how much water should we be drinking?

This is obviously a typical question. But I was after more detail on this as it seems to be very broad. I would like to know how many mm of fluid we should be drinking. I am only small and therefore only have a small bladder. But I have been trying to increase my fluid intake since becoming pregnant mainly because of constipation. Before being pregnant I could drink at most 750mm a day and be happy with that some days less. I have always needed to go to the loo a lot, so increasing my fluids has meant even more trips which gets hard when I need to travel a bit for work. My other question is, Is any of this fluid that I am drinking actually helping because it feels as soon as I drink I pee it out almost straight away. It goes straight through me. Am I actually absorbing any of it?

Look forward to your answers.

Not sure what the golden rule is but I drink 2 - 2.5L water a day plus 2 glasses of milk or a milkshake (one am & one pm) and a glass of orange & grapefruit juice (fresh squeezed).

I do a desk job so it's easy for me to sip on water all day.

The midwives at my antenatal classes said you need to drink between 2 & 3 litres of fluid a day. Which I struggle with, as like you I never drank a lot of fluid before hand.
The best things I have found to get more fluid are:
Having juice with breakfast
Straight after breakfast, having a hot chocolate (the ones you just add water) with metamucil in it
Having a bowl of fruit on the table to snack on
Having a cup of soup as a snack (either by itself or with something)
Having a bottle of water or weak cordial on the bench & have some every time you walk past
Icey-poles, tinned fruit or jelly
Always having a drink with a meal or a snack
Keeping a bottle of water by the bed for in the middle of the night

HTH:)

Hi Puppies
The amount of water you need depends greatly on your lifestyle so without knowing a lot more about you I can only make a general suggestion. The amount of water you absorb is only part of the total requirements. The water you absorb will keep all your cells and organs working however, you also need water to transport oxygen and nutrients around your body. You also need water to wash all of the poisons out of your body. Water is also needed to regulate your temperature. It is recommended that all pregnant women should drink at the very least 2 litres each day. If you have an active lifestyle then you should be drinking about 3 litres a day.

I can't answer you question entirely but I do know that water consumption is seasonal. You need to drink more in summer than winter. I know this sounds obvious but many people abide by blanket rules that really are not useful eg "you should drink 8 glasses of water a day". Consider your biology. Your body needs more water when it sweats, when you are physical (exercising, doing lots of walking) when it is sick. Your body needs water to do almost every metabolic activity. Pregnancy speeds up your metabolism so you would need a bit more when pregnant when not pregnant.

Sometimes people get confused when they get oedema (puffiness that is related to water retention) they think that because they are retaining water they should cut down on their water intake... the exact opposite is true... if you are puffy then your body would benefit from drinking MORE water to re-establish a better balance. I know this is not your problem... you're not puffy are you? (ankles and fingers are good areas to check).

Check the colour of your wee. If it is dark then you need to drink more. Ideally it should be a very pale yellow.

Are you thirsty? if you are constantly thirsty it could be a sign of diabetes. Mention it to your doctor.

750ml is a reasonable amount to aim for but I'd try for more. I wouldn't say that is too much for a pregnant woman... a litre should be do-able for most people. (Eta: thanks Alan... I agree, more is better)

There is a good thread about water consumption called "The water Drinking Challenge" it's a sticky in the general health section.

If you consume caffeine in tea/coffee/cola then it will speed up your system and tend to make fluids pass through a lot more quickly.

Hi Puppies,

I think most nutritionist/dieticians recommend at least 2 litres per day when not pregnant but the amount you actually need probably does depend on your size.

I have found that I am drinking a lot more - like heaps - and more healthy stuff (no coffee and now I'm even going off tea too :( ). I go by the colour of my urine. It's not really possible to drink too much water. You would be absorbing it because most of our bodies are actually water and we need a lot more fluid to make a baby - extra blood, cells, amniotic fluid, mucus etc etc. It just feels like it's going straight through you but its really just that your bladder is getting full. Most people have the urge to wee when their bladder gets to about 250-500ml but it can actually hold a couple of litres. Of course, everyone is different in this area too. Sorry, guess there are no definites! HTH.

Thanks so much for your advice. I am also a desk worker. I try to drink my 750ml drink bottle by lunch time and tend to avoid drinking after 2pm as I have to sit in heavy traffic most of the way home. I try and catch up when I get home by drinking another 750 of my drink bottle. But this tends to make me need to pee a couple of times a night. That is only 1.5 litres a day and not enough by standards. I will try today to finish my first 750ml by lunch time. I am almost done now. And I will do my best to drink another 750ml bottle after lunch but before 2pm. And I will try and drink another one when I get home. I am not sure how this will go though. The constant peeing thing is so frustrating. I do not suffer with puffiness although I used to. Come summer though I do get puffy.

But how much of this fluid is actually staying in my body if I am constantly peeing it out?

Hi Puppies
There is no practical way of knowing how much fluid is staying in your body. You can get an estimate by weighing yourself just before you have something to eat or drink then every time you go to the toilet. Another way would be to measure the amount of urine you pass however neither of these methods are very accurate. Providing you are a normal healthy woman then there is no real need to try to estimate the amount of fluid that you retain, your body will take care of this for you.

Thanks guys. I think the main thing that worries me is the full bladder. I have never been able to hold on for very long. Its not that I pee myself if I hold on too long, its more that I find it so painful and my muscles cramp up so much that I struggle to then be able to pee at all. Then I end up with bladder infections. This has been a problem for me since I was a little kid.
My DH says I am going to have to learn to toughen up and learn to hold on. I am worried about my 18 week scan as they said I need to have a fuller bladder than I did for my 12 week scan. I am wondering if you can train your bladder to hold for longer? If so how do you do this without causing bladder infections?

Ok just finished my first 750ml bottle and about to make my second! I mix lemon cordial with it, cause I really hate drinking water by itself.

I've always been a big water drinker, ever since i can remember i drink at least 3 litres a day.. and being pregnant i drank that maybe a little bit more some days.

Kristy_lee..... I am officially impressed! I think I would possibly die if I drank that much in one day! I must mention I am only 5ft1, so I am only a pip squeek!

With all of my 3 pregnancies I basically felt like I needed to wee all the time too. The raised hormones of pregnancy have something to do with this I think (they irritate the lining of the bladder I think). You just have to accept that getting up to wee several times a night (for me it was about every 2 hours even in the early days) is normal.

Have you ever had a scan to see if you have a physiological problem with your bladder? There shouldn't be any pain associated with passing urine. I'm not trying to worry you but when you mentioned you suffer frequent UTI (urinary tract infections) it made me think that there could be a problem with a valve or a reflux issue down there. You probably get puffy in summer because your body needs more water then... see how it's seasonal? Alan is right... don't worry about exact amounts that your body is retaining... just look for signs of health: pale wee, minimal smell, no discomfort, no puffiness. Size doesn't play a huge role it requirements either. Just follow your body's physical signs for clues.

Thank Bathsheba,
I should have been clearer. I only get UTI when I have had to hold on too often mainly when I was a child as adults were never understanding when I was growing up and my father in particular would not stop the car for me every time I needed to pee.
My pee is almost clear most days and only very yellow in the morning after I take my pregnancy vitamin. It does not smell and it certainly doesn't hurt when I pass it. My bladder only hurts when i have to hold on for too long.
I agree I can see now that my body needed more water in the hotter months and I will make sure I do that this summer. Although I must say if I was to only drink when I was thirsty I would be lucky to drink 2-3 glasses of water a day. I very rarely get thirsty.
I probably get up for pee about 2-3 times a night and I think its not that bad as it might be a good way to get DH used to me getting up in the night to do feeds. Although it doesn't seem to matter how quiet I try to be when i do get up, he always complains that I wake him. We have floor boards its hard to be quiet on them sometimes.

Your DH needs to get used to being woken. ;) There won't be many undisturbed nights ahead for you too for a few years yet! Don't feel guilty for waking him. Don't tippy toe. YOU"RE the one suffering... just wait until he's a old man with a dodgy prostrate then you can tell him "see!"

lol puppies.. im 5ft4 so im not that big myself :D just one of the things that my mother drilled into me

thats funny, and your so right. I have been trying my best to not let my pregnancy interupt him to much. I have been very blessed and not had a tough pregnancy so far. I was only sick for a few weeks and not too bad compared to most women. The tiredness was the main thing. But now constipation is the new annoyance. But I know that drinking more water will help this and I must admit that has been my driving force to pick up my water intake.

He is great though, he cooks almost every night and he works the same hours as me if not more. i try and get to the gym as much as possible and most nights my dinner is either waiting for me or he is in the kitchen making it. He takes me grocery shopping so i dont have to lift the bags out of the trolly and into the car etc. He helps me with the house work and I feel very fortunate to have such a helpful and understand DH. But some things he just doesn't get. The sensitive moods, etc. I wish he would try and let my bad moods just roll of him, but he takes them to heart and thinks I am angry with him. But I am not I just get annoyed at dumb stuff like if its mid day and I haven't had my number 2 yet! I am trying to keep check of these things, but sometimes the mood sneaks up on me.

You should aim for an intake of at least 1.5L of fluid a day, but preferably over 2L if you can manage it - doesn't necessarily have to be plain ole water, but can also come from soups, jelly etc.

As Bath said, there is on correlation between body size, and fluid requirements, and there is not really any correlation between your size, and the capacity of your bladder. For example, how many short women out there with large breasts, and tall women with small breasts - same thing for men and their "appendiges"!

Anyway, the "average" bladder holds about 300ml of urine - about the size of a softball.

You asked if there is any way you can train yor bladder to hold for longer...the only way that you can do this (without surgical intervention!) is to do your pelvic floor muscles, and do them properly. Call your hossi, and ask to speak to a physio about them if you can, to check that you are doing them correctly. Some hospitals also have Continence Advisers who specialize in, surprisingly, continence, and would aslo be able to help you with the correct technique for your pelvic floor exercises, if they are able to talk to you at all (I know ours is always really busy, so that is why I suggested a physio first).

If your issues with "holding on" continue after you have given birth, and it starts to worry you, you could ask your GP for a referral to a urologist, who could help you by addressing any issues you have with your bladder, and your frequent UTIs (again as Bath said, you may have a bodgy valve, or sphincter somewhere in your urinary tract that is contributing to your UTIs)

Good luck, and remember your pelvic floor muscles!

Thanks Ali,
I am off to Pilates tonight so I might ask the instructor after the class to explain how to do these. I have read about them, but like you said I don't know if I am doing them correctly. I have hired a doula as well so maybe this is something that she can help me with also.
you guys are the best I feel better already. Thanks