Dehydration Osteopenia Osteoporosis Not many people think of chronic dehydration as a cause of Osteopenia and Osteoporosis but it is. Doctor F. Batmanghelidj has several books on the topic of chronic dehydration as being a common cause of many health conditions. espec
Osteoporosis is one. But long before Dr. Batmanghelidj began to bring the his research to the public, I recall reading of a Dehydration Osteopenia Osteoporosis connection in a newsletter by a physician who researched the medical practices of aborigines.
At the time NO ONE else was talking about Dehydration Osteopenia Osteoporosis connection and I was more taken with studies about the importance of silica, magnesium and other supplements. Somehow the Dehydration Osteopenia Osteoporosis cause of bone loss slipped from mind. But doing research for this site brought it back to mind.
Could you be dehydrated? Most people in the developed world never think of ourselves as dehydrated because the consume a quart or more of liquids each day.
But Dr. Batmanghelidj points out is that LIQUIDS DO NOT COUNT. If fact many liquids are, in themselves dehydrating. It is water, plain water that you need for your bones.
How much water? If you weigh 160lbs or less, you need two quarts - 8 full glasses of water a day. If you weight more than 160lbs, divide your weight by 20 and you will know how many glasses of water you need.
AND if you drink anything with caffeine, you need even more water. Any drink with caffeine is dehydrating and you need two glasses of plain water to make up for 1 glass caffeinated. AND diet sodas, Dr. Batmanghelidj states are downright dangerous and should not taken at all. (He offers studies showing that adolescents giving up diet soda, automatically begin to lose excess fat.)
Most people will say they never feel thirsty and Dr. B agrees. He says that with years of chronic dehydration we lose our sense of thirst. Many people grow to interpret the 'thirst signal' as a hunger signal and they snack instead of drinking 8 oz of water.
As for the bone loss connection, Dehydration Osteopenia Osteoporosis connection is found in Water: For Health, for Healing, for Life: You're Not Sick, You're Thirsty!Dr. Batmamgjelidj gives the physiology behind the slow erosion of bone density by chronic dehydration.
(Dr. Batmamgjelidj has other books, for example,Your Body's Many Cries for Water which is more informal with examples from his practice.
If you have Osteopenia or Osteoporosis I suggest that you consider Chronic Dehydration as one of your possible causes. After years of chronic dehydration the chemistry of your body may have eroded bone as part of its response to not enough water. The remedy is simple enough. Drink enough water. Stop drinking sodas and caffeinated drinks. Or if you must drink caffeine, be sure to consume twice as much plain water for each caffeinated drink you take.
What you may find in the process of your personal 'water cure' is that all sort of other health conditions begin to disappear too. Dehydration may not be the ONLY cause of your bone loss but it may well be one and if so, it needs to be addressed.
Read about other: Causes of Osteopenia, Osteoporosis
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