# Too much water and your kidneys

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 28, 2000, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524 "2000-03-28T17:56:00Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Steve-o](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecc23a/32.png) [@Steve-o](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steve-o)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2000, 5:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524/1 "2000-03-28T17:56:00Z")

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Drinking too much water… I realize that it can cause electrolyte dilution, but will it hurt your kidneys?

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Things are random only insofar as we don’t understand them.

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**Author:** ![GasDr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ba9def/32.png) [@GasDr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GasDr)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2000, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524/2 "2000-03-28T23:48:00Z")

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Nope, just your brain. Well, I take that back. Your kidney’s maintain a concentration gradient within them which allows them to concentrate urine. I believe that you can decrease this gradient and reduce thier function. But, I doubt it would be permanant damage.

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**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2000, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524/3 "2000-03-29T00:35:00Z")

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Too much water makes your blood too thin.

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**Author:** ![ASPA](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b19c9b/32.png) [@ASPA](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASPA)\
**Post date:** [April 1, 2000, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524/4 "2000-04-01T01:55:00Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> Originally posted by Steve-o:  
> Drinking too much water … will it hurt your kidneys?

_I’m imagining that you can eventually overwork the kidneys with too much water drinking. Depleting nutrients with too much water would, of course, deprive all the organs, so…_

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**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\
**Post date:** [April 1, 2000, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/too-much-water-and-your-kidneys/9524/5 "2000-04-01T02:02:00Z")

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I looked this up before and water can be toxic but it is very difficult to kill yourself. An average adult with healthy kidneys etc would have to drink six to eight GALLONS of water an HOUR.

You would be hard pressed not to make yourself sick, (you’d most likely vomit it up)