What Happens To Your Body When You Drink Water Every Day

Did you know that once you start feeling thirsty, you may already be dehydrated? This event is one we take for granted, but it's actually pretty amazing when you think about it. Harvard University explains that your body goes through lots of changes as soon as it starts feeling low on water, including changing your blood pressure and heart rate. You might not notice those changes much, but you'll definitely feel it when thirst hits — and it's probably something to pay attention to.

Dehydration is bad news, period. It can cause fatigue, headaches, temperature sensitivity, high heart rate, and dizziness, to name a few symptoms (via Cleveland Clinic). Quite simply, our bodies need water, and they need it continuously. According to the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, the daily amount to strive for is close to 11.5 cups of water for women and nearly 12.7 cups for men.

Try your best to drink enough water each day, and you just might find yourself reaping the following benefits.

Dehydration can affect the way you sleep, so it makes sense that drinking enough water every day could help you get the hours of shuteye you need each night to feel refreshed in the morning. So how does it do it? The National Sleep Foundation explains that when you're dehydrated, which can happen easily at night, your body's circadian rhythm may take over to let you know you need to rehydrate. That could be one of the reasons you find yourself waking in the middle of the night.

Therefore, drinking plenty of water throughout the day could make your body less likely to wake you up at night. You'll get more sleep, potentially giving you more energy the next day. It's a win-win.

Another way water energizes you is by perking up those muscles. Biochemist Dr. Bary Sears told NBC News that water could help the body maintain a more consistent energy level by keeping the muscles energized. Sears added, "If you don't have adequate hydration in the cells, your ability to produce energy (such as ATP) is reduced and you feel fatigued."

Water makes up a significant portion of the sweat that comes out of your body when you're hot or working out. Although we don't love how sweating feels, it's a necessary part of how the body functions. Sweat keeps us cool and plays a role in the smells we produce as humans — not necessarily an attractive thought, but those smells are symbolic of male and female attraction (per Popular Mechanics).

Science also suggests that sweat may help you get rid of bacteria on your body rather than absorbing it through the skin or ingesting it. A 2015 scientific review published in Glycobiology explored how sweat helps protect the body from infection. According to the review, tears, saliva, and milk contain glycoproteins that allow bacteria and other pathogens to bind to them, essentially whisking them away from the body when excreted. Research studied in the review found evidence to suggest that sweat can act similarly, as it also contains glycoproteins.

Water sends aid to just about every part of the body, including your airways. According to Medical News Today, airways restrict themselves when you're dehydrated in an attempt to save water. Of course, when your airways are restricted, they make it more difficult to breathe, especially for people with respiratory conditions.

And if you do have a respiratory condition, like asthma or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), water could help you even more than the average person. Lung Health Institute explains that water thins out mucus, allowing your coughs to be more productive at bringing it up. Cardiovascular and pulmonary physical therapy specialist Jennifer M. Ryan told Rush University Medical Center that staying hydrated is key for people with lung problems. "Staying well hydrated by taking in fluids throughout the day helps keep the mucosal linings in the lungs thin. This thinner lining helps the lungs function better," she explained.

The body works in miraculous ways, and water plays a role in many of those remarkable tasks it carries out. When something is wrong, your body will attempt to fix the problem in the best way it knows how. Such is the case in people with diabetes, who have to monitor their blood sugar levels. When blood sugar spikes, the body removes excess blood sugar from it by moving it out in the urine. To do this, it needs some extra water to help carry blood sugar out through the blood (via Diabetes.co.uk).

Therefore, drinking enough water could make this process easier on your body, allowing it to take out the blood sugar you don't need more effectively. Registered dietitian and diabetes specialist Lisa McDermott explained to Everyday Health that diabetes could even lead to dehydration. That's because it causes more frequent urination, leading to a seemingly neverending cycle of your body needing water to do its job. The best way to prevent this from happening is, of course, to drink plenty of water each day.

If you fell short on your ideal water intake one day, try making up for it the next. How do you feel? There's a chance that you might feel better both physically and emotionally. That's because some research points to water being a natural mood-booster. When you don't get enough of it, your lack of water could be a downer.

A study conducted by researchers at the University of Connecticut examined the effects of dehydration on men and women. Once dehydrated, the women experienced trouble concentrating and felt that tasks seemed more difficult. The men experienced more tension and anxiety when dehydrated. Study co-author Harris Lieberman explained, "Even mild dehydration that can occur during the course of our ordinary daily activities can degrade how we are feeling – especially for women, who appear to be more susceptible to the adverse effects of low levels of dehydration than men."

Another study, this one published in a 2014 edition of PLOS One, found that decreasing water intake negatively affected the participants' mood, calmness level, energy, and positive emotions. In contrast, upping water intake decreased fatigue and confusion.

When you drink enough water, you allow your body to be able to sweat like it needs to. Although sweating isn't necessarily a comfortable thing at first, its very point is to cool you down when you're hot. Once you get past the stickiness and ick factor, you'll realize that a light breeze feels way better when you have some sweat on your skin.

Water in the form of sweat also helps release heat from the body, leading to a cooler feel. According to Nature, "Water has a large capacity for vaporization of heat, which allows a loss of heat from the body even when ambient temperature is higher than body temperature. When sweating is elicited, evaporation of water from the skin surface is a very efficient way to lose heat."

This is why it's imperative to rehydrate yourself in hot weather. Water helps your blood flow to the skin, which brings extra heat away from your body. And after that, your body produces sweat. The more you sweat, the more water you need to replenish in your body so that it can keep doing what it needs to keep you cool and comfy (via Verywell Fit).

There are a couple of reasons that bars and restaurants usually offer patrons a glass of water when they order an alcoholic drink. First, water can prevent people from drinking glass after glass of alcohol, leading to a quick boozy feeling. Second, water may actually help avoid hangovers — or, at least, control the symptoms a little better.

The National Health Service explains that dehydration is a major cause of hangover symptoms. Alcohol also boosts the need to urinate, leading to dehydration and putting drinkers more at risk of not having enough water in their bodies. Ensuring that you drink enough water before and during a night of drinking could give you the hydration you need to avoid things like headaches and irritability in the morning.

According to NPR, a good rule of thumb for drinkers is to drink water alongside your alcohol. "Alternating between alcoholic beverages and H2O can help prevent the dehydration that accompanies a night of drinking," the article explained.