Hydration, Cognition, Mood and. . . Recall?

[pj]

I am just coming out of the flu, preceded by over two months of utterly irregular living.  Talking to a friend who was deeply involved in military research and policy, the subject of hydration came up.  He told me about the discoveries they have made regarding the ability of troops to discern when they were dehydrated, how long the brain takes to rehydrate, and how profoundly an even slightly dehydrated brain affects cognition.  These discoveries changed everything involving hydration for troops.

One of the things that has (and continues to) amaze me through this period of my life is how mentally crippled I seem to be.  It is easy to write this off to stress and emotions and all the rest, but if that was the case this should be swiftly passing.  So far, it isn't.

I am now wondering what the correlation is between cerebral hydration and dream recall.  It makes sense that there should be an impact.  Thinking through times in my life when recall has been particularly good or bad, the possibility of a strong correlation does seem to exist.

The tricky bit is how to measure cerebral hydration.  It is relatively easy to tell how overall hydration levels are just by urine color.  My friend tells me that they found the body re-hydrates the brain LAST, however, and that this can take a long time and can be disrupted by any slip in regular hydration.  How many of us, I wonder, live in a semi-permanent state of cerebral dehydration?

I have found no published research on dream recall and hydration.  I am very interested in hearing about any anecdotal experiences any of you might have regarding this possibility.

http://psychcentral.com/news/2012/02/20/dehydration-influences-mood-cognition/35037.html
http://www.nestlenutrition-institute.org/news/pages/Thenegativeimpactsofdehydrationoncognitiveperformance.aspx

[The Littlest Leaf Dragon]

I didn't realize there was a connection between hydration and cognitive performance, but it seems likely that such could hamper your dream recall if nothing else.

[Vex]

Interesting. Makes sense once you think about it.
There's so much I had written here but deleted because it was too rambly. I'll think this over some more and comment on it later.

[Shellidfl]

We are a chronically under-hydrated society.  And, as we age, it becomes even more important to keep hydrated.  (Me, sitting here, knowing how much fluid I didn't drink today...)  Maybe that's (one of the reasons) why many elderly people get dementia.

If you start to feel the sense of thirst, it is already too late - you are not hydrated.  We are told in the health care sector to ensure you drink enough.  Caffiene-filled drinks are only worth about half the fluid in it, as caffeine is a diuretic - for you not in the health care field, that means it makes you pee, just like beer!

When you have the flu, it's vitally important to keep drinking, even if it just.... goes through you are doesn't stay in your system very long.

We are too kind to the drunks who come into the hospitals.  We give them fluid intravenously.  A hang-over means dehydration AND electrolyte loss.  Fix them up by giving them both, and they don't get hung-over.

Now I need Vexxie to edit, as I am babbling educating the masses.  And now, I'll get off my soap box and get something to hydrate by brain!

[iadr]

Unsure how hydration affects dream recall, but iadr learned about the importance of drinking at least 64 ounces of water each day to keep the toxins flushed out of the body when he was in the hospital a few months ago, after which he started drinking 64 ounces of water every day.

Shortly after this he leaned how beneficial green tea was for the heart and in preventing cancer, etc, so began substituting decaffeinated green tea for the water. The easier way we've found to do this is to just have a large glass of unsweetened green tea after we get back from jogging, and another one with our evening meal.

We can feel it flushing out our heart, brain and body, when we drink it in the morning, so can tell that it is benefiting us.  

[Sunshine]

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[Shellidfl]

   (I generally know if I am well hydrated if I get up to pee once in the night - haven't the past few, but Wednesday night was cuz hubby felt I needed another drink of alcohol after the sauna - his idea of party night, as he is working nights, and I have to go out of town again for 2 days.)