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Comment by virtuallynathan | Hacker News Reader

Water intake is regulated by homeostasis... you should drink as much as you want to drink.

You can over-hydrate though. The myth that you need tons and tons of water has actually led to over-hydration which can cause serious problems or even death. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_intoxication

Sure, you can over-hydrate, but when is the last time someone died from drinking too much water who hadn't also just run a marathon? Referring to a normal person who decided to up their water intake, and died later that day?

2007 during a contest to win a Nintendo: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6261509.stm

This is triggering my phobia of dying of a stupid death. Wow this story is so sad.

Note that the "hold your wee" part may have played some role as well, limiting how much the kidneys can process.

> The myth that you need tons and tons of water has actually led to over-hydration

Absolutely false. Do you have any evidence for that statement?

Here's one book that presents evidence: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14537326-waterlogged

yea, this is totally true. You dilute your electrolytes and get hyponatremia. Very common in marathons now - here's a paper on it: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmoa043901

"On univariate analyses, hyponatremia was associated with substantial weight gain, consumption of more than 3 liters of fluids during the race, consumption of fluids every mile"

Came in to post this.. just drink whenever you feel to.

But not that much you water-poison yourself!

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