Drinking sufficient water is an important part of your nutrition plan. You need 32 oz. for every 1,000 calories of your Resting Metabolism Rate (RMR). So…

If your RMR is 900 calories You’d need about 4 glasses x 8 oz each

If your RMR is 1400 calories You’d need about 5 glasses x 8 oz each

If you don’t know your RMR, here is a calculator you can use to get a good estimate.

Why Drink Water?

It can help with weight loss. Drinking a glass of room temperature water before a meal will increase your sense of fullness.
It keeps your skin plump and healthy.
It regulates body temperature.
It flushes toxins from the kidneys.
It aids in digestion and elimination.
It boosts thinking and reasoning. Dehydration by just 2% impairs tasks that require attention, psychomotor or memory skills. (1) Most of us have no idea when we’re dehydrated.

Does it Have to Be Water?

Like most people you may drink tea, coffee, Gatorade Zero, and even sparkling water. These are fine in moderation, but I don’t count them toward the water quota, mostly because they aren’t as pure as plain old-fashioned water. For example:

Gatorade Zero, while sugar free, contains citric acid, sodium citrate, salt, monopotassium phosphate, gum Arabic, natural flavor, sucralose, acesulfame potassium, sucrose acetate isobutyrate, glycerol ester if rosin, and yellow food dye #6. What IS all that stuff?
Club soda, which is a great alternative to diets sodas and alcohol, still contains sodium. For example, an 8 oz serving of Canada Dry Club Soda has 115 mg of sodium.
Decaf coffee still contains caffeine, although it is about 7 mg vs. 70 mg in regular coffee.
Black and green tea have about 30-50 mg of caffeine, although they also have antioxidant properties.

Getting Started with the Water Habit

Do this before you go to bed tonight:

Pour an 8 oz glass of water and put it on your nightstand or bathroom counter.

In the morning, use the bathroom, weigh yourself, and then drink that glass of water! It will flush toxins from your body and will set you up to think about water – and perhaps drink more of it – during the day.