I Drank a Gallon of Water a Day for 30 Days. Here’s What Happened…

I’ve been doing a little experiment for the past 30 days that I wanted to share with you.It was a simple test but one that had a profound effect on my fat loss.You see, like a lot of people the holidays got to me.

After many parties, dinners and more parties I saw my weight jump up to a region that I hadn’t been in a very long time. Hey, it happens we’re all human.

But…

My belt was fitting a bit tighter than I was used to. My shirts were getting a little TOO fitted. I was seeing major signals that I needed to get my body back in balance and fast.

So I set about doing exactly what I’d get my clients to do after a setback…I got back to basics:

1. I had 80% of my meals cooked by hand.2. I tracked my calories and macros.

3. I weighed myself every day.

I also did one more thing that I thought would be a great experiment for 30 days:

I drank a gallon of water every day for 30 days straight.

I never really had a problem drinking water before but after tracking my intake I found myself to be at averaging 2 litres of water a day. 3 litres on good days.

I wanted to see how keeping myself to drinking a gallon of water would affect the above actions.As one of my business mentors would say to me,

“Focus on knocking down the big dominoes and the smaller dominoes start falling into place”.

The results of my test? Pretty damn eye opening…

10 Things I Learned From Drinking One Gallon of Water a Day for 30 Days

1. It’s hard at first but your body comes to crave it very quickly.

Getting to a gallon a day may seem daunting at first but it gets easier over time. After a week or two of consistent drinking you’ll find your body starting to crave water.

It’s understandable too. I’ve learned this from doing photoshoots that your body starts shedding more water as you increase your intake. The more water you take in the more it starts eliminating from your body, usually in the form of urine.

Over a week or two your body gets used to the increased water intake and after week 3 you can start to feel cravings for water that may not have been there before. This is good.

2. It helped me fast for much longer throughout the day.

The more water I was drinking the less I felt my hunger throughout the day.I can usually fast until 2pm but when drinking water my fast periods increased to 4pm to 6pm.

Is this surprising though? Dehydration is usually thought of as actual hunger.

Get hydrated and you lose a common signal for your body to eat.

3. I felt fuller and more satisfied from my meals.

Water is one of the best tools we have to feel more satisfied from our meals.

I used this evidence based water trick learned from Alan Aragon that helped me increase water intake and feel fuller from my meals:

STEP 1 — Drink about 500 ml to 1000 ml of water before your meal.
STEP 2 — Drink another 500 ml to 1000 ml of water during your meal while eating.
STEP 3 — Once your done your meal set a timer for 20 to 30 minutes and stop eating.

The increased water intake with my meals helped me stave off my urges to eat AFTER I eat, which is a big deal if you’re dieting down.

4. I became much more “regular”.

Not to to get into too much detail but I become much more “regular” with my number 2’s.Something you may not know is that constipation sometimes comes from not having enough water.

After I drank my 1–2 litres in the morning the kids got dropped off at the pool at a regular basis.

5. Drinking a gallon of water a day helped make dieting easier.

When we go on any diet we are restricting calories. Take any diet out there and, if you look deeply, calorie restriction is embedded into it.

Restricting calories can make us hungry AF. Anyone who’s done any diet knows this. It may not come at the beginning but at some point hunger and cravings will knock down your door and greet you a big gapped tooth grin.

Drinking a gallon of water (sometimes more) a day made dieting way more easier. Like 80% easier.

What most people don’t realize about dieting is that it’s 50% about cutting calories and 50% about finding ways to manage your hunger.

This leads me to believe that increasing water intake should be a pre-requisite while doing any diet.

Dieting successfully comes down to controlling hunger and cravings. The more you can do that the easier you can make the diet.

Drinking a gallon of water a day does that for you.

6. You’ll pee. A lot.

Make no mistake about it…The bathroom will be your friend. As your body gets used to the increase in water you will pee a lot.

But it’s all good my ninja. Here’s why…

7. Peeing became a game.

When my pee comes out clear I heartily pat myself on the back because I know I’m hydrated AF.

Every time I hit the loo I’d check to see the colour of my pee to do a “colour check”. See the image below:

Seeing the colour of my pee helped me “gamify” my water drinking. The clearer my pee was the more I felt like I was “winning”.

8. My energy and performance were as high as they’ve ever been.

On a scale of 1–10, I’d say my energy is at a 8–9 most times. I “get more shit done” and it’s done with a clearer mind. I’ve also found that most mornings I can go without my coffee until about 10am by just drinking water.

Ever since I started intermittent fasting I’ve come to believe that eating food slows me down a bit. I become less cognitive as if I am dealing with a feeling in my stomach as well as trying to do deep work.

With water alone I can sustain my energy throughout the day even while getting my regular workouts in. In fact, I’ve PR’d on a lot of my lifts in a completely fasted state.

Knowing what I know now…if I were to choose a performance enhancing substance to give me energy throughout the day I’d choose water and one black coffee.

9. It’s not as hard as people make it in their minds.

One of the bigger things I learned from drinking a gallon of water a day is that men nowadays are getting softer than baby wipes.

When I told some about drinking a gallon of water a day they gasped, “How could one drink so much water a day? That must be torture”

I’ve actually had some men tell me that they can’t drink water because they don’t like the taste of it. Admittedly, it’s taken every grain of my conscious being to not shake them furiously and read’em the riot act.

Our bodies are made of water. Any liquids you drink will have some form of water in there.

If you’re not grown up enough to drink water on a regular basis then I can’t help you. This is level 1 of being a healthy adult.

Drinking a gallon of water a day was hard at first but got easier over time and the fact that my body craved it the more I did it helped a ton.

Doing this is no more difficult then brushing and flossing your teeth every day and night.

Like all things, it gets way easier over time. You just gotta get a groove and be consistent.

10. Increased water intake MUST be a staple your fat loss plan.

There are 4 pillars to a lean and healthy body: diet, exercise, sleep and, yes, water.

These are the biggest dominoes that need to get sorted as they will make getting results easier and more sustainable.

Btw, despite what most armchair fitness experts might tell you drinking more water WON’T increase your fat loss or metabolism. At least, not in a direct way.

It indirectly affects your fat loss in a positive way because it makes dieting so much easier and bearable.

Btw…The Results of my “Test”

I’ve dropped 5.6 pounds in the past month and dropped about 1 inch off my waist.

For me, this is huge. I keep my body at round 12 to 13% body fat during the winter times and over a pound a week of weight loss is fucking awesome.

Was it due to the water?

I won’t say it was entirely because of the water but a gallon a day did contribute in a big way.

Summary

So that’s it. Drink more water. It just makes everything easier. You diet easier, you have more energy, you feel fuller from your meals, you can use it to control your hunger and it’s really fun to to play, “The how hydrated is your pee” game.

It doesn’t have to be a gallon a day. If you’re a complete beginner I’d start with a litre above what you’re drinking now as a start. You don’t have to eat the entire elephant at once.

Like we do with our workouts progressively overload your water drinking slowly, over time.Easy does it. Introduce one liter to begin with, see how your body responds, and then carry on from there.

Dedicated to your success,

Dan

Originally published at www.dango.blog.