Drinking Healthier
Drinking Less Sugar
Drinking Healthier
Drinking healthier is important to me. And it was something that kept me busy thinking about it, in 2023. So I hope to start the year 2024 in a good way and maybe give you some ideas or help/advice.
To be very honest, I am not an expert in this, but I just want to share my thoughts and what I experienced. And hopefully, it can be of some help to others.
But first I want to give a short disclaimer. As I already mentioned, I am not an expert, but I just give you my thoughts and experience. This post is also not sponsored by any company, and there are no affiliated links to anything. Everything is my own personal thoughts/advice.
My Personal Health
As you may already know when reading through my posts, my personal health is not that great. Because of my Heart Failure, I am very susceptible to any bacteria or anything else. It is important to me, that I do my best to stay healthy. Which is not always easy. The problem is, that you never know where the other person has been or with what he/she has been in contact with. Or if they have a cold or starting to have a cold.
To do my best, I try to eat and drink healthy. But that is not always easy. And to be honest, now and then, I also cheat. Otherwise, things are boring. And there is no fun or joy. But most of the time I do my best.
As you had read in a previous post, at the beginning of 2023 I had pneumonia and spent 2 months in the hospital. Since that time I have already been coughing. That is now already 1 year. The doctors have, for now, no idea where this is coming from or what is causing this.
The other thing is also, because of the kidney problems I had, the specialist advised me to drink a lot. Something like 2–3L per day. However, because of my heart failure, I was advised to drink only 1.5–2L per day. Difficult, but we managed.
Fruit and Vegetable Juices
When I came home from the hospital, my wife and I had the thought to start drinking some fruit and/or vegetable juices. A few years ago, we already had bought a Slow Juicer. Because this was better than a Juicer.
So we started to make our own fruit and vegetable juices again. Things like apples, strawberries, cucumbers, celery, and carrots. Just put everything together. The celery I did not like that much. Because, the longer the juice was standing in the fridge, the stronger the taste of the celery became. So slowly on I stopped using the celery.
Once a week, we made enough juice for the rest of the week. And every day I would drink some of it. With, in the back of my mind, this would help to stop the coughing. But this was not the case. At one point we had to stop making the juice. Also, my GP told me that my sugar was going up.
But still, you want to drink something. Especially with the warm/hot weather we had. You can keep on drinking plain water, but that is getting boring quickly.
Air-Up
Then I got to know Air-Up. I had seen some advertising and also my son and girlfriend were using it.
After looking into it, I decided to order a bottle and pods.
For those who don’t know what is Air-Up, I will try to explain this a little. For Air-Up, you are drinking plain water. But on the top of the bottle, you can place different pods. While you are drinking water, you are also sucking air, and that air has a “flavor”. You are smelling something, but because you are also drinking water, it looks like the water has some taste to it. There is a wide range of different flavors. From different fruits to something that tastes/smells like Cola or ice cream.
To be safe, I ordered the bottle and Blue Berry pods. Because the weather was really warm, I always placed my bottle in the fridge, so I had something cold to drink. At first, I was a little disappointed. The taste was very little. You could hardly taste/smell anything. Later I found out, that this was because of the pod that was on the bottle and in the fridge. When you place the pod in the fridge, you reduce the taste/smell. So I started to place the bottle in the kitchen and now and then just filled it with cold water. But as you know, the longer the bottle is out of the fridge, the more the water gets warm.
In all, not a great result. I bought different pods, just to try and see what I would like. There are several tastes/smells I like, but the trouble of keeping the water cold was too much.
Crystal Clear
So, I started to look for other drinks I could drink and that could stay in the fridge. I remembered the drinks of Crystal Clear. They advertise that they have 0% sugar in the drinks. Great. The flavors they have are sometimes strange combinations, but I gave it a try anyway. The one that I liked was Watermelon with cucumber. So I bought several packs.
At one point, I found an ad somewhere that was talking about an ebook about reducing or removing sugar from your life. This sounded interesting, so I downloaded it. I came in contact with the writer and explained my situation and what I was drinking. I also like to drink Ice Tea Green Lemon. But as you may know, this is what you could call a sugar bomb. It is full of sugar. And I told her that I was drinking Crystal Clear 0% sugar, at home.
She told me, that Crystal Clear is actually is also a sugar bomb. They use a lot of artificial sugar in there. A sweetener. One that is artificial and not from the Stevia plant.
I started to read the label of the pack and started searching for what kind of sugar they were using. I was a little shocked. One of the effects it could have on you is that your body starts to “scream” or long for more of that sugar. Slowly, if you did not moderate your drinking, you could get “addicted” to it.
So, this kind of drink was also not good for me. But again, keep on drinking plain water is still getting boring.
WaterDrop
In the last few weeks, I also saw some ads about Waterdrops. So I started to look into that. And see what it is and what it was all about.
It are cubs that you need to dissolve in water. This then will give taste/flavor to the water. This sounds nice and it will bring something different to just drinking plain water. But after looking further into it, I saw a lot of remarks that it all tasted a bit chemical. And that they use artificial sugar in it, and not the good ones. Not the artificial sugar from the stevia plant. I was almost at the point of maybe ordering them and seeing how they would taste. I found out, that in the city nearby, they had a pop-up store where you could try it.
However, after reading some of the reviews, I quickly decided that this would not be for me.
But here is a small twist. A few weeks after writing this, I started reading more reviews and researching more about artificial sweeteners, I had a different view of it. Of course, things that are artificial are always doubtful if it is good for you. But, as long as you take it in moderation, it is okay. I took the next step and ordered some samples. To be honest, it was not bad. The only flavors so far that I don’t like, are the ones with Ice Tea.
Fruit Fusion Water
Then I started to think about fruit-infused water. You could make this yourself and use the fruits that you like or have a nice combination. I did this in the past, but for some reason, I had stopped with it. Right now I wanted to give it a try again.
You use a drinking bottle that has some kind of holder in the middle, where you place the fruits in it. You fill the bottle with water, insert the holder, and leave it overnight in the fridge.
For the fruits, I used some frozen fruits. Because these were already cleaned and cut, so it was easy to use. Drinking it the next day was okay. I only had the find the right or nice combination of fruits and the quantity of fruits. Mango and Strawberry were nice. Because I was not drinking the whole bottle in one quick go, I transferred some to a different bottle and kept it in the fridge. After that, I could refill the fusion bottle again. The fruits were good for two to three refills.
The downside was, that once I had transferred the water to a different bottle, I only could keep it for two or three days. Then I started to see things float in the water and it turned a little bit dark.
So not a great success either. I slowly started to use the Air-Up bottle again.
Spa Touch
At one point, when we were doing the shopping, I saw something new. It is called Spa-Touch. They had it in Spa Blue (plain flat water) and Spa Red (sparkling mineral water) with fruit flavor/aroma.
I first bought a small bottle of the Spa Touch Bleu, in the flavor Raspberry-Apple. I bought the plain flat water because I was not that fond of sparkling water. When I tried this, it was very nice. It was just plain flat water, with a hint of raspberry-apple. And there were no sugars in it. When this bottle was empty, I looked in the store again for it and bought the bigger bottle. I also saw they had another flavor. Lime and lavender. I also bought that, so I could try it.
The lime lavender tasted a bit like Lemongrass. It was okay, but so far, my favorite would be the Raspberry Apple. After searching what other flavors they would have, I found out, that for the plain flat water, they only had those two flavors. Only when you go for the sparkling mineral water, they had more flavors. As a test, I recently bought one small bottle of sparkling mineral water with the flavor Watermelon Kiwi. To be honest, this was not bad. I also had read, that drinking some sparkling mineral water now and then, is also good for you.
Now, very slowly, I will try different flavors, to see which one I like best. Then at least I can switch between the different flavors and between the plain flat water and the sparkling mineral water.
Closing
As I had mentioned in the beginning, I am not an expert. I am not sponsoring any of the brands. I just wanted to share my thoughts and experience with the different drinks. Also, I hope that this could be of some help to others. Or give them some ideas.
For me right now, the Spa Blue Touch Raspberry Apple is my favorite. I noticed that I am starting to drink more of this water. Because I have the feeling I am drinking more, I need to keep a close eye on how much I am drinking. I have a drinking limitation because of my heart condition. I mustn’t drink too much. At least I do not drink just plain flat water. Or soft drinks that have too much sugar in them.
I can switch things around a bit so that it doesn’t get bored. I am just hoping that Spa is coming also with more different flavors for the Spa Blue Touch. At least I can switch it around with the Spa Red.
I also have decided to start drinking from my Air-Up bottle. Okay, the water will turn to room temp, but if I want, I can just replace the water with cold water. At least I have more to switch between all of them.
If you have any suggestions or remarks, please let me know.
Of course, now and then, if you are out, in a restaurant or bar, they will not have the drinks you want, but it is okay to cheat now and then a little. As long as for the major part, you stick to your plan.
And in regards to my coughing, which I have had for a year, in this last week, I noticed that it was getting less. I am not sure if it is because I drink less soft drinks or drinks with less or no sugar, I am not sure. But so far, I am happy that it is slowly getting less. In my mind, it had got to do with sugar, and for me, that was good enough. As long as the coughing stops.
About My Posts.
About my posts. My posts are personal. It is about things I experience in my daily life. It can be about simple things, or about troubles that are going on.
The reason why I write these posts is that I want to share my life with others. Just to show others that they are not the only one that is going through difficult times.
With my posts, I also hope to help others. Maybe they are going through the same things, or maybe there are people around them who have the same issues.
I hope these posts can be of some help to everyone.
If you want to know more about me, then check out my profile on Medium. Or visit my blog.
