Q: What’s the best kind of water to drink?
We recommend that everyone drink natural spring water as their regular, daily drinking water. Spring water is naturally mineralized and is checked for impurities before bottling. Sometimes we suggest distilled water for a short period of time (usually three to six months) as it can help extract loosely-bound toxic metals and chemicals from the body. If you can’t find spring water, then carbon-filtered water is the next best. You can buy a carbon filter for your kitchen faucet or a counter-top model. Even units such as Brita will suffice. Carbon does not filter every toxin out of the water, but is much better than plain tap water, which should be avoided if at all possible. If you buy a carbon filter, be sure to change it regularly to ensure the integrity of the filtered water. While bottled spring and distilled water are fine, be careful when buying bottled filtered water, because most brands are filtered with Reverse Osmosis, which is a filtration process that removes impurities from water but unfortunately makes the water non-hydrating to the body and also removes all healthy minerals (read more about that below). For more information on water, read here: Water for Health and Longevity.
Q: What do I look for in a water filter for drinking?
You want a ceramic or carbon filter. You don’t want Reverse Osmosis, Ion Exchange or additives to the water such as they may do when softening water.
Good water filters that I am aware of:
Counter top and larger models: www.doultonusa.com and www.berkeyfilters.com
As far as I am aware, these produce good-quality drinking water. Of course, spring water is even better since it is properly mineralized.
Q: What bottled spring waters do you recommend? Has your office done 3rd party testing?
We have not done 3rd party testing.
According to http://fluoridealert.org/content/bottled-water/, the following is the fluoride levels for various bottled waters surveyed in 2005:
Crystal Geyser – 0.24 ppm
Evian – 0.10 ppm
Naya – 0.14 ppm
Perrier – 0.31 ppm
Poland Springs – 0.10 ppm
Saratoga – 0.20 ppm
SOURCE: USDA (2005). National Fluoride Database of Selected Beverages and Foods, Release 2.
(Artificially fluoridated water – like civic water, contains 0.7 to 1.2 ppm fluoride.) This is obviously only a very few waters and only shows us the fluoride, but the fluoride content may give us insight into other toxicities found. You can usually call the company you are interested in and find out what their source spring is for your area, and ask how many fluoride parts per million are in that water.
Q: Is coffee or soda unhealthy to drink?
Caffeinated drinks are very stimulating to the adrenals. In the majority of cases, the body is already over-worked and we are trying to calm it down to allow it the time and energy it needs to heal and detoxify. A little coffee may be okay, perhaps a cup a day, as long as the only sweetener used is xylitol, stevia, or another natural, low-glycemic sweetener. The sugar, corn syrup and artificial chemical sweeteners in many caffeinated drinks and ALL sodas are very harmful. Sugar uses up vital nutrients in the body, impairs immune function, stresses the liver and adrenals, and otherwise disrupts the body chemistry. This is why there is really no soda, juice or other sweet drink that we view as a safe or healthful beverage, other than naturally sweet herbal teas. For more information on this, read the Q & A section Sugar and Sweeteners.
Q: What about alkaline water?
Alkaline water has become rather popular in recent years. That does not necessarily mean that it is healthful. The alkalinity of the body is determined by the function of the organs themselves and the availability of alkalinizing minerals. One could eat only alkaline food and water and still have an overly acidic body. This over-acidity is due to nutrient deficiencies and improper functioning of organs and glands. In many cases, the body is creating an acidic environment as an adaptive mechanism. For example, it may do this to fight infection. Artificially altering the pH of the body can actually work against the body’s intelligence and interfere with the body’s balancing mechanisms. In addition, there are many areas of the body that are supposed to be acidic, such as the stomach and large intestine. To correct the pH balance of your body, one needs to address the toxicity, imbalances and deficiencies. We have found repeatedly that the over-acidity of the body is automatically corrected with proper diet and Nutritional Balancing, without any specific address to the acidity/alkalinity of food, water, or even the body itself. Proper pH balance is just an automatic by-product of a healthy diet and proper nutrition.
Alkaline water can even add more stress to the body because the body now has yet another unnatural element to deal with (alkaline water is FAR more alkaline than any water occurring in nature). Also, there is some evidence that many alkaline water machines do not fully filter the water, thus leaving toxins in the water, and may themselves add certain metal toxicity to the water, such as platinum. We therefore do not recommend their use for any length of time.
We recommend natural spring water, not only because it is usually the proper pH, but because it is what our bodies have had for many thousands of years and also has trace minerals. Read more here: Water for Health and Longevity.
That being said, if one really wants to drink it, alkaline water can be fine to drink for a short period of time (a month or two at the most). Some even experience relief while drinking alkaline water. This is usually the case when an individual switches to alkaline water from RO-filtered water (which isn’t hydrating at all) or switches from toxic water. Another reason is that, believing the water is healing, they wind up drinking much more water. Because the body is now better hydrated than before, they think the water is “working”. Truthfully, they would experience the same benefits and more from switching to or drinking more of a good natural, spring water.
Q: What is Reverse Osmosis filtered water (also known as RO water)? And do you recommend it?
A reverse osmosis unit (or RO unit) is often seen as a long nozzle next to the kitchen faucet that usually looks something like the image here. We do not recommend Reverse Osmosis filtered water for drinking. We, along with many others in the nutritional world, have found that water filtered with Reverse Osmosis does not hydrate the body properly. It can be great for cooking, though, as heat seems to chemically change the properties of Reverse Osmosis water to make it into an absorbable form again. It is also good for showering, or cleaning, and for any sort of food cleaning and preparation. One can, for example, make coffee or tea using RO water.
Reverse Osmosis filtration uses a huge amount of pressure to force the tap water through a “super-fine filter”. The problem is that the “filter” is actually a semi-permeable membrane that is so fine that certain elements of the water itself are altered in the “filtration” process. Osmosis is a process found in nature that can seem magical when not understood. Reverse Osmosis is an artificial reversal of that natural process. To learn more about Osmosis and Reverse Osmosis, read this: How Reverse Osmosis Works. Read more here: Water for Health and Longevity.
Q: I heard that it’s not a good idea to drink more than about two cups of water at a time because the body can’t absorb more than a certain amount. Is that true, or can I reach my quota by drinking many of cups at a time?
It is true that it is not good to guzzle a lot of water at one time. About 8 ounces at a time is fine, but no more than that. Ideally, you would drink 4-6 ounces of water every half hour or so. The two exceptions to the rule are 1) when you first awake, and 2) when you are sweating excessively due to heat or exercise. These are times when you can drink 16 ounces of water or even a little more.
Q: Do the guidelines for drinking water also apply to water used in cooking? Is tap water fine for cooking? Or even Reverse Osmosis (even though not best for drinking)?
For cooking, you do not want to use tap water because the toxins in the tap water will pass into your food. You can use carbon-filtered water, spring water or Reverse Osmosis (R/O) water for cooking. In fact, I feel that cooking and cleaning are the only uses for R/O water.