Why 100 ounces of water a day?

I bet you want to know how I came up with 100 ounces!!  Well, let me tell you why.  Most people will give you the commonly recommended daily intake which is eight glasses of water a day which is about sixty-four ounces. Why do I ask 100? There are two reasons.

First, over my many years of experience I have consistently observed that when the goal is sixty-four ounces, my clients fall short. They get to around fifty and subconsciously feel that they’re “close enough.” And while many agencies use the recommendation of eight glasses a day/sixty-four ounces, the National Academy of Medicine determined the ideal water intake to fully replenish the body without overwhelming the cells is actually approximately sixteen eight-ounce cups (128 ounces) for men and eleven eight-ounce cups (eighty-eight ounces) for women.

Depending on your weight and whether you engage in strenuous exercise, you may need even more. And guess what? You can’t really have too much water in a day. Dangerous intakes of water don’t occur until you are ingesting gallons upon gallons in a relatively short period of time. In a healthy body, extra water in your system is simply flushed out as waste. My goal for you is 100 ounces so I can first get you to at least sixty-four ounces, and hopefully far beyond. Raising the target means you will have to work harder and more consciously to accomplish the goal. And you will get there!!! 

Secondly, I like to make things easy and simple. In order to find out how much water you should be drinking, many diets and health programs ask you to perform some sort of calculation based on body weight, and then add a certain number of ounces for each however-many minutes of exercise you perform and so on. That’s not simple!!! 

I don’t want you confused. I don’t want you struggling to remember numbers and calculations, or worrying about updating everything as soon as you make progress.

I am asking you to take in 100 ounces of water. Why? Because it is what your body wants. Also, if there are any bad habits hanging around, like a fondness for soda or other sugary and/or caffeinated beverages it will get rid of them, and far easier than if you tried to eliminate the habit through sheer will. If you have to hit 100 ounces of water, it will push off that midmorning latte or afternoon Diet Coke. (And honestly, the lack of energy you thought you needed caffeine to combat is likely due to dehydration, at least in part.) My only exceptions to the rule are plain sparkling water and green tea. Concentrate on getting your 100 ounces first, and once you get there, if you still want your diet soda, go for it but you are not going to want it. You are already going to the bathroom all day 😉 

I can not tell you how many clients I have had that hit a plateau in her weight loss, and one week we made drinking more water her only goal. She aimed for the 100 ounces and was so excited when we spoke the next week. She said she felt like a completely new woman. She was glowing, her skin looked clearer, and her energy levels were through the roof. This one change, on top of her newly formed healthy food and exercise habits, made all the difference. She saw a weight loss that week after struggling for several without a drop on the scale. That’s called SUCCESS!!!!!