Water

Water is ultimately the drink of choice.  Not only is it healthy, but it can prevent, cure, and/or alleviate any number of health difficulties.  In fact, dehydration -- not enough water -- is often the ultimate cause of death in any number of disease inflicted and/or injury caused health problems.  At the same time, dehydration derives from the most common of sources, including:  Beer, soft drinks (root beer, et al), chocolate, beef, and ice cream.  (And if that doesn’t ruin your day, you’re either unconscious, or you’re someone who is partial to suffering and deprivation of the basic necessities of life!)  

On the basis of Health and Responsibility, we can whole-heartedly recommend water (and not some watered-down version) .  There are no Drug Reactions, no Drug Enforcers involved (at least, not yet), and it represents the ultimate in Inexpensive Remedies. 

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Disclaimer

The information contained within the pages of this website is for educational purposes only.  Nothing set forth herein is intended to be medical advice or able to be construed as such.  This discussion is private in entirety and non-negotiable between the parties.  Anyone acting on any of the contents herein does so solely on the basis of her or his own volition and at his or her own risk.  Everyone has the duty and absolute right to think, evaluate, research, learn, and act autonomously.  Inasmuch as Medicine and Law equate to the “right” to use potentially deadly force (destructive violence), it would appear prudent for anyone to refrain from adopting any course of action without first understanding the basis and reasons thereof and how to defend it if challenged.

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For the healthy consciousness, we obtain “an exquisite crystalline transformation of water” -- i.e. “we are constantly transforming the living energy around us and within us, creating crystalline shapes of harmony and divine resonance -- with positive thoughts, compassion, meditation, generosity, etceteras.”  

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The top essentials of life include:  Oxygen, water, salt, potassium, and exercise.  No one can live without these.  Mainstream medicine too often ignores water and salt in favor of selling drugs and procedures to treat the symptoms of dehydration.  

Nothing kills life quicker than lack of water.  

The people with the worst health drink the least water and use the most deadly diuretic drought-causing drugs - caffeine and/or alcohol.  

The salinity of the water outside the cells in our bodies is the same as the ocean.  

In the middle ages people were put to a horrible death by salt deprivation.  

Health care makes big bucks by selling a quart of water with salt in it (Saline 4) for up to $350.00 installed, but won’t tell the patients they do indeed need more water and salt in their diets.  

How can you expect drug companies and pharmaceutical corporations to do research on the importance of water in our daily lives when they can’t make money on it?  Who does research to put themselves out of business?  

No two substances in the Bible are mentioned more than water and salt.  

The environment of an unborn baby is water and  salt.  

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On a more point by point basis, the positive aspects of the water equation include:  

z Water depresses the appetite naturally and helps the body metabolize stored fat.  A decrease in water intake will actually increase fat deposits.  Why?  Fluids are what make the kidneys function properly.  Without them, the load gets shifted onto the liver.  If the liver has to carry some of the kidney’s burden, it can’t do its own job of metabolizing fat. Therefore, more fat is stored and weight increases.

z Drinking water decreases fluid retention.  When the body doesn’t receive enough water, it begins to store additional water in the tissues.  This shows up as swelling in the limbs.  Diuretics force some of this “stored” fluid out of the cells.  The best way to get rid of fluid retention is to give the body what it needs most: water.  Also, water retention may be caused by excess salt.  By drinking more water, the sodium levels in the system are reduced and the sodium is flushed from the cells, thus decreasing the swelling.

z Those who are overweight need more water.  The larger the person, the larger the metabolic load.  If you know that lack of water causes the liver to lessen the job of metabolizing fat, then it makes sense that overweight people need more water.  Water rids the body of wastes. 

z Adequate water intake helps rid the body of wastes that are produced when weight loss occurs from metabolism of fats.

z Water maintains muscle tone.  Water plumps up the tissues, prevents dehydration, helps the muscles to contract, prevents sagging skin and helps the skin stay healthy.

z Water relieves constipation.  If you don’t drink water, the body will take what it needs from other areas of the body, like the intestines.  This can create constipation.  Adequate water intake can prevent this from occurring.  

Research has demonstrated the medicinal effects of water [1], and that water can prevent, relieve and cure many painful degenerative diseases. By drinking plenty of water on a regular basis, studies show it is possible to avoid diseases and painful conditions that require pharmaceutical drugs and expensive medical procedures.  

Crisis calls of the body for water include: pain, asthma, diabetes, hypertension, multiple sclerosis, chronic fatigue syndrome, and more.  Unintentional dehydration leads to illness and painful, degenerative diseases that can be prevented, treated, and cured by drinking plenty of water.  This includes: preventing and reversing premature aging, eliminating back pain, arthritis, colitis pain, anginal pain, heartburn, migraine headaches, and hypertension.  

Drinking enough water?  Probably not.  Most people are dehydrated to some extent.  An article by Reuters/Sightings reported on a survey of more than 2,800 people living in 14 cities in the United States, which was conducted by an independent research group for the International Bottled Water Association.  Of course, the latter implies a potential conflict of interest between the survey results and the funding for the survey -- and thus the results may be questionable.  However, despite the fact the IBWA might be making more money as a result of the survey, there is every likelihood that the survey was indeed accurate.  

The survey results indicated that few Americans consistently drank the recommended dose of eight 8-ounce servings of water per day.  Three quarters of Americans were aware of the recommendation, but only 34% lived up to it.  While most managed 6 servings, almost 10% failed to drink any water at all.  Instead, they drank nearly 6 servings a day of soda, coffee, and caffeinated beverages, which cause the body to lose water, making proper hydration even more difficult to attain. 

The report also noted that water makes up more than 70% of the body’s tissues and plays a role in nearly every body function from regulating temperature and cushioning joints to bringing oxygen to the cells and removing waste from the body.  Severe dehydration can affect blood pressure, circulation, digestion and kidney function.  On a daily basis, not getting enough water can cause fatigue, dry skin, headaches and constipation.

“Without proper hydration, the body is exposed to a variety of health risks,” said Dr. Barbara Levine, director of human nutrition at The Rockefeller University in New York, which commissioned the survey.  In fact, in the survey 37% of the respondents mistakenly believe that people need less water in cold weather and 49% erroneously believe the body loses less water while sleeping than while awake.  And nearly one-third did not know that giving a child water instead of sugar-containing drinks such as juice or soda can help prevent childhood obesity. 

In an unrelated study, it was found that 75% of Americans are chronically dehydrated  (which likely applies to the world as well), and that for 37% of Americans, the thirst mechanism is so weak that it is often mistaken for hunger.  

It’s important to realize that:  

Even mild dehydration will slow down one's metabolism as much as 3%.

One glass of water can shut down midnight hunger pangs for almost all dieters.

Lack of water is the number one trigger of daytime fatigue.

Preliminary research indicates that 8-10 glasses of water a day could significantly ease back and joint pain for up to 80% of sufferers.

A mere 2% drop in body water can trigger fuzzy short-term memory, trouble with basic math, and difficulty focusing on the computer screen or on a printed page.

Drinking 5 glasses of water daily decreases the risk of colon cancer by 45%, plus it can slash the risk of breast cancer by 79%, and one is 50% less likely to develop bladder cancer.

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Then there are the comparison studies:  water and salt, and water and coke.  First, salt.  

In a study led by Dr. Michael Alderman, chairman of  epidemiology at Albert Einstein School of Medicine in New York and president of the American Society of Hypertension, a low-salt diet was found not to be so healthy after all.  The study concluded that the less salt people eat, the higher their risk of an untimely death.  

“The lower the sodium, the worse off you are,” Alderman said.  “There’s an association.  Is it the cause?  I don’t  know.  [But] any way you slice it, that’s not an argument for eating a low sodium diet.”  The study also suggested the government should consider  suspending it’s recommendation that people restrict the amount of salt they eat.  

To add a bit of salt to the paradigm-shaking wound, it might be worthwhile to consider some interesting facts about water and salt.  In particular, salt intake is vital to life.  It is critical in ensuring the survival of all living  creatures, particularly humans.  

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Additional information on salt intake has been taken from Dr. Batmanghelidj’s book, Water: Rx for a Healthier Pain-Free Life, and includes:  

h Water and salt regulate the water content of the body.  Specifically, water regulates the water content of the interior of the cell by working its way into all of the cells it reaches, where it cleanses and extracts the toxic wastes of cell metabolisms.  Salt forces some water to stay outside the cells for balance.  There are in fact two oceans of water in the body; one ocean inside  the cells of the body, and the other ocean outside the cells. Good health depends on a most delicate balance between the volume of these oceans, and this balance is achieved by salt -- unrefined salt.  When water is available to get inside the cells freely, it is filtered from the outside salty ocean and injected into the cells that are being overworked despite their water shortage.  This is the reason why in severe dehydration we develop an edema and retain water.  

h The design of our bodies is such that the extent of the ocean of water outside the cells is expanded to have the extra water available for filtration and emergency injection into vital cells.  The brain commands an increase in salt and water retention by the kidneys. This is how we get an edema when we don’t drink enough water.  The process of water filtration and its delivery into the cells is more efficient at night when the body is horizontal.  The collected water, that mostly pools in the legs, does not have to fight the force of gravity to get into the blood circulation.  

h If reliance of this process of emergency hydration of some cells continues for long, the lungs begin to get waterlogged at night, and breathing becomes difficult.  The person needs more pillows to sit upright to sleep.  This condition is due to dehydration.  One can overload the system by drinking too much water at the beginning.  Increases in water intake should be slow and spread out until urine production begins to increase at the same rate that one is drinking water.  When one drinks enough water to pass clear urine, they also pass out a lot of the salt that was held back.  This is how one can get rid of edema fluid in the body; by drinking more water.  Not diuretics, but more water!!  

h In people who have an extensive edema and show signs of their heart beginning to have irregular or very rapid beats with the least effort, the increase in water intake should  be gradual and spaced out, but not withheld from the body.  Naturally, salt intake should be limited for two or three days because the body is still in an overdrive mode to retain it. Once the edema has cleared up, salt should not be withheld from the body.  

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Salt has many other functions than just regulating the  water content of the body.  Some of the more vital functions of salt in the body are:  

1. Salt is effective in stabilizing irregular heartbeats and, contrary to the misconception it causes high blood pressure, it is actually essential for the regulation of blood pressure - in conjunction with water.  Naturally the proportions are critical.  

2. Salt is vital to the extraction of excess acidity from the cells in the body, particularly the brain cells.  [I.e., is your Congressman getting enough salt?]  

3. Salt is vital for balancing the sugar levels in the blood; a needed element in diabetics.  

4. Salt is vital for the generation of hydroelectric energy in cells of the body.  It is used for local power generation at the sites of energy need by the cells.  

5. Salt is vital to the nerve cells’ communication and information processing all the time that the brain cells work, from the moment of conception to death.  

6. Salt is vital for absorption of food particles through the intestinal tract.  

7. Salt is vital for the clearance of the lungs of mucus plugs and sticky phlegm, particularly in asthma and cystic fibrosis.  

8. Salt is vital for clearing up catarrh and congestion of the sinuses.  

9. Salt is a strong natural antihistamine.  

10. Salt is essential for the prevention of muscle cramps.  

11. Salt is vital to prevent excess saliva production to the point that it flows out of the mouth during sleep.  Needing to constantly mop up excess saliva indicates salt shortage.

12. Salt is absolutely vital to making the structure of bones firm.  Osteoporosis, in a major way, is a result of salt and water shortage in the body.  

13. Salt is vital for sleep regulation.  It is a natural hypnotic.  

14. Salt is a vitally needed element in the treatment of diabetics.  

15. Salt on the tongue will stop persistent dry coughs.  

16. Salt is vital for the prevention of gout and gouty arthritis.  

17. Salt is vital for maintaining sexuality and libido.  [Finally!  An important reason!]  

18. Salt is vital for preventing varicose veins and spider veins on the legs and thighs.  

19. Salt is vital for reducing a double chin.  When the body is short of salt, it means the body really is short of water.  The salivary glands sense the salt shortage and are obliged  to produce more saliva to lubricate the act of chewing and swallowing and also to supply the stomach with water that it needs for breaking down foods.  Circulation to the salivary glands increases and the blood vessels become “leaky” in order to supply the glands with water to manufacture saliva.  The “leakiness” spills beyond the area of the glands themselves, causing increased bulk under the  skin of the chin, cheeks and into the neck.

20. Sea salt contains about 80 mineral elements that the body needs.  Some of these elements are needed in trace  amounts.  Unrefined sea salt is a better choice of salt than other types of salt on the market.  Ordinary table salt that is bought in the super markets has been stripped of its companion elements and contains additive elements such as aluminum silicate to keep it powdery and porous.  Aluminum is a very toxic element in our nervous system.  It is implicated as one of the primary causes of Alzheimer’s disease.  

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Finally, as a substitute for water, consider Coke!  I mean, like Coke tastes good!  Right?  But perhaps the reason Coke tastes so good is that:  

1. In many states (in the USA) the highway patrol carries two gallons of Coke in the trunk to remove blood from the highway after a car accident.  

2. You can put a T-bone steak in a bowl of coke and it will be gone in two days.  

3. To clean a toilet: Pour a can of Coca- Cola into the toilet bowl and let the “real thing” sit for one hour.  Then flush.  The citric acid in Coke removes stains from vitreous china.  

4. To remove rust spots from chrome car bumpers: Rub the bumper with a crumpled-up piece of Reynolds Wrap aluminum foil dipped in Coca-Cola.  

5. To clean corrosion from car battery terminals: Pour a can of Coca-Cola over the terminals to bubble away the corrosion.  

6. To loosen a rusted bolt: Apply a cloth soaked in Coca-Cola to the rusted bolt for several minutes.  

7. To bake a moist ham: Empty a can of Coca-Cola into the baking pan, wrap the ham in aluminum foil, and bake.  Thirty minutes before the ham is finished, remove the foil, allowing the drippings to mix with the Coke for a sumptuous brown gravy.  

8. To remove grease from clothes: Empty a can of coke into a load of greasy clothes, add detergent, and run through a regular cycle.  The Coca-Cola will help loosen grease stains. It will also clean road haze from your windshield.  

9. The active ingredient in Coke is phosphoric acid. Its Ph is 2.8.  It will dissolve a nail in about 4 days.  

10. To carry Coca-Cola syrup (the concentrate) the commercial truck must use the Hazardous material place cards reserved for Highly corrosive materials.  

Now the question is, would you like a glass of water or a coke?  Just keep in mind that Caffeine may harden your arteries, and Cow’s Milk is almost as great a plague as Aspartame, and highly detrimental to your health.   

Water really is the drink of choice -- assuming that you have any interest in health!

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References:

[1] See, for example, the editorial article in the June 1983 issue of the Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology.

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