11 Signs of Fluid Retention And How To Solve It

It is common to confuse fluid retention with being overweight because it is usually closely related, but when the real problem is inflammation and not excess fat, dieting or going to the gym has no much use. In this post, I will show you what can be done about it.

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What is Fluid Retention?

Fluid retention, dropsy or oedema is the imbalance of the body’s lymphatic system that is responsible for the filtration, elimination and reabsorption of water between our blood vessels, tissues, cells and interstitial spaces.

It is a complex and highly evolved system that is based on osmotic and hydrostatic pressure, which are forces that regulate the fluids, the ones that are eliminated, the ones that enter or the one that leaves our cells and circulatory system.

In other words, the lymphatic system works as a “sewage system”.

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Do I Have Fluid Retention?

Sometimes it’s difficult to distinguish if what we have left over is fat or fluid in our body, but there is some evidence that confirms that the problem can be inflammation due to the accumulation of retained water.

Here are a few signs of fluid retention to observe:

• You go to bed with more weight than you get up.
• Clothes fit you well in the morning but are too tight in the afternoon.
• You put a ring on easily in the morning, but at night you have a hard time taking it off.
• Your ankles and abdomen swell very easily.
• You have bags under your eyes in the mornings.
• Even if you lose weight, you still have cellulitis.
• It’s difficult for you to move; you feel tired and you have lost flexibility.
• Clothes, especially socks and pants leave marks on you.
• You feel cold feet and hands almost all the time.
• Even if you diet or play sports, you can’t lose weight or you lose very little.
• Sometimes when something changes, your weight can vary up to 5 kilos in a week.

Why Do I Have Fluid Retention?

As mentioned, the lymphatic system that maintains the balance of our fluids is very complex and above all very delicate, because small metabolic or environmental variations can break that balance and cause us to swell quickly.

We tend to think that drinking more or less water, exercising or not exercising or staying in the same position for many hours are the causes of fluid retention, but there are much more causes and just as important, although they are not usually taken into account.

A diet rich in sodium favours inflammation, but a diet deficient in protein, vitamins or electrolytes, especially potassium, is a more common cause of fluid retention.

That is, both an excess of some nutrients and a deficit of others can unbalance our lymphatic system.

Hormonal imbalance is another very common cause of fluid retention, especially in women.

The balance of female sex hormones is as delicate as the hydrostatic balance, and our endocrine system works like a butterfly effect circuit. 

During pregnancy, it is more frequent to suffer the ravages of this hormonal alteration, but without the need to be pregnant, we also tend to suffer all kinds of hormonal imbalances that we have to solve to eliminate our fluids.

If your body doesn’t get enough water from the diet, it tends to increase retention as it will likely take a long time before it gets water again.

That is, if you do not drink enough water, your body will go into a water “saving mode”.

Suffering from Insulin Resistance or Hyperinsulinism greatly favours the hormonal imbalance and the water imbalance in the body.

Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome, increasingly common in our society, is a hormonal disorder that affects many young women and one of its most frequent symptoms is inflammation due to fluid retention.

Stress is the most common cause of fluid retention today. Both in my personal life and in my practice I see how people swell and deflate depending on their emotional state, their level of stress and their anxiety.

Stress greatly alters our circulatory system and our hormonal system, so it’s easy to deduce that it’s one of the protagonists of the water balance problem in our body.

Anaemia is another determining disorder for inflammation and that especially affects women and vegans.

Kidney, lung or coronary (heart) problems usually cause fluid imbalance and inflammation throughout the body, although in addition to this, they produce many other symptoms by which they are more easily recognisable.

Antidepressants, sleeping pills, sex hormones, steroids (corticosteroids, for example) or beta-blockers (to treat hypertension, for example), usually produce or promote fluid retention in our body.

Constipation and other digestive or transit disorders favour the body’s toxicity, nutrient deficit and therefore inflammation.

Any state of immune hypersensitivity causes a multitude of inflammatory reactions to happen in our body, so much so that sometimes constant inflammation when maintained for longer periods can also cause fluid retention. 

Natural Treatment for Fluid Retention

As we have seen, there are many causes of fluid retention, and many of them have nothing to do with your physical activity or your diet, therefore, finding out the cause of your inflammation is essential to be able to apply an adequate treatment. 

Each person is unique in their circumstances, so it’s important to study your case, and your general health, including your emotional health and stress levels, to develop a plan of action that is effective and long-lasting.

Taking diuretics is a path that can also have a rebound effect in the long term, so although in some cases it can help, it’s not the best solution.

We’re better off working on our nutrition, our purification, a well-thought-out supplementation, our habits and our emotional health.

A common natural treatment for fluid retention is potassium supplementation.

The main role of potassium is to maintain normal levels of fluids in our cells, counterposing sodium.

The issue is that we need great quantities of potassium a day: an adult should get around 4700 mg of potassium, which despite being widely available in a variety of foods, it’s really hard to get by diet alone.

For instance, a banana, considered to be one of the foods highest in potassium, has 420 mg of the mineral, which means one should eat 11 bananas a day to get their daily needs met.

Even if you follow a varied diet, rich in vegetables, you may still be deficient in potassium.

In cases when patients are experiencing fluid retention, supplementation is advised alongside a change in their diet.

Final Thoughts

If you’re trying to lose weight but you can’t, if you feel bloated and tired or you’ve realised that your stress levels greatly affect your body volume, don’t give up, use this awareness to trigger a lifestyle change so that the problem doesn’t get worse.

Find out why you’re retaining fluids and use these tips to tackle the problem once and for all!

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