Sasha Kennedy of Essex is addicted to water, drinking 25 liters of the stuff a day, far exceeding the USDA Recommended Daily Water Intake of  2.7 liters. Her condition provokes many pressing questions, namely “Won’t that dilute her blood?” and “Has she ever tried soda?”
What surprised me most was that the condition had a name: Psychogenic polydipsia. It is “an uncommon clinical disorder characterized by excessive water-drinking in the absence of a physiologic stimulus to drink” and is typically found among mental patients on phenothiazine medications. Kennedy appears to be completely sane, although she does experience the dry mouth sensation characteristic of the condition.
If I feel my mouth start to get dry I have to get my next fix of water – it’s all I can focus on. People never really think anyone can drink that much until they get to know me – then they just cannot believe their eyes.
You’d think drinking so much water would do something to her health, but medical experts confirmed that there is nothing wrong with her. She doesn’t even have hypoatremia, where cells swell due to too much water in the blood. She’s perfectly healthy and her blood isn’t diluted. Then again, her habit started when she was two years old, so maybe her body acclimatized.
Her lifestyle, however, is drastically affected by her addiction. She has to go to the toilet 40 times a day and can only get about an hour of sleep every night before having to wake up to drink some water or go to the loo. She carries large bottles of water with her everywhere she goes, and once quit her job because the tap water quality wasn’t up to par.
Speaking of water quality, here’s Kennedy with bottles of her favorite water.
So now we know Highland Spring and Buxton are the best of bottled water.
I really really want to know what she thinks of soda.
(via Daily Mail)
Published: Jul 12, 2012 04:17 pm