Why do we dehydrate so quickly?

I've always wondered this. I can't gulp, but I stay plenty hydrated by sipping constantly, usually getting over 80 oz. a day. I pee all the time. But if I go 30 mins without drinking something, I feel incredibly thirsty. Biking home from work today, I needed to grab my water bottle every couple of stoplights. Why do we dehydrate so much faster after surgery even if we're taking in the same (or greater) volume of fluids that we did pre-op?

I don't particularly agree with the premise that "we dehydrate so much faster after surgery". It has not been my experience nor the experience of most people I know IRL. I don't drink any more or less than I ever did (although I did during the frist 6 montsh or so), and have never in my life been dehydrated except when I had a case of food poisoning in the late 1980s.

I know of no one who has had to go to the ER for dehydration or who has experienced any serious issues attributed to dehydration.  I only know a couple of people who had trouble of any kind with dehydration, and those were people who had mild issues (constipation, lightheadedness) that might have been attributed to trouble drinking enough during the first month or so post-op.

I think it gets far more "press" here -- as do all other issues, since the people with issues are the ones who post -- than is reflected in the general RNY population.

Lora

I went to the ER last December for dehydration. And I was a little over 3 years post op. 

Ok.  So?  

I didn't say it NEVER happens.  I said that it has not happened to anyone I know and that posts here about dehydration (and posts about fears of dehydration) make it seem as if it is more prevalent than it is.  Just like strictures... and bowel obstructions...

Low carb diet, type of food we eat that is often low salt ..(yogurt, protein shakes) . Makes us retain less water... So even one day or lower liquid intake or one bad day of food poisoning may makes us slightly dehydrated

I have to make conscious effort to add salt to most of my foods - even coffee. . 

Our bodies lie to us. We often thought we were "starving," even though we were obese. But we were just hungry, not starving. You are thirsty, not dehydrated. There's a big difference. If you are getting 80 ounces of fluid a day, you aren't dehydrated. So you aren't in danger. But I have no idea why you are thirsty so often.

I drink 180 to 220 ounces a day. Everything I drink is in 20 ounce bottles, so the math isn't too hard. Not everyone wants to drink that much, but I do. It's just what's comfortable for me.

I guess I probably should have mentioned that when I had to give a pee specimen at urgent care for a kidney infection last weekend, they told me that on top of the infection, I was really dehydrated. I hadn't had as much to drink that one day (because it hurt to pee), but that seemed awfully fast to get to a detectable level of dehydration.

The people at the Urgent Care almost certainly based your "dehydration" on the color of your urine.  When we don't drink enough, our urine is darker in color, and that can vary a LOT just between a morning  specimen and an evening specimen.  That is NOT the equivalent of actual clinical dehydration, though.  It just means you didn't have enough to drink since the last time you peed.

That seems like a tremendous amount of fluid.

Do you have a sense of how much urine you output daily?

I've been increasing my fluids to 80-100 and I'm putting out about the same 80-100 in urine.

Is that normal?

Hi.

Ru still drinking 200oz per day?

I think I need to up my fluids.