There is just SO much misinformation on the web about how we should approach the concept of hydration.

I recently read a Choice Magazine article on enhanced water, and with the article it claimed that tea and coffee do NOT dehydrate us, claiming scientific studies as proof.

I think many of us are confused, and reports like this don’t help. Cassie and I discussed the question over a hot cup of Lavazza Americano, and realised that we get caught on terminology. When you drink any water based liquid, be it tea, coffee or beer, the water has to go somewhere, (assuming don’t immediately pee it out) and in doing so it cannot NOT hydrate us. So yes, the article was probably correct, but the EFFECT of some drinks are diuretic, which means, simply, they make you pee. So yes, drinking tea or coffee doesn’t dehydrate you, but the effect of drinking them does in the sense that peeing always reduces your level of internal hydration!

Why oh why does everything have to be so darn complex?

Dr Corinne Allen is a died-in-the-wool-ionized water fan and she has spent a lot of time spreading the message. One of her pessages is on this very subject and it includes protocols for the consumption of alkaline ionized water.|

She says drinking ionized water is the easiest single thing you can do to support the environment in your entire body.

Her recommendations are:

Begin by drinking water with a pH of 8.5.
On day 1 drink 2, 8 oz glasses
Day 2 drink 4, 8 oz glasses
Day 3 drink 6, 8 oz glasses
Day 4 drink 8, 8 oz glasses
After this day you should stop drinking any of your former water except for medications or vitamins

For non Americans an 8oz glass is roughly equivalent to a 250ml glass, so she builds up to a total intake of 2 litres, which, coincidentally or not, is the same mantra we have heard for years; drink 8 glasses of water a day.

She says that after day 5 you can move up to higher pH water. She suggests pH 9, but also says that you should stay on 8.5 if ‘symptoms persist’. I’m not sure what she’s referring to but I suspect she refers to the detox symptoms many people experience when beginning alkaline ionized water. Our two year study of users confirmed many common symptoms including shoulder muscle aches, ‘thick’ head, fatigue, skin problems and cold symptoms, which just happn to be the same symptoms I have experienced many timed during detox sessions regardless of the protocol.

After day 5 begin on 9.0 water or when symptom free from the 8.5 water.

She encourages us to eventually move to pH 9.5, but to take it easy and not be afraid to drop back to a lower pH if symptoms make like difficult.

After this breaking in period she recommends building up to 1 oz of water per pound of body weight. I get a bit lost in translation here so I’ll assume she is talking about pounds of body weight and ozs of water, in which case I, at 85kg, am 187 pounds, so I would be trying for 185 oz of water, which equates to 5530 ml of water, or 5.53 litres, which at 250ml per glass, equals 22 glasses!

Help me out here. have I converted incorrectly? Is she really asking me to drink 22 glasses of water? In an 8 hour day, that’s a glass of water every 22 minutes. I think my boss would be getting a little irate about my pee breaks!

She does have a caveat. She says we should only drink an oz of  ionized water per half our body weight, the rest should be purified water. So.. up to noon, 11 glasses of ionized water. after noon, 11 glasses of pure water. That would be the simplest to implement and remember.

She also cautions seniors (like me), those with sever illness or with brain injury to go much slower.

Now here’s the interesting bit. She says that you must opt for more neutral pH water during your detox period. Simply put, the more water, the faster the detox. I have a bit of a problem with this because excess water consumption will leach your electrolytes. i have known people to faint from excess water consumption.

I certainly agree with her admonishment to not be in a  hurry to detox. Men seem to be the culprits here. Getting their new water ionizer seems to be similar to getting a new car or motorcyle. They want to go as fast as they can.

Dr Allen continues with a few recommendations on what to eat during your introduction to the water. She makes the point that it took a long time to become acid so it’s unreasonable to expect alkalinization to happen overnight.

Her other recommendations include getting completely off sodas, and meat for the duration of the detox, but perversely, she recommends FRUIT and vegetables. Given the high acid-loading you experience with almost all fruit, this may be a popular recommendation but not one that stands up to scrutiny. She recommends fruit smoothies with riceprotein; both acidifying, with fruit smoothies being literally fructose on steroids and an instant acid overload.

Summarizing, Dr Allen has made a pretty good fist of a hydration and alkalizing regimen, with a few small things I disagree with. From my own research the jury is still out on optimum amounts of water we should drink per day, and certainly new research casts even more doubt on our newfound need to load up on H2O. However it’s my view after talking to thousands on the same subject that 8 glasses a day is a pretty good average.