Drinking Cold Water – What Does This Mean for Your Body?

You may have heard a lot of people saying that they have lost weight by drinking water with ice, while others claim that this is definitely a bad habit that can harm your digestive tract. Who is right? What can cold water do to your body?

For a better understanding of what happens to your body when drinking cold water, you can imagine what happens to it on the outside when exposed to ice-cold water. Let’s say that you fill your bathtub with cold water and ice cubes and wait until the ice cubes are melted. Would you like to take a bath right in that cold water, right after the melting of the ice? How will your skin and body react in contact with that water? Most probably, you will feel your body tight and constricted, and far from relaxed.

While a warm bath will open your pores and it will relax you, such a cold bath will seal your pores and will tighten your skin. The effects of warm and cold water on your skin are similar to their effects on the inside of your body.

Drinking cold water and its effects on digestion

Ice and cold water compresses are used for bleeding wounds because the low temperatures will decrease the blood flow. But, in order to digest the food, your digestive system needs a proper blood circulation. The blood vessels should be able to provide your digestive tract with all the oxygen and nutrients it needs for a normal functioning, especially after you eat. When drinking cold water, the blood vessels from your digestive tract constrict. This way, digestion will last longer, and you may also experience some symptoms of indigestion.

Moreover, the temperature of your entire body will quickly decrease, which means that your body will be struggling to regulate its temperature. The energy will be used in for this, and not for the digestion process. Digestion will be slowed once again, and you may lose essential nutrients.

The weight loss myth

You may think that all these effects might lead to losing weight and getting fit. The short answer is no. If you no longer benefit from the nutrients that are vital for your overall health, you may lose muscular mass, not fat. This will not help you get fit, but instead it will make you sick.

Furthermore, if you drink iced water while you are eating or right after your meals, your body will have a hard time processing the fats. If the meal is rich in fats, your body will only process a part of them. What happens to the other part? All those fats that have not been processed will be deposited by your body as subcutaneous and visceral fat.

Taking all these into consideration, it is not hard to understand that iced water has nothing to do with getting fit or with a healthy weight loss. In fact, it may be a danger to your health, and it can determine your body to deposit even more fat.