||| BY REGINA ZWILLING |||
Regina has been a massage therapist, yoga practitioner and teacher, and a nutritionist for 20+ years. She co-owned several yoga studios and in that capacity led yoga teacher trainings and several cleanses, helping hundreds of people learn how to truly nourish their bodies and live their most vibrant life. Today, Regina still loves teaching and practicing yoga and helping people feel great in their bodies. She has written a book called Health is a Habit based on her decades of experience in this area, and is offering an online course to dive deeper into the material.
Water. One of the most basic human needs. We all know we *should* be drinking water. Some of us may think we need to be drinking *more* water. But the real question is, are you drinking the right water.
If you are drinking water straight from the tap, or from a plastic bottle, then you are likely drinking water that is not adequately hydrating. In fact, most plain water, regardless of the source, may be doing more harm than good for your health. Tap water is often full of contaminants: runoff from roads (rubber from tires and gas and oil from cars and trucks) and agricultural fields (with high levels of pesticides, herbicides and industrial fertilizers); as well as residues from many pharmaceutical and over the counter drugs (antidepressants, blood pressure medications, birth control, and much more). Check out Environmental Working Group’s tap water database to find out about levels of contaminants in the water in your area.
Most plastic bottled water is just cleverly marketed tap water, with the added problem of chemicals leaching from the plastic into the water. And then there is the problem of how to dispose of all the plastic from water bottles. According to earthday.org, Americans use about 50 billion plastic water bottles every year, of which roughly 91% ends up in the landfill.
So what’s the solution? First, a good filter is a must. I recommend the Berkey filter, rather than the pitcher filters that are popular. The pitcher-style filters generally improve odors and flavors, but not necessarily the actual contaminants in water. The Berkey filter is a gravity style filter that removes most contaminants. If you live in an area where fluoride is added to your water, I strongly recommend getting the fluoride filter.
I also strongly recommend a shower filter to remove chlorine and other contaminants from your shower. The hot water turns the chemicals into steam which is easily inhaled and absorbed through your skin.
Once you have pure, filtered water, adding minerals to your water is an important step in optimal hydration. Plain water can actually strip your body of critical minerals, especially magnesium. I know, hard to believe, but true. Adding minerals back to your water creates a more hydrating water that can help to replenish our bodies’ depleted mineral stores. Most of us are highly mineral deficient, for a wide variety of reasons. First and foremost, many of us eat highly processed foods that are grown in depleted soils (with a few industrial chemicals applied to get the food to grow). These foods not only don’t provide nutrition, they are like negative nutrition in that our bodies take minerals form our bones and other vital organs to buffer the toxins in the foods. Other reasons we are so depleted is through stressful lifestyles (our bodies burn through minerals to mediate the effects of stress) and many medications we take.
By adding a pinch of salt (Real Salt is a great brand) or minerals (such as Trace Minerals), every time you drink water, you can easily make your water more hydrating and start to mitigate the effects of our current lifestyles.
If you want to learn more about how to remineralize your body for optimal health, along with other strategies to optimize your nutrition, sleep, movement and more, check out my new book and online course Health is a Habit. Email me at regina@zwillinghealth.com with questions or to learn more!
While I agree in principle with Regina’s comments, I would add that ESWUA and other water systems on Orcas are treating and filtering their water sources as currently required by law. If the levels of contaminants that are passing through their systems are concerning, it is because the allowable levels of contaminants is set too high, not that the systems are being mismanaged. I would also add that most well water has plenty of minerals, often more than desirable and/or is unbalanced compared to what we actually need.
Just like every other species of land mammal, humans evolved drinking surface water, which is highly variable in mineral and contaminant content, so we actually are quite resilient at tolerating all kinds of water, including tap water. It is clearly healthier for the environment and for us to stay hydrated by drinking a glass of tap water than it is to be thirsty or to drink tap water from somewhere else out of a plastic bottle.
I would like to see an experiment that took a bunch of potted plants (like the seedlings on everyone’s windowsills maybe?) and watered half with Eastsound tap water and half with Berkey filtered + minerals added water and see if there is any observable difference. A mineralogical test could be done with the dried plants after they are grown to see if they uptake additional minerals from the filtered and enhanced water. My working hypothesis is that there are certain minimum levels of minerals and other nutrients, below which organisms do not thrive but above which the minerals are simply not absorbed or are excreted as waste.
It’s amazing how much people fear natural water.
In the 1980’s my friend and I built a shack in the deep coast range of Oregon. We never carried a canteen because creeks were everywhere, in an environment where one would expect water-borne disease.
Even when the creeks were high and running, we filled 5-gallon buckets and let the mud settle before drinking. No problems. As natural as it gets.
Now we have a shallow well here, get plenty of minerals and have no health issues, unfiltered at the level described in the article.
Agree completely about the outrageous scam of commercial bottled water in plastic bottles (what’s next–air?) We’re blessed with great (if rocky) water here–so far. Interestingly, when we had our good, filtered spring water tested recently, it came up with a high salt (NaCl) content–apparently added by our water filter! so we’ve been buying reverse-osmosed refills from Island Market. Mostly, though, I go back to my mother’s old adage about water: “Don’t drink it–rusts the constitution”, or WC Fields’ observation about the procreation of fish therein. In the end, simpler and more satisfying to stick with whiskey…
Brian – There’s an old saying in the West, “Water is for fighting. Whisky is for drinking.”