The short answer: You die a slow and painful death.
Every human body is comprised of about 65 per cent water, which is needed for a number of human bodily processes and reactions, including blood circulation, regulation of body temperature, waste removal and detoxification. We start to feel thirsty when our body water percentage drops to about 63 or 62 per cent water.
How much water you need to drink a day, depends on factors such as where you live, your age, your body fat and your gender.
Each day we lose 2 to 3 litres of water through sweat, urine and bowel movements. Even breathing uses water. It is essential to maintain a balanced water level. Men need between 2.5 and 3.7 litres of water a day, while women need 2 to 2.7 litres.
Here’s what happens to your body when you don’t drink water:
1. Dark Urine
When your body is low on water, your brain sends signals to your kidneys, which cause the blood to retain water, rather than flushing it out in the urine. When your blood holds on to the water, it causes your urine to turn a deep yellow colour, rather than the healthy colourless urine.
2. Brain shrinks
When you don’t drink enough water, your energy drops and your mood becomes more irritable. A dehydrated brain actually works so much harder to achieve simple tasks, than when you are well hydrated. It even temporarily shrinks without much water!
3. Joint pain
Water is meant to lubricate the areas between the bones, for easy movement and comfortable sleeping. If you don’t drink water, your joints begin to hurt. The lubrication just isn’t enough!
4. Hunger
You feel hungry, when you don’t drink water, even if you’ve eaten recently. You are more likely to over eat when you don’t drink water. It's very common to confuse dehydration with hunger.
5. Headaches
Because it takes your brain more than double the effort to get anything done, you will suffer headaches if you don’t drink enough water.
6. Water weight
If you don’t drink water, you gain water weight. We know this sounds counterintuitive, but drinking less water causes your body to hold on to every drop, causing a temporary weight gain.
7. Slowly dying of thirst
When you stop drinking water, you experience the above signs of dehydration. Feeling of thirst, dark urine, hunger and irritability to name a few. As you continue not drinking, you stop going to the bathroom all together. You start having trouble swallowing, suffer from muscle spasms, and should experience some nausea. Your blood stops flowing to the skin and your core body temp increases. After three to five days of not drinking water, your organs begin to shut down, especially the brain. Which could have lethal consequences.
Drinking water can solve many health problems in the body, so make sure to keep your cells hydrated and healthy.
If you want to help in the mission to end global thirst, check out the amazing projects on Water.org and see how you can contribute.
