It's essential that you talk to a healthcare provider about ways to reduce water weight. You might require blood thinners or diuretics, depending on the cause.

You might think that putting more water into your body adds more water weight. It turns out that the opposite is true. Your body will hold on to whatever water it has if it's dehydrated.

Make sure that you get plenty of water, especially if you are eating salty or sugary foods. It might help to limit tea, coffee, and alcohol, all of which can dehydrate you.

Cranberry juice, in contrast, has a slight diuretic effect and may help flush out excess water. Choosing hydrating foods is a safe and healthy way to lose excess water weight and helps hydrate you. Take in more fluids, even in the form of hydrating foods, to ultimately help your body excrete water.

Hydrating foods include fruits and vegetables like:. Try eating more potassium-rich foods like leafy greens and potatoes. Potassium also helps you get rid of excess sodium.

Physical activity is key to losing water weight. Not only will you sweat out some fluid, but you'll also need to rehydrate. Moving around can also help reduce puffiness. Stop the car at regular intervals while driving long distances to get out and stretch your legs.

Move around if possible while riding buses, planes, and trains. You can even do simple exercises with your feet and legs while sitting. Regular exercise is important if you are pregnant, which increases swelling in the legs and ankles. Resting with your feet up also helps reduce that swelling.

Quality sleep is generally essential for your overall health. Experts advise that adults get about seven to nine hours of sleep per night. It turns out that sleep may help decrease water weight. Research has found that your kidneys can effectively manage the amount of water and sodium they store when you get adequate rest.

Salty and sugar foods make your body hold onto more water than usual. Try cutting down on high-sodium foods, such as bacon, cookies, donuts, and ham. Replace sugary drinks with water flavored with pieces of fruit or cucumber slices.

Cook from scratch when you can, using fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. Read the label if you need to use a packaged item. Compare the sodium and added sugar contents across similar products. Your body stores excess carbs that it does not use right away in your cells as glycogen, which has three grams of water.

Most people on a 2,calorie diet need grams of carbs per day. Try swapping bread and pasta for meat, fish, or poultry to cut down on your carb intake.

Excess cortisol, the stress hormone, may increase water weight. Cortisol levels directly correlate to antidiuretic hormone ADH levels. ADH communicates with your kidneys to control the amount of water in your body. Electrolytes , like magnesium and potassium, help manage the amount of water that your body stores.

As a result, you might gain water weight if your electrolyte levels are out of balance. Water does not have electrolytes, so reach for a sports drink to replenish them.

You might also consider electrolyte supplements if you are significantly increasing or decreasing your water intake. Dandelion and magnesium supplements might help manage water weight. Research has found that dandelion has a diuretic effect. Magnesium is an electrolyte that helps control the amount of water inside your body.

Some evidence suggests that vitamin B6 supplements reduce bloating and decrease premenstrual syndrome PMS symptoms. More research is needed to know exactly how vitamin B6 affects PMS symptoms. There are several factors that result in excess fluid in your body. Some of the most common causes include eating too much salt, sitting for long periods, and taking certain medications.

Some blood pressure drugs, like calcium channel blockers, increase fluid retention. Certain anti-inflammatory medications like corticosteroids also cause your body to hold onto sodium and lose potassium, resulting in added water weight.

Talk to a healthcare provider to determine if your medication is the cause of water weight. They might be able to provide an alternative medication. Cortisol is best known as a stress hormone, although it's much more than that.

The hormone helps keep your blood sugar and blood pressure levels stable, supports metabolism, reduces inflammation, and helps form memories. Although rare, fluid retention might be the result of elevated cortisol levels.

Cushing syndrome, for instance, might cause your body to hold on to sodium. This disorder occurs when tumors on the adrenal and pituitary glands release too much cortisol into your blood. Some people with an underactive thyroid hypothyroidism may have swelling around their eyes.

Estrogen and progestin, hormones in birth control pills , might increase fluid retention. This water weight is usually temporary and not significant.

Still, you may want to talk to a healthcare provider about other birth control options if you are uncomfortable. Fluctuating hormones cause many people to retain water the week before their period. Three minute spurts of exercise per day can be just as good as one minute workout.

Remember: anything is better than nothing. Start off slowly with small amounts of physical activity each day. Then, as you start to lose weight and have more energy, you'll find it easier to become more physically active.

Find exercise you enjoy. Try walking with a friend, dancing, hiking, cycling, playing Frisbee with a dog, enjoying a pickup game of basketball, or playing activity-based video games with your kids. Far from it. Since it was established in , The National Weight Control Registry NWCR in the United States, has tracked over 10, individuals who have lost significant amounts of weight and kept it off for long periods of time.

Whatever diet you use to lose weight in the first place, adopting these habits may help you to keep it off:. How choosing healthier carbs can improve your health and waistline. This diet can help fight heart disease, diabetes, cognitive decline, and more. How focusing on the experience of eating can improve your diet.

Tips for building a fitness plan, and finding the best exercises for you. BetterHelp makes starting therapy easy. Take the assessment and get matched with a professional, licensed therapist.

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About Us Meet Our Team Our Story Jeanne Segal, Ph. Harvard Health Partnership Audio Meditations Newsletter. What's the best diet for healthy weight loss? Weight Loss How to Lose Weight and Keep It Off There's a better way to lose weight.

Copy Link Link copied! Download PDF. By Melinda Smith, M. and Lawrence Robinson. Four popular weight loss strategies Control emotional eating Stay motivated Cut down on sugar and refined carbs Fill up with fruit, veggies, and fiber Take charge of your food environment Get moving Keeping the weight off.

Four popular weight loss strategies 1. Cut calories Some experts believe that successfully managing your weight comes down to a simple equation: If you eat fewer calories than you burn, you lose weight. Weight loss isn't a linear event over time.

When you cut calories, you may drop weight for the first few weeks, for example, and then something changes. You eat the same number of calories but you lose less weight or no weight at all.

That's because when you lose weight you're losing water and lean tissue as well as fat, your metabolism slows, and your body changes in other ways. So, in order to continue dropping weight each week, you need to continue cutting calories.

A calorie isn't always a calorie. Eating calories of high fructose corn syrup, for example, can have a different effect on your body than eating calories of broccoli. The trick for sustained weight loss is to ditch the foods that are packed with calories but don't make you feel full like candy and replace them with foods that fill you up without being loaded with calories like vegetables.

Many of us don't always eat simply to satisfy hunger. We also turn to food for comfort or to relieve stress—which can quickly derail any weight loss plan. Cut carbs A different way of viewing weight loss identifies the problem as not one of consuming too many calories, but rather the way the body accumulates fat after consuming carbohydrates—in particular the role of the hormone insulin.

Cut fat It's a mainstay of many diets: if you don't want to get fat, don't eat fat. Not all fat is bad. Unsaturated fats found in avocados, nuts, seeds, soy milk, tofu, and fatty fish can help fill you up, while adding a little tasty olive oil to a plate of vegetables, for example, can make it easier to eat healthy food and improve the overall quality of your diet.

We often make the wrong trade-offs. Many of us make the mistake of swapping fat for the empty calories of sugar and refined carbohydrates.

Instead of eating whole-fat yoghurt, for example, we eat low- or no-fat versions that are packed with sugar to make up for the loss of taste. Or we swap our fatty breakfast bacon for a muffin or donut that causes rapid spikes in blood sugar. Follow the Mediterranean diet The Mediterranean diet emphasizes eating good fats and good carbs along with large quantities of fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts, fish, and olive oil—and only modest amounts of meat and cheese.

Control emotional eating We don't always eat simply to satisfy hunger. If you eat when you're: Stressed — find healthier ways to calm yourself. Speak to a Licensed Therapist BetterHelp is an online therapy service that matches you to licensed, accredited therapists who can help with depression, anxiety, relationships, and more.

Take Assessment HelpGuide is user supported. Learn more. More Information Helpful links. How to Stay Motivated - Srini Pillay, MD, psychiatrist and brain imaging specialist, discusses the missing rewards that motivate healthy lifestyle change.

Harvard Health Publishing Lose Weight and Keep It Off - Smart approaches to achieving and maintaining a healthy weight. Harvard Medical School Special Health Report Weight-loss and Nutrition Myths - Debunking myths about food, dieting, and exercise.

National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disease Losing Weight - Including tips for recognizing roadblocks and keeping the weight off. American Heart Association Cutting Calories - Strategies for eating more while still losing weight, avoiding portion size pitfalls, and using fruits and vegetables to manage weight.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Low-Carbohydrate Diets - How a low-carbohydrate diet may help some people lose weight more quickly than a low-fat diet.

Harvard School of Public Health Just Enough for You: About Portion Sizes - Tips for managing portion sizes at home and when eating out. National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Disease. However, you don't want to use water pills, aka diuretics, to lose water weight without talking to your doctor first.

Sometimes, doctors will prescribe diuretics to people with high blood pressure to help reduce the amount of salt in the body. But diuretics come with a case of side effects, such as dizziness, headaches , muscle cramps, and dehydration, so be sure to consult your MD, especially if you're taking certain medications.

Research in the American Journal of Kidney Disease links higher dietary potassium with less sodium in the kidneys, and thus, reduce water retention and blood pressure.

Intake recommendations are 4. Reach your daily quota with these 13 delicious foods that have more potassium than a banana. Beyond burning a few calories about calories in 20 minutes for a pound person , adding steps to your schedule can coax your cells into shedding water.

Conquer desk drain by setting a reminder to walk for at least five minute every hour. Just be sure to hydrate throughout your workout to help replenish electrolytes. Some water weight is normal, says Jessica Cording, M. But, when you gain it in excess, it can translate to a higher number on the scale, she says.

There are a lot of different reasons why people gain water weight. According to the Mayo Clinic , those can include:. Tried all seven of these action items and still not having luck?

Taub-Dix says, "This could be a sign of a blood pressure issue, medication problem or other health concern. Certain diseases such as kidney disease and thyroid conditions can cause edema. If you suspect you have edema, talk to your doctor about running some tests.

Karla Walsh is a Des Moines, Iowa-based freelance writer, editor, freelance writing coach and level one sommelier who balances her love of food and drink with her passion for fitness or tries to, at least!

She has over 15 years of professional experience covering food, wine, travel, nutrition, health, fitness, psychology, beauty, relationships and beyond. Weight Loss Drugs May Impact Blood Pressure.