Addicted to water?

by Rigel Celeste (Subscribe to Rigel Celeste's posts)
Oct 16th 2007 2:59PM

Categories: Diet & Weight Loss, Nutrition & Supplements

Recently I came across this very interesting article in the New York Times about a woman who was seemingly addicted to water -- she would carry several water bottles with her everywhere, never going more than a few minutes without a drink and making frequent visits to the bathroom. Overnights she would even drink, sometimes more than a gallon, before morning.

The scary thing is that she had been that way as long as she could remember but had never understood why -- it took a doctor taking a special interest when when she was 38 years old and in the hospital for something else to finally solve the mystery.

For that woman the issue was a hormonal deficiency and the fix was as simple as a daily nose-spray prescription. But can a person actually be addicted to water? According to the article the answer is yes -- it's called psychogenic polydipsia and it's defined as an uncontrollable compulsion to drink, usually due to mental illness.

And to think that most have a hard time making ourselves enough water!

Source

Comments (3)

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

curious george 10-16-2007 @ 5:04PM

the obsesive conpoltion to drink water. I don't exactly see as a bad thing. if they eat from nutritional stand point is at an equallibrium with the water consumption to sbstain healthy body mass and bodily functions the readily aviblility of extra fluid in the body and and healthly kidney fuction they'll probably out live us all. if they are in good health the likelyhood that blood toxicity should be at a lower theshold givein eating habit and eviromental habitat I see as a good thing

Ephrenia 11-05-2007 @ 10:54PM

I was drinking about 2 gallons of water a day. Frequent bathroom trips, including about 3 times each night. Yet I was still always thirsty.

Turns out, I have diabetes and that is a symptom when the blood sugars are too high. It's the body's way of trying to clean the sugar from the blood.

Usually, its the simpler answer.

god 11-06-2007 @ 4:10PM

ok 1 the first guy...wtf did you say? that made no sense lolz. and the second guy...ya my grandmas diabetic so i know what you mean it sucks lolz. ok back to the obsessive water drinker. this is a VERY bad thing. why? ok when you drink water it flushes the body clean, not much mind you because the body doesnt want to flush away the nuitrients within it. BUT if your drinking that much and its all circulateing your body flushing it clean then what do you expect will happen to nutrients your body has just absorbed? its like liguid starvation.