Make Your Own Alkaline Water
Why would you want to make alkaline water? Isn’t water a low-acid drink anyway? It’s certainly not going to eat away at your stomach the way coffee or cola will. Water is indeed low in acid, but the stuff coming out of your kitchen tap isn’t necessarily high enough to help you get rid of acid in your body. If you have a problem with acidity then you might want to increase the alkalinity of your drinking water; that is, increase its pH level.
What Does This Mean?
When you increase pH in water you ionize it; raise the amount of hydrogen in your liquid. This gives it a slightly higher pH of perhaps 1 or 2 points. The result is water with more nutrients in it: better mineral content, for instance. You need minerals for healthy bones, nerves, and muscles.
Signs that you aren’t getting enough could be jittery legs when you try to sleep or sit still, cramps in your legs or muscles when you exercise, and problems with bone density including brittle bones and osteoporosis. Your immune system is also strengthened by a higher amount of minerals in your blood stream.
Flushing Out Your System
Some people would argue that drinking more water full stop is the answer to high acidity in the blood stream. Hardly anyone drinks enough water these days: it’s all coffee, pop, juice, and energy drinks.
Health food fans argue this is not entirely the case. There are some conditions which make it difficult for people to absorb the minerals from water. They need a higher pH level in every glass to get enough of the minerals they lack.
Make Your Own Alkaline Water
First, you need something to put it in. Choose a clean, dry container you can seal and don’t bother with anything too small. You will be making loads of it. A large water bottle from the place where you refill regularly is a good choice.
Now you just need filtered water or distilled water; enough to almost fill the container. In fact, just bring home your regular refill. This type of water isn’t the same as tap water unless you have a built-in filter or distillation system that gets rid of fluoride, chlorine, etc.
In one method you put half of the water into your container and add baking soda, sea salt, and calcium powder. Next option is you can add lemon without seeds. You have most of these things in your refrigerator, so the recipe is easy and inexpensive overall. Combine until well mixed then test with a pH strip like the ones you have seen in chemistry class. There are other methods and you will need to find specific measurements per gallon.
Another Method
There is another way; somewhat easier but not using household products. Buy alkaline drops. These are available from a number of health food stores and also online. You will not have to cut lemons or measure salt. It is a far less messy way to go.
More Thoughts
Some people say you do not need baking soda, lemon, and calcium powder. They recommend choosing either the soda or the lemons but not both. There is also the possibility that your water contains enough hydrogen already depending on where you live. Again, test it using those pH strips. Involve the kids; this is a lot of fun and highly educational.
Another camp entirely believes this is a gimmick; another way to get people buying water filters and bottled water. There’s no proof, they say, that alkaline water will really make a difference. If you’re drinking water because you made it, your water intake is probably higher than usual and that’s what’s making the biggest difference.
