Feeling Foggy? You Might Be Dehydrated!

Is that afternoon slump hitting you hard? You might be parched! This episode dives DEEP into hydration, caffeine, and electrolytes. Kimberly Beam Holmes breaks down why water is SO important, from flushing toxins to keeping your brain sharp.

Here's what you'll learn:

• The TRUTH about thirst: Is it the only sign of dehydration? We reveal the sneaky symptoms that hinder peak performance. It might surprise you!
• 2 Types of Dehydration: We unveil the difference between intracellular and extracellular dehydration and how it affects you.
• How much water YOU ACTUALLY need: Ditch the "8 glasses a day" myth! (It depends on your weight, activity level, and even climate!) We'll teach you how to personalize your hydration plan.
• Coffee Blues? We explore how caffeine impacts hydration and debunk some common myths.
• Electrolytes 101: Are they just for athletes? We explain why electrolytes are crucial for EVERYONE and how they impact your exercise performance.

Smash dehydration and unlock your body's peak performance! Hit that play button and get ready to LEVEL UP your health! Learn how to optimize your hydration, ditch the fatigue, and feel your best all day long!

Your Host: Kimberly Beam Holmes, Expert in Self-Improvement and Relationships


Kimberly Beam Holmes has applied her master's degree in psychology for over ten years, acting as the CEO of Marriage Helper & CEO and Creator of PIES University, being a wife and mother herself, and researching how attraction affects relationships. Her videos, podcasts, and following reach over 500,000 people a month who are making changes and becoming the best they can be.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Today's episode, we're going to be talking about hydration, caffeine and electrolytes. This episode is because hydration is important and I have been drinking a lot of electrolyte powder caffeine and just had questions of my own about why does hydration matter? Does caffeine affect hydration and exercise performance? And electrolytes are they really even worth it? So we're going to be diving into some of those topics today. As normal, I'm joined by Jason, our producer of the podcast, who's going to help stay on track. Help me stay on track and also make sure that what we're talking about makes sense and help with the key takeaways of all of these articles that we're going to be going through scholarly articles and how we can apply them to our everyday lives. Thanks for joining Jason.

Speaker 2: 0:51

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1: 0:52

So we're gonna talk about hydration. What do you know? I'm bad at it.

Speaker 2: 0:57

Let's just get this out of the way. I'm bad at it, so just this is going to be like a self-reflection moment for me during this whole episode, so let's just get that out of the way now.

Speaker 1: 1:07

I feel like that's a lot of these episodes. They turn into mini counseling.

Speaker 2: 1:11

Yeah, I feel like they're like directed towards me. I kind of. Sometimes I leave the studio sweating, but it's okay, we're good.

Speaker 1: 1:19

Yes, but are you learning and applying?

Speaker 2: 1:22

Well, learning, yes, applying somewhat.

Speaker 1: 1:25

Oh, okay, I'm getting there, we'll work on that I can't do everything all at once. We'll work on the implementation intentions in a future episode, which is its whole own category of goal setting by the way.

Speaker 2: 1:37

See, that's why I haven't done it. I'm just waiting on that episode.

Speaker 1: 1:50

You're waiting on that episode. We should do a future episode where we take goals and break them down into all of the different stages of a goal. Okay, let's do it. That would be. That would be super fun. Okay, cool, that's a future episode.

Speaker 1: 1:53

Right now, we're talking about hydration and electrolytes, and a little bit about caffeine. Okay. So hydration what does it mean to be hydrated? Why is it important to be hydrated? To be hydrated. 50 to 70% of our body is made up of water, which is probably the largest amount of anything that's in our body, and so our body needs water to survive. It helps us to regulate our temperature, it helps to lubricate our joints, it helps to protect our tissues and it helps rid our bodies of waste and toxins that are in it through our bodily functions. So hydration and water as the outcome, or as the mechanism in which that happens, is incredibly important for us to live healthy lives.

Speaker 1: 2:40

The question that a lot of people have is how much water should I drink on a day-to-day basis? According to Harvard, the estimate for men and for women is that men should be drinking around 104 ounces of water a day and that women should be drinking around 72 ounces of water a day. I'm not fully satisfied with that answer, and there were several different sources that we looked at to come to this conclusion and all of them said around the same thing. But then they also all, in their own caveats, said but it also depends on weight, it depends on how active this person is, it depends on the climate that they live in. So there are a lot of depending factors in thinking about how much water you should be drinking a day. But here's one thing we do know Eight glasses of water of eight ounces, each glass being 64 total ounces of water, is not enough for men or for women as fully grown adults. It's not enough in any of the calculations that we looked at. So the what you typically hear eight ounces in eight glasses a day is not sufficient.

Speaker 1: 4:01

Really, what you want to look for to know that you're properly hydrated are a couple of things. The first is do you feel thirsty? Thirst is the first sign that you are dehydrated. In fact, it's a sign that you're already dehydrated if you're already thirsty. So if you're thirsty, drink water. It's a sign of dehydration. But then the next thing that you want to look for is the color of your urine. If it's too dark, it shows that you're dehydrated. Really, what you're aiming for is colorless or light, pale color of urine, and that's how you know that you are properly hydrated. And that makes sense for anyone. So you can take any body size, any body shape, any athletic level, and really you're just looking at the output. If it's too dark, drink more water. That's the key that you want to look for. So then, what is dehydration?

Speaker 1: 4:55

Dehydration leads us to feel drained, that our energy is drained, we're tired, we have brain fog. A lot of times people will mistake dehydration for hunger. They'll feel like they need something to get their energy up, when really what they need is water. But instead of drinking something that's hydrating, they end up turning to snacks or to chocolate or whatever it might be. But that sign of feeling like you're low in energy or that you're thirsty is already a sign that you need to drink water. So feeling thirsty and lightheaded, a sign of dehydration. Dry mouth being tired, dark colored or strong smelling urine is another sign of dehydration. Or realizing that you're not using the restroom that often throughout the day is another sign of dehydration. Ideally, if you're well hydrated, you want to be going once every couple of hours. So if you realize that you've gone five or six hours and you haven't used the restroom, you're dehydrated, you don't have enough water in your system and you need to go and drink something.

Speaker 1: 6:02

So, as we said before, not drinking enough fluid, this can depend on the climate that you live in. If you live in higher elevation areas, you're going to actually need to drink more water. If you live in very dry areas or very humid areas that get very hot, you will need to drink more water. I remember when my husband and I lived in Texas and it would get incredibly humid and incredibly hot in the summer and I would just constantly crave water. I remember when my husband and I lived in Texas and it would get incredibly humid and incredibly hot in the summer and I would just constantly crave water. And I went to the doctor one of those summers and I was like I just my thirst cannot be quenched and I thought that something was wrong with me. But at the end of the day, I was being very active out in that hot, humid environment and my body was just craving more water.

Speaker 1: 6:44

So drink. Like, as long as you are thirsty, you need to drink, even if you feel like you've drank 110 ounces of water. If you're still thirsty, then it's your body's sign that you need to drink. Also, recovering from illness is another way. If you've had a stomach bug or the flu or anything like that, then it puts you at risk of dehydration, and so it's important to recuperate the hydration back into your body, and this affects everyone. It's especially important for babies, for young children, for elderly and for athletes. These are all people that can be even more affected by the symptoms of dehydration, but overall, it's important for every single person. What do you think, jason?

Speaker 2: 7:28

Yeah, I mean I think it's super important. Like I said at the beginning, I don't drink enough water, as we're like.

Speaker 2: 7:35

I mean, I just finished drinking a Mountain Dew, so I haven't had any water today at all, and there are lots of days where I don't have any water, like I just drink other drinks, and we'll get into that, you know, as we go further on how some of these other things at all and there are lots of days where I don't have any water, like I just drink other other drinks and we'll get into that. You know, as we go further on how some of these other things affect hydration, I'm sure. But uh, yeah, this is probably something that a lot of people struggle with. A lot of people are probably erring more towards being dehydrated than they are hydrated.

Speaker 1: 8:01

I would agree with that. It's similar in my, in my view, to protein intake, in the sense that if you aren't intentional about it, you likely will not get sufficient amounts.

Speaker 2: 8:13

Yeah, cause it takes a lot more than we realize.

Speaker 1: 8:17

For sure. There are two types of dehydration. Interestingly, there's intracellular dehydration, which is insufficient fluid intake or by doing things that burn or use a lot of the fluid in your body, like exercising. So intracellular dehydration is caused by losing water from the inside of the cells and then it changes the osmolality of the blood, the osmo, the osmolality, and it changes the blood osmolality, so it changes the concentration of the different electrolytes which we'll get into in this episode in the blood, and so it can cause the cells inside of your body to shrink. And the way that you can fix that is by drinking more water. But then there's extracellular dehydration.

Speaker 1: 9:06

This one is especially important for women, and here's why. So extracellular dehydration is a decrease in your blood volume in your body through things like bleeding that can cause you to feel dehydrated. So this again, it can still be corrected by replacing those electrolytes and replacing the water in your body. But for women specifically, menstruation is a time in a woman's cycle when she's losing blood. Women lose anywhere from two to five tablespoons of blood during menstruation, which affects the hydration levels of your body. So women can be even more prone to dehydration at many areas and times during their 28 day on average cycle, but especially when they're actually losing blood. So it's important for women while you're menstruating that you are even more intentional about drinking and drinking maybe even things with electrolytes that we'll see later in the study.

Speaker 1: 10:07

But it's also really cool and one of the things I didn't realize until we started researching this and going over it was that there are areas of your brain and we won't go into all the specifics of it, this is just a high level overview but there's certain areas in our brains that seem that their dedicated role that they play in our bodies is to help monitor that osmolality in our blood. And when these areas in our brain start to detect a shift in it, our brain then signals to us hey, you need water, you need hydration, you're thirsty. And there's many other parts of our body that play into this as well Our kidneys. They can detect low blood pressure, they can detect changes in our blood that show that, can tell us that we're dehydrated and send signals back and forth. But overall, the brain will then stop telling us that we're thirsty by using sensory cues in two different ways.

Speaker 1: 11:07

So either immediately when we start drinking water.

Speaker 1: 11:10

When we start drinking water, our oropharynx is tracks, it's in our, that's what's in our mouth and throat, and it begins to track how much water we're consuming immediately and it begins to signal to our brain like hey, water is coming in now. And so, even though our body doesn't feel the effects of hydration for about 10 minutes after we start drinking, our brain can talk to the different areas in our mouth and in our throat to understand, like, hey, water is here. Therefore, it can immediately begin to turn off those signals of dehydration and continue to have that feedback loop with other areas of our body. So then, even after the immediate response of realizing that there's enough water, then it still continues to monitor it for like 10 minutes after that and then it can kind of settle down and see, ok, how much did we actually get of water? Are we good or are we thirsty again? And then, if there's still thirst there, it can kind of reactivate it until your body gets to the correct level, which is just a, I think, a really cool way that we're made.

Speaker 2: 12:22

It's insane that our brain is able to do that, right, I don't know, it's hard to wrap your your mind around around the fact that we can do that.

Speaker 1: 12:35

Yeah, it's really cool, fearfully and wonderfully made, absolutely. There was a study that was done in Japan a couple of years ago I in 2020. So yeah, just a couple of years ago and they were looking at the effects of dehydration. Now this study specifically was done on participants older than 65 years old. So it you know we're looking at a very specific group of people here, but basically they were trying to look at hydration levels and other health outcomes that could come from that, and this study found that chronic dehydration for those in Japan who were 65 and older was highly associated with dementia and higher BMI, specifically in women. So there was a correlation between the need to be hydrated and something that it seems to do inside of our brain and then something that it seems to do in regulation of appetite. So, again, when we look at studies like this that look at a very specific age group, as a researcher I can't look at that and say that this is completely generalizable to the general public, because it's not. We can only say that it was true for that population in that study. And then you know, we know that it is replicatable if that study is done again and finds the same results. But here's what it does and here's what I love about research it points to the need to further investigate that correlation in many other types of studies and in future research so we can look at this study. It's kind of like a mystery. We look at this study and we say, okay, there seems to be a hint here, there seems to be a clue that there's something here that we should continue to investigate. So later on in this episode we're going to look back into how does hydration affect mental state and how can hydration affect weight or different parts of our physical body. So that's coming up in just a minute.

Speaker 1: 14:29

But before we get into more in hydration, we're going to talk for just a minute about caffeine. First topic what role does caffeine and electrolytes play in hydration and does exercise increase the metabolism of caffeine? So I'll tell you where this came from. I came in one day a couple of weeks ago and I wanted to know, if I drink coffee before I work out, do I burn off the effects of that coffee in my workout? Because one of the things I have found is that if I drink coffee, which I typically do early in the morning before I work out, I just have this extra power, right, like the coffee gives this extra amount of energy and power going into my workouts. And my question was if I drink coffee on a morning and work out, then does that effect of coffee like wear off during the workout because of how much I'm working out, or, as compared to if I drink coffee on a day I don't work out, does it like stay in my body longer? So that was the question we one of the questions that we sought to understand here.

Speaker 1: 15:41

But the first one that we wanted to figure out was does coffee cause dehydration? Because we hear this a lot. Right, we hear well, it's. You know, coffee is super dehydrating. So, and the reason is because typically, when you drink coffee, you need to urinate a lot. Therefore, coffee is dehydrating. Well, there was a study done. This was several years ago, it was done in 2003, but it was a meta-analysis. So a meta-analysis reviews several different studies over a period of time and this meta-analysis looked at literature, scholarly literature, from 1966 to 2002. So this is quite a span of studies that we're looking at and ultimately, what it found was that large doses of caffeine and they categorized that as over 250 milligrams of caffeine have an acute diuretic effect. So yes, if people drink over 250 milligrams, which honestly could be two and a half cups of coffee or one extra large Dunkin' Donuts, I'm looking at you, jason.

Speaker 2: 16:51

Yeah, I figured.

Speaker 1: 16:52

Or two Red Bulls, right Like 250 milligrams, isn't necessarily a ton of caffeine, especially in our society where there's so many caffeinated drinks that people can drink throughout the day. So large doses can cause a diuretic effect. But single caffeine doses at the levels found in commonly consumed beverages have little or no diuretic action. Now here's what I would love to know more of Single caffeine doses. I'm going to assume that this is somewhere between 40 to 100 milligrams of caffeine at one time. So not drinking two cups of coffee, but one cup of coffee is what this would be akin to. So they had little to no diuretic effect.

Speaker 1: 17:36

Regular caffeine users tend to be habituated to the effects of caffeine, which diminish its actions. And then there were some other studies that I looked at before we started recording today which also said it really doesn't seem like there's any conclusive evidence that we can point to to say that caffeine is dehydrating and in fact could. For people who are used to drinking caffeine, it could be normal or seen as equal to hydration in terms of like drinking water. So it doesn't necessarily mean it has all the same benefits as drinking water, but it could hydrate equal to how water could hydrate if you are used to the effects of it.

Speaker 2: 18:22

Not so bad after all.

Speaker 1: 18:23

Not so bad after all, not so bad after all, there was another study that was done in 2015 along these lines as well. It was titled no Evidence of Dehydration with Moderate Daily Coffee Intake a Counterbalanced Crossover Study in a Free-Living Population. I just love how they title studies sometimes. So for this study, they looked at males 52 males between the ages of 18 and 46. So this tends to happen often in research, and here's the reason why and yes, women should be included in more research than they are, especially in the health related space or in the medical related space but the reason that they do it is because no one knows how to account for a woman's menstrual cycle. So a lot of times when women are included in medical research, a lot of times they're menopausal women, so they don't have an active menstrual cycle. And it even said for this one, females were excluded due to possible disruption in fluid balance because of the menstrual cycle, because there are different parts of a woman's menstrual cycle where she retains fluid and there's different parts where she doesn't retain as much fluid. So this was only done on males. So the men were were uh were moderate coffee drinkers and consumed three to six cups of coffee per day. So this is going to be somewhere between 250 to 600 milligrams of caffeine. And uh, and so what they did, is they the men completed two different lab trials before they tested. So on their first visit they came in, uh, they gave their weight, they told they weighed their food, they told about their fluid intake and they completed a diet diary and a baseline body weight.

Speaker 1: 20:05

On the second visit, and then participants completed two treatments for four consecutive days where they were told to consume their normal diet and daily caffeine intake, and then they were split into a coffee trial and a water trial. So the coffee trial consumed four mugs of black coffee a day, so the coffee trial consumed four mugs of black coffee a day, which equaled a caffeine intake of four milligrams per kilogram of body mass. And then the water control consumed four mugs of water a day, so 200 milliliters per day. They were told that's still not a ton of water, but that's what they were told to do. So participants were asked to refrain from alcohol and all physical activity for when they were coming in, to come back and then look at their their fasted blood sugar levels, their body mass, and they were told to give urine samples at the end of the study.

Speaker 1: 20:56

So here's what it found the body mass didn't really change between the coffee or the water trials and, overall, the real big thing to focus on is that there was no significant difference in the hydrating properties in the study of coffee or water, and they determined that by the fact that the participants had no differences in blood urea nitrogen or serum creatinine, which suggested that renal function, so the kidney function, was normal throughout the trial. So the overall result that they came to was that coffee, when consumed in moderation by caffeine-habituated males, so men who were already used to drinking caffeine provided similar hydrating qualities to water. And they also looked at things like potassium, which is an electrolyte that they were looking at in the blood, and found that this stayed equal among the coffee and the water groups as well. So just further indication that it was fine to drink coffee.

Speaker 2: 21:59

I feel like there has to be like a but, but um. There's no way.

Speaker 1: 22:05

this is just good Well, but it was black coffee.

Speaker 2: 22:14

Oh yeah.

Speaker 1: 22:17

It wasn't Well, and I mean that's the other thing, like when we're just looking at potassium, when we're looking just because these are some other things that I that I didn't say they were looking at potassium, they were looking at body mass, they were looking at urea nitrogen, they were looking at potassium, which I may have already said, but these were the things they were looking at because they were looking at was there a different in elect, a difference in electrolytes? They were also told not to work out yeah before coming in or drink alcohol.

Speaker 1: 22:47

So these were they really they're only looking at. Is there a difference in water versus coffee? And the other thing is they didn't tell the coffee group to not drink water.

Speaker 2: 22:58

They basically just told the water group to not drink coffee. Yeah, that is okay. Yeah, that's a very interesting point as well.

Speaker 1: 23:06

So I don't think that we can make any takeaway from this study. That you can just replace all your water with coffee? Yeah, because then we're still going to come back to the effects of caffeine on sleep.

Speaker 2: 23:18

Mm-hmm.

Speaker 1: 23:20

And we haven't even brought in sugar.

Speaker 2: 23:22

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 23:23

So, Okay.

Speaker 1: 23:26

Moving on. So then the question of does exercise have an effect on the metabolism of caffeine? So in this study it was done in 2002. It was a smaller study as well, from the journal of applied physiology. The participants included eight active humanoric women. Humanoric women what does that mean? It means women who have predictable and timely menstrual cycles, and six active men in Canada.

Speaker 1: 23:54

So the participants were told to do a VO2 max test, and so they were told to do different levels of warmups and then things that like they were told to do two minutes workload on a bike and to increase that capacity for 15 seconds and kind of continue that, that structure, until their volitional exhaust exhaustion was reached, basically until they couldn't do it anymore. They gave their body composition, they did a bunch of stuff, but overall what they were trying to do was take the women and put them into four randomized eight hour trials. So, uh, they were given, they were put into some different trials based on where they were in their menstrual phase, either their follicular or their luteal phase. And then they were given um, the women in the follicular phase were even given two extra or put into extra groups where they were put in their regular workout clothes, or they were put in like sweatshirts and a bunch of extra clothes to make them sweat even more. And then they had men just provide one exercise trial and then one resting trial, which is the same thing they did with women. They were put in a resting trial, arresting trial or an exercise trial, and then they looked at their body mass by doing some calipers. They had given blood samples and then they ingested caffeine.

Speaker 1: 25:18

After caffeine ingestion in the exercise trial, participants were weighed and then their skin and rectal temperatures were taken, which sounds terrible and then they were told to do the exercise. So one hour after caffeine ingestion, participants exercised for an hour and a half on a cycle ergometer at 65% of their VO2 max, so relatively kind of like a 7 out of 10 on the rate of perceived exertion scale, and they were. After they exercised they were reweighed, they gave another urine sample. They did all of these things and ultimately here's what they found that for the women who did not work out, they tended to have higher plasma caffeine, which I find very interesting and we'll get back to why in a minute.

Speaker 1: 26:09

For the women who exercised there was no difference in heart rate, skin temperature, rectal temperature before the beginning of the exercise. There was no difference in their O2 consumption during the exercise and it didn't seem like there was overall any effect of menstrual cycle, gender or exercise, with or without the extra thermal stress on the absorption, distribution, metabolism or elimination of caffeine in matched men and women. And the reason that I find this interesting is because the women that did that rested. There was a trend for higher plasma caffeine, but it must be that there was no statistically significant difference between those that worked out and those that didn't. So overall it doesn't seem like we excrete caffeine quicker if we work out.

Speaker 2: 27:02

Which is surprising.

Speaker 1: 27:03

I think it is.

Speaker 2: 27:04

Because I thought we would.

Speaker 1: 27:06

I hoped we would.

Speaker 2: 27:08

Yeah, yeah. I really did Um, but it would also make sense if we, if we did if we didn't.

Speaker 1: 27:14

I guess it just works in two just different ways in the body because it feels like I do. I feel like if I work out that I that the effects of caffeine fade quicker, as opposed to if I just drink a bunch of caffeine and just like sit around but it's probably just all placebo effect in my mind.

Speaker 2: 27:34

I guess so.

Speaker 1: 27:35

I guess so Okay. So now let's talk about electrolytes. Do you know what electrolytes are?

Speaker 2: 27:41

No, I don't.

Speaker 1: 27:43

What do you think they are?

Speaker 2: 27:45

I have. I couldn't tell you. I know that they're like in Gatorade Right and some waters, but I have not the first clue.

Speaker 1: 27:53

You know the marketing behind them.

Speaker 2: 27:54

Yeah, but this is the first time I've ever thought about this. I don't know, I've never looked it up, I've never thought about, I just know like, oh yeah, electrolytes Probably a good thing, probably a good thing.

Speaker 1: 28:04

Probably a good thing. So electrolytes conduct electrical charges inside of our body. Electrolytes are what allow our muscles to contract when we need them to, because that is an electrical firing that's happening inside of our body, and they also help with chemical reactions, that help with hydration, that help with fluid balance. They keep us balanced inside of our body. They do a lot of great things, and there's several different types. There's sodium. Sodium, when we have too much of it, can cause confusion or behavior changes, strong reflexes where we may have like be even kind of jumpy if there's too much sodium, a loss of muscle control, seizures. But not enough sodium can cause confusion, can cause irritability, weakened reflexes, nausea, vomiting, seizures, at its worst, even a coma.

Speaker 1: 29:00

Sodium is one of those that you hear a lot about in electrolyte powders and people are very divided about sodium. There's a camp in general that says that you shouldn't have a lot of sodium in your diet and there's another camp that says that sodium, even when it comes to heart disease, is not really the issue if you're properly hydrated. That's not exactly what we're getting into right now, but sodium is important. Then there's magnesium Magnesium. It allows our bodies to relax, it helps our muscles to recover. But too much magnesium can cause problems in the heart, weakened reflexes, decreased breathing ability. But not enough can cause your muscles to twitch. It can cause muscle weakness. It can even cause arrhythmia in the heart. So I've had I've had times in in my life where if I'm really stressed out in life and drinking a lot of coffee, my eyelid will twitch like all day.

Speaker 2: 30:03

Me too.

Speaker 1: 30:05

Yes, that's a magnesium deficiency.

Speaker 2: 30:07

Oh my gosh. Yes I had no idea. Yeah, so you said when you what? When you?

Speaker 1: 30:14

if you're stressed or drinking too much coffee. It can cause twitching in in eye or any muscle that typically people have it in their eyes just have to be coffee or just caffeine in general caffeine in general okay, because sometimes I get it when I when I drink red bulls when you drink red bull

Speaker 1: 30:32

yes is because it's. It's okay, because with electrolytes, yeah for whatever reason, the magnesium is being depleted through the increase in cortisol from the caffeine Interesting and because that electrolyte is out of balance. It causes muscle twitching and it tends to be in the eye, but you can combat it by taking magnesium or natural calm, which is magnesium but it's like the powdered version of it Interesting Okay. That's how I've always cured it.

Speaker 2: 31:00

Well, I just kind of let it ride and just let it twitch.

Speaker 1: 31:06

I mean mine would would twitch for two months. What? Yes, there was a time in my life back in 2018, when we were going through our adoption process and I was so stressed because you were stressed. It twitched and I was drinking a ton of coffee.

Speaker 2: 31:23

Yeah, um, it would twitch every day for two months wow yeah, talk about annoying, just like oh, I know, I know the feeling, yeah, but I've never had it. I mean, we're talking, like you know, 20, 30 minutes, you know oh, max, yeah like you know one day and then like, maybe four days later, maybe it does it again.

Speaker 1: 31:47

Right, no, no.

Speaker 2: 31:49

That's yeah, I would say, you were probably stressed.

Speaker 1: 31:53

Yeah, yeah, that's an understatement. I was also not eating correctly. So that was also the period of my life where I um at the church that we were going to at the time, we did a 30 day fast and I fasted from all food from sun up to sun down, so I was probably only eating about a thousand calories a day, which is way too little, and I was still like working out and and I was dropping a ton of weight and was stressed and had all of that going on and was drinking coffee Cause that's all I could do and were you only doing like the paleo stuff at that point too?

Speaker 1: 32:33

And I was still only doing paleo, yeah, so by the end of that I had lost like 15 or 20 pounds and was, and was visibly like panicky all the time.

Speaker 2: 32:50

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 32:50

My anxiety was through the roof. My panic attacks were like daily. It was incredibly unhealthy.

Speaker 2: 32:56

Wow.

Speaker 1: 32:57

So all this to say, don't do that. Electrolytes are important. There's also potassium, there's calcium, there's chloride, phosphate bicarbonate, there's a ton of these, and when any of them are out of alignment, it can just begin to wreak havoc on the way that we feel. So then, what do you do to stay hydrated and to have our electrolytes in balance in the correct way? And I want to say first, I really don't think, like I do believe that electrolyte balance is important and I believe that even the use of electrolyte powders I use them and we'll talk about more about that in a minute but overall, if you were to go and you should every year you should go and get a physical. If you were to go and get a physical Every year, you should go and get a physical. If you were to go and get a physical, they should test your electrolyte levels in your blood. And even if you don't use electrolyte powder and even if you work out a ton, you are likely still going to have clinically, on blood labs, decently normal electrolytes. So, and if they're not like, that's good to know and your doctor will advise you on what to do if they are clinically out of balance. So when I'm talking about electrolytes and keeping your electrolytes healthy. It's mostly we're talking here about through hydration, and our body will excrete the electric. If we're, if we have enough electrolytes, then our body should, if it's functioning properly, excrete extra electrolytes that we may consume through electrolyte powder that our body doesn't need. So don't feel like you have to take electrolyte powder. You're probably fine. But I do believe that it can be healthy and helpful in trying to stay hydrated, and we're going to cover some reasons for that.

Speaker 1: 34:54

Like we said earlier, we lose electrolytes typically the most when we sweat. So this can be based on us being in a higher elevation. That's affecting our bodies and our sweat, and we may not feel like we're sweating because it's not as hot as we typically would be, but we are actually losing some of our electrolytes and some fluid in our bodies, even though we don't realize it because we're at higher altitudes. It can be if we're in the desert, it can be if we're in a super humid place. Our climate can affect how much we sweat, as well as, of course, physical activity and, as we said before, as well as illness. So we can lose that when we sweat. Our cells use electrolytes to conduct electric currents like contracting muscles the things we said before. It helps our body maintain balance and it's essential for basic life functions.

Speaker 1: 35:48

Electrolytes are essential and electrolytes, again, these are sodium. These are potassium, magnesium, calcium, chloride, phosphate, bicarbonate. These are some of the most common and most necessary electrolytes for our bodies which you can find in foods. All of these things Sodium is salt. It's putting salt on your food. Magnesium can be found in spinach. It can be found in dark chocolate. Potassium can be found many people know bananas, right and many other fruits and vegetables. Calcium you can find this in almonds. You can find this in spinach. You can find it in dairy products. Chloride I don't know off the top of my head, but I know that there's going to be a food or a natural way that you can get any of these. Same with phosphate, same with bicarbonate. You can get any of these in a normal, healthy diet, but it can be helpful if you're not eating a great diet, if you're not eating as many fruits and vegetables as you should or as you typically should, then electrolyte supplementation can be a great way to help you just feel a bit better, and it's shown in the research from 2021 that electrolytes improve hydration.

Speaker 1: 37:02

So there were 19 adults, young adults, that were put into quite a battery of tests and I won't go through everything that they did. But each participant drank four different types of beverages and they were measured before and after each to see how hydrating that beverage was for them. The four different beverages used there was deionized water, which wouldn't have had any electrolytes in it. Sugar-free electrolyte drinks, sports drinks that did have sugar with electrolytes, so that would be like a Gatorade. And alanol glutamine dipeptide with electrolytes. So this alanol glutamine dipeptide was used in this study because in previous studies it had been used and seen to have a rehydration effect after exercise. So it kind of was used as a control based on previous study data that was out there and basically what this study ended up finding was that the inclusion of electrolytes had the largest effect on the beverage hydration index. So there was a way that they did the study where the participants emptied their bladder, then they were given some different things to fill out and analog testing and things to see how hydrating that beverage was that they took for them and so electrolytes had the largest effect. They were the most hydrating according to the beverage hydration scale, which is important to know. So electrolytes did seem to have a positive impact in that study.

Speaker 1: 38:40

There was another study that was done and I am going to bounce a little bit here, but there was another study that was done in 2019 looking at hydration, mood and cognition, and in this study there was 174 participants and bear with me there were several different experimental conditions they were put into. Some people were given an electrolyte capsule with no water, just a capsule with electrolytes. Some people were given a placebo capsule with no water. So they're just looking here about the capsule, like was there something about the capsule that people could think that it was more hydrating or not? So the placebo was given, which wouldn't have done anything.

Speaker 1: 39:24

Another group was given an electrolyte capsule plus water and then a fourth group, the placebo capsule plus water, and then I thought this was really interesting.

Speaker 1: 39:33

The last two groups were given colored water, so the color of it meant nothing, it was just colored plus an electrolyte capsule or colored water and a placebo capsule.

Speaker 1: 39:46

So we have six different control or six different experimental groups that were being used in this and then they were given, they were told to drink these, their given drink over a period of time and they were given several different tests to look at their cognition and to look at their memory and different things like that.

Speaker 1: 40:05

And so here's what the results found that electrolyte and water the people who took the electrolyte capsule with with regular water had the least decline in agreeability. Another way to say that is because one of the assessments that they gave was the agreeableness, so their mood and the people who had electrolytes and water were had the best mood. They stayed in the best mood overall and the combination of electrolyte plus water proved to be the most beneficial. Those who received electrolyte alone so they didn't have any water, given they just had the electrolyte pill reported a significantly greater decline in overall composure and things like that, compared to those who received the electrolyte combined with plain water. Now I found this to be interesting, but, jason, I want to ask why you think that is why the electrolyte plus the water is what made the difference and not just the electrolyte pill uh, I'm well, I'm guessing, because the water has a has the more hydration benefits, and if they just consume the electrolytes alone?

Speaker 1: 41:22

yeah, that would be my assumption yeah because just consuming electrolytes still can imbalance, because we're looking at the balance of electrolytes in the water in your body.

Speaker 2: 41:36

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 41:36

So you still need you still need water the water.

Speaker 2: 41:39

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 41:39

Yes, that's right, that's right.

Speaker 2: 41:41

They were just taking. They were just taking the pill, yep, yeah. So yeah, I mean that's. That would be. My assumption is that you I mean you have have to have, you have to have water. You can't just take a dry electrolyte pill and be OK.

Speaker 1: 41:55

Yeah, this was the other one I found interesting. Those who received the colored water plus electrolytes reported significantly less of a decline in ratings of composure than those who've received electrolyte but no drink. I mean, I guess that. I guess that still is the same as what we just said. Um, they had less decline in their composure so they stayed more composed. Is a is the easier way to understand that? I just find this colored water group so interesting because you know they likely thought they were getting something.

Speaker 1: 42:35

it was like a placebo to the placebo yes, yeah, I don't know, it's interesting or those who received electrolyte plus water, reported less of a decline in energy, so they maintained more energy than those who received electrolyte alone or the electrolyte plus colored water. The people who had the electrolyte plus the colored water literally had the same thing given to them, but as the people who were the electrolyte plus water group, but they reported more of a decline in energy just because the color of their water was different.

Speaker 2: 43:11

Yeah, I don't, I don't know.

Speaker 1: 43:16

This is so fascinating.

Speaker 2: 43:18

I know.

Speaker 1: 43:20

But perhaps my favorite one was that the combination of electrolyte and water most effectively prevented an increase in anxiety. So there is again. This goes back to like electrolytes help maintain balance.

Speaker 2: 43:33

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 43:34

Maintain balance. So how can we continue to maintain balance? Well, it seems that electrolytes with water lead to the best way that we can maintain balance in our body, according to these two research studies.

Speaker 2: 43:47

Well, I agree.

Speaker 1: 43:49

You drink electrolyte powder because it turns a weird blue color.

Speaker 2: 43:53

No, that's just crystallite, it's not electrolyte powder, never mind We'll cut that part.

Speaker 1: 44:02

No, I think it should stay.

Speaker 2: 44:06

No, if you're watching this, obviously it stayed in.

Speaker 1: 44:09

Obviously it did. Another point is that water can aid in weight loss. So not only do we see that water, plus electrolytes, can help us with memory, with mood, with cognition, we can also see from this study in 2010 that water can help with weight loss. So overweight or obese men and women between the ages of 55 and 75 years were a part of this study and they went through being put on hypocaloric diets. Both groups were put on a hypo, so less than the amount of calories that they were supposed to eat, and then they were split into groups where one group was told to drink water but not given water, and another group was given water 16 ounces of water before each meal that they took, and this lasted for 12 weeks. Weight declined significantly for both groups, but the water group showed a 44% greater decline over the 12 weeks than the non-water group, and also the decline in total fat mass was greater in the water group.

Speaker 1: 45:31

Bmi, waist circumference, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, low density lipoprotein cholesterol and triglyceride concentrations were observed for both of the groups, but there was not exactly a difference in groups between those, which I think is pretty interesting. But they were both eating a hypocaloric diet, which could help improve all of those measurements. Caloric diet, which could help improve all of those measurements, and overall, combined with a hypo caloric diet consuming 500 milliliters of water, which is 16 ounces prior to each of the three main daily meals, led to almost a two kilogram. So that would be like almost 4.5, nearly five pounds greater weight loss over 12 weeks compared to a hypocaloric diet alone in middle and older aged adults.

Speaker 2: 46:17

That's insane, like actually.

Speaker 1: 46:21

Nothing else changed. And here's the other thing that makes the results of this actually pretty astonishing is that they were not given their meals every day. They were just instructed on what to eat. I believe, yeah, because both groups received instructions from a registered dietitian. They were told to maintain their current level of physical activity. They weren't given all of their meals, they were just told to eat a hypochloric diet, which people historically are terrible at following the rules of that and knowing whether they're actually eating enough or not enough. So really it does seem to be that there was a huge impact of just the water.

Speaker 2: 47:04

Just the water, because I mean there's probably a good percentage of these people didn't follow specifically exactly the diet they were supposed to follow, so some people might have eaten more, some people might have eaten a little bit less, but more than likely probably more. And yeah, I mean it definitely seems like the water was the main factor, for sure, they stated it was likely because of the increased sensations of fullness. Because you're drinking right before you eat.

Speaker 1: 47:34

And you're drinking 16 ounces. You're drinking that whole water bottle.

Speaker 2: 47:39

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 47:39

Right in front of you before, and so think of how many times like. Think of the last time you drank a full bottle of water right before eating a meal.

Speaker 2: 47:48

Never, never, never.

Speaker 1: 47:51

I don't ever do it.

Speaker 2: 47:52

Yeah, I mean.

Speaker 1: 47:54

I'm going to try it.

Speaker 2: 47:56

I am too my like. The wheels are turning up here. I'm going to start doing this every meal.

Speaker 1: 48:00

This is so simple.

Speaker 2: 48:01

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 48:02

Implementation intentions. Jason, Do you have a bottle that size? Is that yours?

Speaker 2: 48:09

No.

Speaker 1: 48:10

Who says this? Why is it? I don't know.

Speaker 2: 48:12

I think we used it for a different recording. I was just pointing in a glass.

Speaker 1: 48:15

So then, all you need to do is get a bottle like that, and I think I have one and before every meal just fill it up and drink it before you let yourself eat, do it for. Well this is. This was 12 weeks, but do it for well this is.

Speaker 2: 48:33

This was 12 weeks, but do it for just two weeks.

Speaker 1: 48:34

Yeah, I'm gonna do it, I'm gonna do it.

Speaker 2: 48:35

We'll do our own research, that's right.

Speaker 1: 48:36

Yeah, I'll do it do it for 16 weeks and then, by the time I get back from sabbatical, we can talk about the results.

Speaker 2: 48:44

I might be 180 pounds at that point there.

Speaker 1: 48:48

I don't know that that's healthy, but we will look. Yeah, that's a super easy takeaway. Another thing that I will point out with this and this isn't just crazy talk but with bottles of water, you should be very concerned about leaving plastic bottles of water in your car when it gets hot outside and then drinking from them. Don't do it.

Speaker 2: 49:13

Yeah, I've my mom's a nurse. She thinks everything gives you cancer. So she's uh, she ingrained that in me from a very, very young age.

Speaker 1: 49:23

So yeah, I can't say that. I always adhere to that but I always do it.

Speaker 2: 49:30

I mean, it's like ingrained. Yeah, I'm like I wouldn't say terrified, but maybe a little bit to like drink out of a water bottle If it's been sitting in my car. I'll never like, I won't ever do it. Unopened, I mean opened or unopened, I won't touch it. If I mean opened or unopened, I won't touch it. If it's been sitting in my car for more than a day, I'm not touching it.

Speaker 1: 49:53

It's going right in the trash. Do you ever wonder, though, about how you're not even going to pour the water out on a plant?

Speaker 2: 50:01

Sure, that is so besides the point, so besides the point.

Speaker 1: 50:08

Give the plant cancer? Yeah, I don't know. I would pour it on the plant, but what wait? What was I gonna say about that? Oh, my goodness water. Oh, do you not wonder that if, in transportation to the grocery store, it was in a hot vehicle?

Speaker 2: 50:26

no, most of those vehicles are like refrigerated they.

Speaker 1: 50:30

They keep water cold.

Speaker 2: 50:31

I mean they're being transported with like Cokes and because, like all your major, Do they keep Coke cold? I would assume. So yeah, Do we know? I mean, I don't know 100%, but who knows? We might have to cut this because I could be completely wrong.

Speaker 1: 50:51

I could definitely be completely wrong. Either way, it's best. It's best not to drink water out of a hot plasticky bottle overall. So what are some tips to help you drink more water? Electrolytes can be important, and you may be thinking well, if I'm going to add electrolyte powder to my water, where do I even start? I would encourage you to begin looking at electrolyte powders that include stevia and not sugar. There's a lot of popular brands out there that are electrolyte powders, but they have a lot of sugar in them that it's worth the blood glucose spike, the extra sugar in your diet to get those extra electrolytes in with, or even something popular like Gatorade. I always opt and I know there's probably sucralose in some of these, but I always tend to opt, if I'm going to get one of those more mainstream ones, to at least get the Gatorade zeros or the Powerade zeros instead of the ones that are full of calories and sugar. You just did this.

Speaker 2: 51:54

Yeah, I just made a face because I hate the taste of the zero sugar ones.

Speaker 1: 52:00

I actually love the blue ones. Of any of them, the blue and the white are my favorite, favorite, favorite.

Speaker 2: 52:07

Yeah, I just, I don't know, I can't do it.

Speaker 1: 52:11

So I really like and we don't have any affiliations with these people I have used Ultima as an electrolyte, an electrolyte powder. I've really liked that, specifically the passion fruit and the grape flavors. I have used LMNT for several years, on and off. I don't use LMNT or element I don't I really don't know the right way to say it daily, but I use it. Probably in the summer I'll use it more often because I'm sweating a whole lot more when I work out and I just started using a new one called feel good.

Speaker 2: 52:47

Interesting.

Speaker 1: 52:48

Yeah, and this, this guava powder, uh, or it's a guava uh flavor that I'm using right now and it's really good, and all of those are stevia sweetened.

Speaker 2: 52:58

Yeah, does it make you feel good.

Speaker 1: 52:59

I mean yeah.

Speaker 2: 53:00

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 53:01

And I've been trying to do that first thing in the morning now, instead of coffee and drinking like this much like 30 ounces.

Speaker 2: 53:08

Kind of like as a proactive, not of not as a reactive, right yeah.

Speaker 1: 53:12

Yeah, and so what I have found with any of them is I will double the amount of water, because typically they'll say put in 16 ounces of water and that's good. It's just a very strong flavor. And I it's not that I don't mind the strong, I like the strong flavor, but I don't want to get addicted to the strong flavor. And I it's not that I don't mind the strong, I like the strong flavor, but I don't want to get addicted to the strong flavor. I'd rather it be uh, and I don't not actually addicted, but I don't want that to be what I'm craving. To where, then? I don't want to drink water if it doesn't have that in it.

Speaker 2: 53:45

Yeah, would you? This is a question off of that, would you, cause I don't think there's anything that we've seen in in our research that we've done so far on this Would you think there's a benefit to doing to drinking electrolyte powder proactively? Oh yeah Over like reactively. Oh yeah, I think that would be the better way to do it. Yeah, that way you're kind of you're setting yourself up to have those electrolytes already in, as opposed to having too little and then having to re-up.

Speaker 1: 54:14

Yeah, and there was a formula I don't remember who it was that um, maybe it was Andy Galpin, maybe it was Dr Andy Galpin, who's? Who basically had a formula of for every 15 minutes it was either Andy Galpin or Lane Norton Every 15 minutes that you work out, you should replenish with an extra four ounces of water and probably ideally, electrolyte filled, I would say, especially if you sweat you sweat it a lot yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 2: 54:50

Interesting Okay.

Speaker 1: 54:53

So some tips carry a refillable water bottle. That's made a huge difference for me and I found that the bigger the water bottle, the easier it is for me to drink, because I just have to fill this one up like three times a day. So it can kind of help me know of like, okay, drink one or one and a half by lunch. Drink the other one and a half of these by the end of the day. The second tip is choose water over sugar drinks.

Speaker 2: 55:22

Who are you looking at? You're looking at me. Yeah, I know you are Dang it.

Speaker 1: 55:28

When eating out. Opt for water. It saves money too, which is great. Drink low or no calorie beverages like plain coffee, tea, sparkling water, seltzers, flavored water All of those can be helpful and consume drinks that have important nutrients. So we didn't necessarily get into this part of it. But if you are going to drink your calories, then let's make sure that it has some protein in it. So you can do low fat or fat-free milk. You can even do whole milk. As far as I care, if it's milk and has the protein in it, then I think the fat from it is gonna be just fine. Unsweetened fortified milk alternatives. I have no earthly idea what those are Almond milk, oat milk.

Speaker 2: 56:18

Sure, I mean yeah, I would imagine.

Speaker 1: 56:20

So, yeah, just the unsweetened part threw me off for a minute. Uh, or you could drink fruit or vegetable juice which can help with calcium, potassium or vitamin D. I still would. That would be like my last thing I would recommend someone drink. I would so much rather you eat the fruit or eat the vegetable than drink the juice from it, because you're still going to get the same insulin spike, just as if you were drinking the sugar, like you might as well drink a Mountain Dew.

Speaker 2: 56:51

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 56:52

No, I'm not saying you should, I'm saying I don't know that it's that much better, but at least this one has like vitamin C, vitamin D, potassium and different things like that. So those are our takeaways on hydration, electrolytes and caffeine.

Speaker 2: 57:13

Quick question.

Speaker 1: 57:13

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 57:14

Before we end have you heard anything or seen anything in the research about drinking milk to rehydrate?

Speaker 1: 57:23

Rob has my husband.

Speaker 2: 57:25

So I saw something not long ago about how milk can actually be a really good thing to drink when you're dehydrated or need to rehydrate because, it almost happens quicker. It seems like from what I've read.

Speaker 1: 57:40

Well, it has all the essential carbs, fat and protein.

Speaker 2: 57:43

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 57:45

Which also means that even though it does have a decent amount of carbs in it and sugar, like the natural sugars of milk in it, because it has the fat and the protein, you're not going to get the same insulin spike or insulin response from it and it can be incredibly rehydrating. I know that Rob would always drink that after weightlifting.

Speaker 1: 58:08

Okay, yeah that after weightlifting. Okay, yeah, because he had read a study that said that drinking milk chocolate milk, which I was like you probably get the same results of regular milk, but uh, that the chocolate milk was also like really great for your muscles and and re yeah not hydrate, that's not the word I'm looking for, but as a recovery from after a hard workout my dad drinks chocolate milk after after a workout.

Speaker 2: 58:35

He's done it for years is he in good shape?

Speaker 1: 58:40

yeah, maybe there's something to it yeah, maybe, so I don't remember the last time I've drank milk, just like a glass of milk I I probably drink too much milk. Rob drinks too much milk.

Speaker 2: 58:53

Yeah, like I'm talking, like I can easily like, just in one sitting, drink like half a gallon. Like it's so easy for me to drink milk, especially if it's like skim milk.

Speaker 1: 59:05

Have you ever done the gallon challenge?

Speaker 2: 59:06

Nope, because it's like impossible. Yeah, that would be like impossible. Yeah, that would be the result, yep.

Speaker 1: 59:12

That would be the result. What are your takeaways from today's episode?

Speaker 2: 59:16

Drink more water. Drink more electrolytes, plus water.

Speaker 1: 59:23

And there's one thing you said you were gonna do.

Speaker 2: 59:26

Oh, drink the 16 ounces of water before every major meal, and I'm going to do that.

Speaker 1: 59:33

Do it.

Speaker 2: 59:33

I'm actually going to go chug a glass of water right now and eat a snack.

Speaker 1: 59:38

There you go. A healthy snack, a healthy snack.

Speaker 2: 59:41

Ish.

Speaker 1: 59:42

Perfect. Well, we would love to know your takeaways, as well as always. If you enjoyed this episode, we would love if you would subscribe on YouTube If you're watching us there, follow the podcast If you're listening as a podcast wherever you listen to podcasts and share this with a friend if you think that they would find it beneficial. Overall, we are so glad that you listened to this podcast. I know that I am. I love talking about these things and I love sharing what I am learning along with you. Until next time, stay strong.