Friday 6 November 2009

Hydration

A very odd thing happened this week.

My gym does monthly assessments, where you get weighed, measured and have electrodes stuck on you to measure your fat and water content. I'm not always brilliant at remembering to drink water, and last month's water measurement was very low.

So this week I confidently skipped down there, expecting to be congratulated on the improvement in my hydration level. After all, I've been religiously following the clinic's instructions to drink at least two litres of water a day since embryo transfer, and although I haven't been quite as good since my BFN was confirmed and AF showed up, I'm still drinking a lot more than usual.

So imagine my surprise when I was told that my water content had actually gone DOWN!!! The trainer said all my weight loss over the last month can be attributed to a combination of muscle turning into fat because I haven't been exercising as much, and loss of water. In other words, there's no REAL weight loss at all - and there was me thinking my nausea and loss of appetite had at least had one good effect.

Anyway, when I said how much I'd been drinking, she couldn't explain how my hydration level had actually gone down. But I suppose it just proves how right the clinic was to advise me to drink so much - I'd be a shrivelled-up little prune now if I had kept my water consumption at normal levels over the last few weeks.

Perhaps the water was needed to flush out the extra follicles (I've read something about that - they fill up with liquid after the eggs have been removed, and you need to drink more to flush them out, or something).

Or perhaps, combined with all the extra weeing I've been doing, it was needed after all the jabs and suppositories I've been taking to get all the extra horror-moans out of my system.

But whatever it was, this test seems to have indicated that it was VERY necessary.

4 comments:

  1. So glad that you were able to get that useful bit of info from the gym! No one likes to hear that all of their weight loss wasn't really weight loss, though! Keep guzzling! :-)

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  2. I really needed that wake-up call! I am horrible at drinking enough water. I know I need to drink 2L a day (I did as you suggested and bought a 24pk of 1L bottles to keep track), but I have had a really hard time of it.

    Looking forward to your England posts. I read the whole guide book already and made a list of everything we want to see -- now I am going back and prioritizing/eliminating things. I would love to hear what you think is/isn't worthwhile.

    As for the CD, I love that woman's voice! I actually really love British accents (I think lots of Americans do). I have to call the UK at work sometimes for ordering lab reagents/equipment and am always amazed by how pleasant and super polite and kind the people are -- way nicer than American customer service!

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  3. How interesting....I am feeling really dehydrated, so for once in my life am actually drinking quite a lot, but still never feel hydrated....am panicking a bit about it.
    At least this goes to show how important it really is. Thanks for sharing xx

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  4. I read your post this morning and then ran out and drank some more water. I'm terrible at keeping hydrated ....
    Thats amazing that your hydration level has dropped, freaky, and like you said: imagine what your levels would have been like if you DIDN'T do all that drinking!!!

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