The island I live on, St. Simons Island, becomes super crowded with families and vacationers coming down for the festive holiday weekend. It’s a time of outdoor fun and beachtime! Realistically, it may also come with sunburns and hangovers exacerbated by what I wish to emphasize today, dehydration!
So, the #1 thing to remember is:
***HYDRATE*HYDRATE*HYDRATE***
We all know how important it is to stay well hydrated, so consider this a friendly reminder. Because:
The solution to pollution is dilution. Well, not really. But it’s fun to say!
Here are some helpful tips to remember:
Drink ½ your body weight in ounces of water per day, approximately. So a man weighing 190 lbs. should drink 95 oz. and a woman weighing 150 lbs. should drink 75 oz. in a day Caveats: more muscle, activity and sun exposure = more fluids.
Your urine can guide you too. Here’s what I recommend: Look at your urine (important to look at your kid’s urine, too), if it’s clear, that’s a sign of good hydration. If it is dark yellow, amp it up!
When you drink is very important too. Hydrate between your meals.
Typically stop 20 minutes before and wait 2 hours after you meal. Or 1 hour after a light fruit, cooked veggies, or soup meal.
Try not to drink more than 4 oz. during your meal. Why is this so important? Because we need our digestive juices to be at full concentration to be effective in extracting the nutrients from our food. Fluids naturally dilute them.
You may ask “I get so thirsty when I eat, how could I possibly do that? I guarantee you’re not chewing enough, chew more. More on chewing in this post.
Enjoy your holiday weekend, connecting with family and friends. Be safe and have a blast :-)!
