You’d think that I’d be better at staying hydrated after three years in the desert. But it just sneaks up on your. At least once every two months I end up sick from dehydration.
As most of you probably know, moderate dehydration causes symptoms similar to a stomach bug or mild food poisoning. There’s nausea, dizziness and generally feeling awful.
For the 4th of July, we went to a friend’s house for her birthday/Independence Day celebration. Looking back, I didn’t have a lot of water during the day. That night, I had three mixed drinks, which is just about the perfect amount (in retrospect) to complete the dehydration process.
This was one of the worst cases I had. I was horribly dizzy for hours — to the point of barely being able to stumble out to the kitchen for water — and my stomach was cramping in addition to the normal nausea.
Unfortunately, once the symptoms start, it’s too late to just gulp down water. Not that I didn’t try, mind you. But let’s just say I saw that water again relatively quickly.
It generally takes a day of sitting around being miserable and sipping Powerade. Also, your stomach will be so upset that you generally have to stick to the BRAT diet: bananas, applesauce, rice and toast.
By the way, I really don’t recommend trying to eat just plain white rice. That did *not* go over well with my taste buds/stomach.
So I sent Tim out for Powerade, bananas, applesauce and Saltines. Not all that considerable an expense — probably $6 — but a completely avoidable one.
More importantly, it nearly cost me a day’s work. I felt so awful that I was going to call in sick. But the nausea was making it hard to sleep. So I figured I’d rather be productive and feel awful in the living room than be bored and feel awful in bed.
So. The moral of the story here is drink your water. More accurately, the moral is that I need to drink my water.
A $5-15 water bottle will save you a surprising number of trips to the grocery store for BRAT ingredients.
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