Water Weight (inflammation) – the importance of getting the water out. Sometimes when you tell people how much weight you’ve lost in a week or at the beginning of a diet, they say “oh its just water weight you didn’t lose that much fat.” Not exactly an example of a positive reinforcement or encouragement.

I have often found myself not giving my self enough credit for losing “water” weight and under valuing it’s importance to my overall weight and health. But as I have read more about edema and adjusting my food choices to very low sodium to help lower my blood pressure, I have come to the conclusion that losing the “water” weight is JUST as important as the weight from fat.

Excess water in your body makes you feel bloated, sluggish and “fat.” Losing the water weight gives you a real boost to see the numbers on the scale go down which is a great motivation to stick with a diet plan.

Excess water (edema) can be dangerous to your body — it can cause high blood pressure, it hinders the flow of fluids throughout the body slowing down the ability to eliminate waste or bring nutrients to the cells because the circulatory system is sluggish.

Excess water weight is also putting a strain on your joints and heart - they don’t know the difference of what is causing the weight, they only know it’s a lot to carry around.

Also it only makes sense that the body fluid (water) has to be flowing and being lost in order to transport the fat out of the cells so the fat can be lost too. So the more water weight you lose, it has to be beneficial to the overall fat loss as well.

Some ways to get the water out:

  • Lowering your sodium intake to below 1500 mg per day and getting some movement (even light exercise) can really help get the water moving out of your body and flowing again.
  • Proper nutrition and drinking enough water to meet your body’s needs also reduces water retention, because the body will hold on to fluid if it is malnourished or dehydrated.

It’s kinda ironic that you need to put more water in your body, to get more water out — but think of it as the ebb and flow of your body’s fluids. Just watch the sodium content of what you are drinking — some sodas and flavored drinks can be very high in sodium, so stick to water, crystal light, herbal tea, homemade lemonade with splenda, homemade veggie broth, or other low sodium, 0 (or almost 0) calorie liquid.

I found a great online shop for a wonderful selection of low sodium items called Healthy Heart Market. They have lots of info. and some recipes too for low sodium cooking. I placed a large order today and I’m looking forward to trying out a lot of 0 sodium and very low sodium new foods (even Pickles!!!!).

I will write reviews here as I use them. I also ordered three new no salt added cookbooks that should arrive in the next week or so.

So don’t undervalue the importance of losing water weight. Pat your self on the back when ever the scale moves down a bit — it’s hard work losing weight whether is water or fat. Get the water out, keep eating healthy low sodium foods and move your body (the lymph system doesn’t have a pump - you have to move the body to get the fluid to move).

Three Cheers for Losing Water Weight!

********************

Technorati Tags

Rate:
2.5

Tags: , , , , , , ,