Since there are so many great apps out there, I want to ask the ever-so-important question: Which one is absolutely essential to your daily life?
I'll go first: Waterllama! I started using it a few months ago because I really like to know precisely what and how much I drink each day, especially during the summer.
I'd love to hear about the app you use the most and why it's so important to you. And if you have any tips or tricks for getting the most out of the app, I'd love to hear those too!
I've seen that claim made and also refuted multiple times and it honestly doesn't make any sense to me in the context of animal behavior. All animals presumably drink when they're thirsty. My cat is not game planning its next drink to avoid dehydration before it hits. They drink when they're thirsty and that's probably just fine.
I really don't think this is as big of an issue as people make it out to be.
I generally agree with you but cats probably aren't the best example to use here. They evolved as desert animals with very limited access to water. Because of that their bodies are extremely efficient at using water, which is why their pee is so concentrated and smelly, and they have a very low thirst drive. Cats do regularly drink without being thirsty.
Insert dog for cat, whatever.
The cats drinking despite not being thirsty sounds like a hard claim to prove.
Cats have a biology that is supposed to extract the liquids they need from their prey. Their drinking is supplementary and opportunistic, so likely doesn't work through a sensation of thirst the way it does for us.
Cats who are fed dry kibble, do not drink enough, because of this. Dehydration related problems are by far the most common health issue with pet cats.
Flowing water devices, or even flavoring the water, to encourage cats to drink more, is a thing because of this.
I bought a mouse poison that works on the same principle. Mice eat the dry pellets and it dehydrates them. Apparently, they don’t have a similar thirst mechanism as humans. I have found a dead one in my garage, so it does seem to work.
A lot of the research that points to hydration being the type of issue that can be impacted by carrying a bottle of water everywhere is funded by...
Water bottling companies.
Interesting hadn't heard that. This article kinda touches on that a bit and generally goes into debunking the idea that we're not drinking enough water.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2011/jul/22/had-our-fill-of-water
There's an Adam Ruins Everything on the subject.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/OWASUMMQjj8
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I'm open-source, check me out at GitHub.
I believe it's about optimizing our well-being by staying ahead of potential dehydration and supporting our body's functions more consistently. When we maintain proper hydration levels, we're not just preventing thirst – we're also supporting digestion, circulation, temperature regulation, and overall cognitive and physical performance.
But I think I am digressing too much from the topic of the post.
Except drinking all the time also has proven drawbacks. In proffessional sports, drinking too much plain water is known to be detrimental to performance.
You do not sweat nearly enough to warrant the multiple glasses of water the average school teacher makes kids drink in PE nowadays. Even though you do get thirsty.
What your body actually needs, are the salts and other minerals you just sweated out, which was the whole point that created Gatorade.
Also a lot of the research that claims thirst to be "too late" in telling you when to drink, is funded by companies that sell bottled water.
I just don't buy that at all and I'd love to see some credible sources for it.