You probably already know that drinking plenty of water throughout the day can help keep your digestive system humming, control your blood pressure, and even support your weight-loss efforts. But did you know that water can also offer natural pain relief?
Pain can increase, in part, because the body becomes so busy fighting pain that it doesn’t have the ability to fully manage its many other functions. That means some of your achiness, fatigue, anxiety, and even bad moods may be the result of your body not being able to do everything it is supposed to do. Drinking sufficient water, however, gives your body a fighting chance to stay in peak form.
Water: Nature’s Simplest Pain Relief Treatment
When you are dehydrated, your body struggles in so many ways, which then results in a variety of aches and pains—as well as making any other pain you may be experiencing even worse. For instance, dehydration causes:
- Toxins. When you don’t drink enough water your kidneys cannot adequately flush and filter impurities out of the blood. Instead of being washed out of the body, toxins are recirculated and can do damage throughout the body.
- Constipation. If you aren’t getting enough water, chances are good that you are constipated. This causes you to feel bloated and uncomfortable. And again, toxins that can cause a multitude of ailments begin building up in the body.
- Circulation problems. Your circulatory system uses water to keep the body’s overall volume of blood adequate to meet all bodily functions. Low blood volume may lead to circulatory problems and can also decrease the amount of oxygen that reaches your muscles and organs. Without enough oxygen, muscles and organs suffer and cannot work as they should.
- An inability to recover. Your body uses water to repair itself and recover from injury or other stressors. If your body does not get enough water, it will divert what little it does get to the more primary bodily functions. That means some of your body’s “repairs” will go undone, which, in turn, can result in pain.
- Joint troubles. The body uses water to lubricate joints. Dehydration hinders joint function and can lead to pain and decreased mobility.
Natural Pain Relief in a Glass
So how much water do you need daily to increase your body’s ability to fight pain? The rule of thumb about drinking eight glasses of water a day is certainly fine, but I think six glasses a day is enough to realize pain-related benefits. Just remember that in that six glasses per day total, you should not count coffee, tea, sodas, power beverages, or flavored waters. And you do not need to buy fancy bottled water, either. Regular tap water is just fine.
