What is this need to drink water constantly? Even in 'intimate moments'?

[taratiaras]

Provoked by an item in today's Guardian - https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/jul/31/you-be-the-judge-should-my-boyfriend-stop-drinking-from-a-water-bladder-during-sex

I was reflecting on what is this need some people have to drink water almost constantly and the whole performance of carting around containers for this water even if they will be away for a short period. Growing up in the 1980s and 90s I dont remember this at all and we largely survived!

By all means carry water when away hiking in rural areas but going to the shops, a short walk or similar there is surely no need. Even my children going to school where there are water fountains in the playground seem to feel the need to take a metal bottle with them.

As regards the Guardian question this looks a bit pathetic -at home you are never more than a two or three minute walk from the tap! I think the boyfriend clearly has too much time on his hands and a 'building fortresses' need - clearly spent too much time playing Minecraft and similar when younger?

I don't find people carting water bottles around with them half so irritating as the clutching their take- away- coffee brigade.
And even more depressing seeing young girls immitating the adult women and also clutching their coffee and thinking it makes them look cool.
I expect men do it as well but it's predominantly women, and increasingly, girls i see doing it.
I do plead guilty to carrying a water bottle with me in my bag and taking the occasional sip when I'm out.

This is another "Ye good Olde days" thread from someone who has misremembered the time.

Carrying a bottle around has become a "thing" not due to excessive hydration but because buying water bottles or drinks while out has become less fashionable. I was also around in ye good Olde days of the 80s/90s and we had a bottle of drink that we took to school in our lunch box. A box of juice or Capri sun and access to water fountains.

We'd buy water bottles while out and if you watch old TV from the 80s/90s you'll see people taking water bottles out of the fridge. Which would be akin to punching a baby seal in the face nowadays.

None of this related to a weirdo with a water bladder attached to his bed. That's either fake or a fetish. Not to say I've never needed a drink during sex because I absolutely have and you have to if you're doing it right.

Again, clutching the coffee has replaced Styrofoam cups of cheap coffee. This is a cost of living/environmental thing and not at all new.

Half the users on this site seem to use Botox etc though, so it would be pointless if you were walking around with dry skin and parched lips.

And who the eff pays £50 for a Stanley bottle thingy?

Even being 'a few steps' away from a tap is enough to stop me drinking enough water. I have a BIG water bottle next to where i usually sit and watch TV and a bottle by the bed.

If i don't have it under my nose i just don't drink enough and get headaches ect.

Its a big house and a treck to the kitchen, but even when we had a little house i wouldn't go and get a glass ect.

I take a bottle out with me if i'm driving a long way (hour or more).

One of my DDs 🥹

I have the big plastic tesco ones - £7 i think.

Heaven forbid younger people want to stay hydrated so they don’t look half as old and wrinkly as the generations who lived off tea and beers down the pub after work.

I think the water thing is just a con by the bottled water industry. I dont think it is particularly healthy. Bacteria multiply incredibly fast in small containers, they are stimulated to do so by contact with the walls of the container as the water sloshes around. Water bottles need washing out every two hours or so, at least. I am sure this water bottle fad contributes to stomach upsets and the like

I was born in the 70s and can remember taking squash out with me, in old squash bottles and freezing them in the summer.
I think it’s a lie we didn’t drink. We just used to be in and out of friends houses and drank there too.
We just didn’t have reusable bottles (just the ones you got in lunchboxes) and when I was older buying tea in styrofoam cups.

I think tea is more hydrating than water. It has a higher solute content. Pure water has too high a water potential for the human body, so it is just peed out to readjust the solute balance

I agree OP. In the 70s we went to school with our school bags - we didn't take snacks or water bottles, and we all survived. If we were out playing and we were thirsty we might have bagged a drink from someone's mum, but often we were too busy to notice or too far from home to trek back. In the 80s as teens it was the same - no carrying around water bottles or drinking from them in class.

I’m a 50 quid water bottle and never go anywhere without it wanker 🤣 🤣
I panic when I drive the 20 min round trip to the supermarket & occasionally forget it 🤣
My mum mocks me about it and says the old “when I was a child we’d go all day without drinking water” line too.
For me the 50 quid bottle was an investment cos I’d go through cheap ones made of plastic every 6 mths cos they’d get so gross. This one will last me 10 yrs I reckon and it’s way more hygienic and keeps water cold. Plus way better for the environment. I think everyone having water bottles is a combination of the importance of drinking water being all over the media all the time and concern for the environment. No one would be seen dead buying a bottle of disposable water these days…although people clearly still do cos Evian etc are still in business and shops are always stocked with them…so it does make me wonder, who’s buying them?..

Bacteria does not grow rapidly in water containers, surely? The pipes running to the tap you get the water from isn’t washed every two hours.

Personally I have a kidney problems so need to chug water all the time.

I remember a few day trip with parents in 80s where we were all desperate for drinks - remember getting horrible sweet small bottles from ice cream vans skikly sweet that didn't help. Think a few times they had thermos flask or drink bottles but not often.

My kids have bottles - cause we don't drive and this time of year walking miles you often want a drink. We did city break recently with them all now teens - everyone had a bottle with them but with the weather we were still buying additional drinks - often cold and it was a signifcant expense.

I thiunk US citziens seem to drink water excessively that seems to be a result of water industry PR and misinformation and possible a diet higher in salt sugar and addatives - and habit.

Excessive thirst can also be a sign of an underlying medical conditions - diabetes being obvious one.

I have kids who don't always get body messages - ND - so them having habit of having water bottles on hot days does seem to help them avoid dehydration and headaches as a result.

“Punching a baby seal in the face” 😂😂😂😂😂

I drink an awful lot of water. It’s maybe just because it’s habit now but I don’t feel well if I haven’t drank water in half an hour. (I do not have a medical condition)

I carry a bottle of water almost everywhere I go. I think as addictions go I’m not too concerned by my water one!

I also have a teen who takes a water bottle everywhere and another child who doesn’t ever feel thirsty and needs to be reminded to drink or they’d go all day without. Maybe just different people feel differently?

@BakingMuffins ,

‘Heaven forbid younger people want to stay hydrated so they don’t look half as old and wrinkly as the generations who lived off tea and beers down the pub after work.’

You are missing a key factor in why younger people are less wrinkly than us older generations: age.

I don’t think it is the constant over drinking of water!

@taratiaras we were never allowed to have bottles or sweets or such like on our desks. it just wasnt the done thing in any school when i went to school. even at work, you had to wait till break time to have a drink!

Or get hospitalised with dehydration and uti ‚s which make them go absolutely loopy. No it’s obviously a badge of honour to have urine the colour of Fanta.

a good mountaineer pees clear , a true saying.

We never used to buy drinks when we were out and about when I was a child in the 80s. My mum would give us those little boxes of juice (for a treat) if we were having a picnic. If we were going round the shops or out sightseeing we would have a stop in a cafe for a glass of squash. We absolutely would not ever drink directly from a can or bottle and never, ever eat or drink in the street or while walking around. It was considered to be very 'common' and slovenly.

Yes water bottles. And dogs. Two things that everyone seems to NEED to take everywhere and also the two items that nobody needs to take everywhere. (Unless it’s a service dog of course).

It’s all clever marketing hype. We were all conned with Perrier, then Spa/Evian/any “natural spring source” water believing we were somehow healthier. Then, when it dawned on us that the plastic waste wasn’t so good for the old virtue signalling, whilst clutching said brands, so the clever marketing men then got us all hooked on Chillys/Stanleys/S’Well bottles.

There was a documentary not so long ago where this constant need for healthy people to drink was debunked. They took identical adult female twins and got one to drink the “recommended” 8 glasses a day and the other to just consume her usual amount. After 10 days, there was no difference in skin texture or kidney function. It was discovered there is no need to “flush” out your kidneys, that’s what they’ve evolved to do quite efficiently and anything you drink over and above is literally just peed away, it doesn’t miraculously improve your complexion - not dissimilar to these supposed detox drinks.

The message was; listen to your body and drink when you’re thirsty and be to be aware that older people/children aren’t always as aware about thirst signs, but this constant sipping has no health benefits whatsoever and that we actually obtain 20% of our daily hydration from food too.

I drink a lot of water, but my approach has always been to stand by the sink and down a pint every couple of hours. None of this endless sipping, and I never feel the need on a train or car journey or day trip. For one thing, access to toilets is so poor everywhere, I don't want to endlessly need a wee!