Water- get sick of it

[Jonathan Orr]

i have recently started having problems keeping down water after about day 3.  Day one and two are fine then starting about day 3 my body just says… no more water for me, and I get nauseous and sometimes actually gag in pure water.  I have heard other people develop this adversity to water, besides going crazy with crystal light packets, what can you suggest?

[Jerry Adams]

was this in hot weather?

how much did you drink day 1 and 2?  like, was your pee clear or just faint yellow?

[Roger Caffin]

As Jerry asks: how much were you drinking per day? What colour urine?
It may simply be that you are trying to drink too much. This is a known problem.

Cheers

[Jonathan Orr]

Thanks guys, we were in  sequoia NP from mineral king up to Hamilton lakes via middle fork over 5 days.  I was drinking 3-4L on average per day.  My urine was mostly clear.  Highs were low 70’s.

breakfast was oatmeal,

lunch cliff bars, trail mix, Jersey, beef stick etc

dinner was mountain house (lame I know but I had a stack in the pantry and I was just coming off another trip)

 

 

 

[Roger Caffin]

I doubt I could drink that much per day at those temperatures. I would bloat.

Instead of forcing water down your throat all the time, you could try just drinking when you are actually thirsty, and not too much each time. See how that goes. (Yes, known problem.)

Cheers

[Paul S.]

Two suggestions:

• Drink less water (already mentioned), just drink when thirsty.  If you use a Camelbak style hydration hose consider using regular bottles, as the constant sipping of water from a hose can lead to too much water intake.
• Add electrolytes. If you are sweating a lot you might not be getting enough from your food alone.  Your urine being clear is an indication you are over-hydrating and low on electrolytes.

[Jerry Adams]

I might drink 3 liters of water in a day, at mid 70s temperatures, if you include breakfast and dinner

If you’re just talking during the day, 1 liter would be closer

My pee will be totally clear in the morning because I drink some extra water to make sure and start hydrated.  During the day my pee will get a little yellow

Sometimes, I’ll not drink enough during the day I’ll forget to drink enough and my pee will get quite yellow.  I need to remember to drink that 1 liter of water.  I just carry 1/2 liter.  If it’s warm, I’ll drink that and stop to refill sometime during the day.  If it’s hot, at the rest stop I’ll drink 1/2 liter and then refill 1/2 liter so I drink a total of 1.5 liters.

[jscott]

I don’t think that three liters is excessive at all–while hiking at altitude for sure. Not enough to create the symptoms that the op mentions. granted, the temps were low so possibly he wasn’t sweating that much. Maybe four liters in addition to the water in oatmeal and dinner….but hyponatremia? No. If one drank 4-6 liters over a short period of time, yes.

In any case, electrolyte additives are a good idea. But there’s plenty of salt in the diet that the op was eating.

[Franco Darioli]

“I might drink 3 liters of water in a day, at mid 70s temperatures, if you include breakfast and dinner

If you’re just talking during the day, 1 liter would be closer”

We are all different but same here…

 

[Aaron]

On a typical non-hiking day, I have a 20 oz bike water bottle I drink one in the morning, 2-3 at work, 1 in the evening, and half at night. An extra 40 oz for a 2 hour gym or 2 hour bike ride. So a typical non hiking day I probably drink 140 oz = 4L. Probably a little more if I’m doing a long hike. Pee is almost always light yellow. Sometimes dark if I drink too much booze last night. Or clear if I toke too much and guzzle water from the munchies.

Also, does OP have trouble keeping down water at home?
Perhaps OP is just chronically dehydrated at home, and then can’t stomach how much it takes to hydrate while being active?

[Josh J]

clear pee means your drinking too much and flushing things out you shouldn’t be.

 

google “pee color”

[Jeffs Eleven]

Nothing wrong with mtn house. If somebody is judging you based on what you are eating tell em to f right off.
Plenty of salt in those meals, but to my non-scientific butt it sounds like a lot of water you were drinking.

[Roger Caffin]

Fascinating. Sue and I will drink maybe one 125 L pop bottle of water during the whole day, unless it is over about 85 F. Sounds like OP is drinking FAR too much water to me.

Cheers

[Tom K]

3-4 liters per day seems a lot, particularly with no added electrolytes, even at altitude.  I have spent quite a bit of time hiking at altitude down through the years and have seldom gone over 2 liters.  Individual needs vary, to be sure, but seldom by that much, assuming normal backpacking days in the range of 10-14 miles or so.  On longer days, or in high temperatures, more water might be needed, as also if fast packing 25-30 mile days or trail running.  In any case, it would be wise to add electrolytes to the water, just to be on the safe side.  One might not risk hyponatremia on day 1 or, even day 2, but a cumulative deficit of electrolytes, particularly sodium, could end up causing serious problems at some point.  Why risk it?

[Roger Caffin]

I have to say that with the excessively-high levels of salt in most packaged meals, I can NOT see any risk of a sodium deficiency.

In fact, my wife and I will not use those freeze-dried packaged meals for this reason: they are intolerably salty. As well as being small and expensive.
But it is the salt levels we are really concerned about.

Cheers

[Tuukka U]

It seems to me OP only has lots of sodium in their dinner, which might lead to them just pissing out most of the sodium before next morning. The symptoms described match well with my experience on hyponatremia. Even if they had the sodium divided evenly into three meals, some people just don’t hold onto sodium that well, especially in warmer temperatures, IME.

[jscott]

From wikipedia:

Signs and symptoms of hyponatremia include nausea and vomiting, headache, short-term memory loss, confusion, lethargy, fatigue, loss of appetite, irritability, muscle weakness, spasms or cramps, seizures, and decreased consciousness or coma.[11] Lower levels of plasma sodium are associated with more severe symptoms. However, mild hyponatremia (plasma sodium levels at 131–135 mmol/L) may be associated with complications and subtle symptoms[12] (for example, increased falls, altered posture and gait, reduced attention, impaired cognition, and possibly higher rates of death).[13][14]

[jscott]

A quick google search is suggesting that three liters a day in normal circumstances is about right. when hiking at altitude, this shouldn’t be excessive.

Which suggests that there’s other causes for the op’s issues.

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