alkaline balance to learn how to test your alkaline level at home.


My daughter’s boyfriend, who drinks Perrier constantly throughout the day, recently began complaining about fatigue. I gave him a pH strip (discussed in my acid/alkaline balance post) and we were surprised to discover that his pH was close to 7.5, almost anemic in measurement. I suggested that his over consumption of Perrier may be influencing his body to the degree that it could be part of the reason for his fatigue.


A recent trend in the bottled water industry is the marketing of water that is said to possess higher oxygen content than competitors. The jury is still out on this one. I don’t drink these waters because extra oxygen most likely means more free radicals. We discussed in another post that there is almost universal consensus over the past several decades that free radical damage is the main reason for disease, degeneration, and aging. I am cautious about drinking water that may increase my free radical production.



Everyone: Realize that the type of water you drink can influence your health a great deal. You drink water everyday. Take extra care to choose wisely, as this is an important area of healthy living.



Remember that any drinking water carries some minerals out of your body through urine, regardless of its mineral content or method of filtration. All waters being equal in this regard, I find it most beneficial to drink distilled water for its purity and lack of toxicity, and take supplements to replace the minerals I lose from regular water drinking.

1 comment:

  1. The basic waters available are tap water, spring water, purified water, distilled water, alkaline etc.
    Get exactly the pure water can be known as Bottle water cooler in San Antonio, available at Artesia Springs

    ReplyDelete