The big problem that I have with the 8×8 recommendation is that it is WAY to general of a guideline to cover everyone. This guideline is supposed to work for the 125lb person as well as the 250lb person. That just doesn’t make sense. We talked about this a bit when I was in massage school. I found and presented this report to the class:

‘Drink at least 8 glass of water a day’ — Really?

I prefer that people use their own body weight, activity levels, and geographical climate to figure out how much they need to drink. I also like ‘teaching’ people to look at the color of their urine. It is a great indicator of body hydration/dehydration. Urine output should be anywhere from pale yellow to mostly clear (unless you take a multi-vitamin).

Here are a few more recent reports that have been in the news:

ABC News: Advice on Water Doesn’t Hold Water

Yahoo News: Research debunks health value of guzzling water

Urban Legends Reference Pages: Eight Glasses (one of my favorites)

We should be teaching people to listen to their bodies. We should not be giving such specific information as 8×8 because as we all know, people take things way to literally. They look for someone else to ‘fix’ their problem and when someone says to them ‘You need to drink at least 8 – 8 ounce glasses of water per day’ they listen and go for it … even if they only weigh 100 pounds.

When are we going to stop giving ‘guidelines’ and teach people how to actually listen to their own bodies?

Add on to that the problems with people consuming more unfiltered water and water that has been sitting in plastic bottles leeching chemicals into the water. Not only are these plastic bottles bad for us, they are horrible for the environment.

How much water do you drink? Do you actually achieve the 8, 8 ounce glasses recommended? Have you tried to achieve that? How did it make you feel?