Water Retention- What Makes you Puffy and How to Fix It

Water Retention- What Makes you Puffy and How to Fix It - Thomas DeLauer

Stress & Water Retention

Long-term stress can increase the hormone cortisol, which directly influences fluid retention and water weight

This may occur because stress stimulates cortisol, which, in turn, can cause the release of aldosterone - not only that, but it can also increase ADH

A review published in Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews that looked at the relationship between aldosterone and stress concluded that stress does activate the rennin–angiotensin–aldosterone system

Not only that, but stress reduction studies have resulted in decreases in aldosterone

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Additionally, a study published in the British Journal of Plastic Surgery looked at, among other things, the relationship between cortisol and AVP (ADH) in burn patients

Obviously, burn patients had increased levels of cortisol, and researchers found this to be positively correlated with increased levels of ADH

**The exact pathway of how ADH is released is not currently known, but it’s believed that stressful stimuli activate AVP release via parvocellular neurons (part of the hypothalamus) in the paraventricular nucleus, and osmolar stimuli through magnocellular neurons in the supraoptic nucleus** -- these areas are part of the hypothalamus

Hibiscus/Roselle Tea

Roselle tea is an age-old natural remedy for hypertension or high blood pressure. This species of hibiscus contains polyphenols that act as blood pressure-lowering drugs, ACE inhibitors

Roselle also contains quercetin, a flavonoid that contributes to vascular relaxation. It also increased urine production by 48% in a study done on kidney tissue
delphinidin-3-O-sambubioside, 11.5 mg/g cyanidin-3-O-sambubioside, 11.5 mg/g quercetin which have been found to actually control aldosterone activity

A study from the Journal of Ethnopharmacology found that hibiscus tea increased urine production by 48% in a study done on kidney tissue

Coffee/Tea

Technically speaking, caffeine in coffee is a natural diuretic that binds to adenosine receptors - this effect prevents the kidneys from taking up sodium and enhances water and sodium elimination

Renal renal reabsorption requires functional adenosine A1 receptors, which caffeine locks onto - via this effect, caffeine can decrease salt and water reabsorption in distal nephron segments, thereby altering ADH secretion

*Adenosine receptors are expressed along the entire nephron*

Additional Resources

[DR_ibtissamghar]

It’s so lame when you’re doing everything right and you still retain water 😭
Thank you for the video

[Dekipoo]

I'm exercising almost every day, eating healthy, drinking lots of water, getting a good night sleep and yet I feel like a cheese ball. It's really discouraging since I know I'm putting in the work.

[justins]

Keep the kidney focused videos coming Thomas! I've been having more kidney/hydration issues recently, at my 10 month mark on keto. Anything you have in regards to leafy greens, nuts and oxalates forming kidney stones would be excellent. Albuminurea is also a concern of mine due to consistently foamy urine when I eat too much protein, which then led to an underconsumption of protein that also felt awful. Finding the right fluid & electrolyte balance for me has been the absolute hardest part of my keto journey, and it has made me want to quit several times over the course of the past 10 months. Luckily, I've stayed the course, and hope to make 12 months successfully around Thanksgiving. You started my journey last year, so thank you for that. Down 70lbs back to my weight at 18 years old. Very happy, but I worry about kidney damage more often now.

[mikeessary]

I hit the sauna 2 or 3 times a week. It definitely helps with this and many other things.

[ashleynichole]

Omg! Thank You because I've been stressing about stressing and I just realized that is the only thing that has always been a factor when I have puffy issues.

[austinjohnson]

Back to back to back vids Thomas coming with the golden nuggets

[katie_moore]

Thanks for cranking out the daily videos Thomas! These are super informative!

[denissemedina]

Well I’m a STEM student, I work, volunteer and workout 5x a week, make sure I eat healthy and drink enough water, I also try to sleep enough, make time for friends and family plus I try to make time to work on other things that make me happy. So yes, I’m in a constant state of stress :) even tho I’ve learned to control it, then I’m destined to retain water for ever 😣

[Vitatalks]

Yep, stress is just like too many carbs, both increase your water retention. Low carbs/keto is easy compared to avoiding stress!

[ones]

I would like to know why traveling makes a body puffy/retain water. The last trip I took, my ankles turned into cankles 😳.

[Upthewahz]

That explains why men in relationship always gain weight they are stressed haha😂

[julianroberts]

Hi, Thomas, can you do a video on Lymphedema and water retention in the legs and fixes. Thanks.

[ellenka]

I feel like you read my mind with this video. I seem to overreact to stress and this has been happening. Thank you for the insight! It's nice to understand what's going on.

[vitoanania]

but caffeine also increase cortisol Thomas. I sleep much better (even dreaming every night) since I gave up coffee

[Sabrina]

Wow. Good to know I was taking a pharmaceutical diuretic and I felt my heart cramping like you described I thought I was over thinking it. They should really put a warning on it to take with a meal atleast

[abztraktt]

Man Im stressed because of water retention !

[josenicolasaponte]

Thomas, thank you for explaining so well the mechanism of aldosterone and ADH secretion, but I also want to point out that it gets more complicated than that, aldosterone also has other mechanisms of negative feedback back secretion that involves the renine, angiotensin, aldosterone system in the kidneys. I know you need to make it as simple as possible so everyone could understand but I thought it might be of some help to clarify that. Anyway keep on the nice work.

[itznunyabizz]

Thomas, this is amazing that you made this video today because just yesterday I was thinking the same thing like what am I doing wrong because I felt so big and bloated but of course when I woke up that all went away and then I see this video a few hours later so that is outstanding. I appreciate the videos even if I do not comment often.

[chrisburke]

Most helpful video in a while!! Great videos all around, but this one REALLY helped me on a few levels!

[ghipsandrew]

Alcohol also inhibits ADH and causes you to retain less water (the reason why you need to pee every 20 minutes when drinking beer xD). Just chug some shots daily.