Do you want to know the side effects of drinking too much lemon water?
Lemons are loaded in vitamin C, which has antioxidant, antibacterial, and immune-boosting properties.
Overall, evidence suggests that lemon water can enhance the body to burn fat faster, increase your immunity, stop digestive system problems, detoxify the body, protein synthesis, and improve overall health.
Can too much lemon water be harmful?
Yes. But as you already know that too much of everything is bad. So, drinking too much lemon water can cause several side effects such as:
These are the negative effects of too much lemon water.
1. Causing frequent urination and dehydration
Lemon water works as a diuretic to remove toxins from your body.
Lemon has a high content of ascorbic acid (vitamin C). This nutrient is well known for its diuretic properties. It stimulates your liver and makes it easier to clean out toxins from the body, which means it increases urine production in the kidneys, helping your body eliminate excess liquid quickly.
Therefore it is flushing out excess quantities of sodium and electrolytes through your urine.
When you become dehydrated, you start feeling very sick, dizzy, confused, or weak. If you begin to feel thirsty after drinking lemon water, consider increasing your pure water intake to avoid dehydration.
Your body needs a lot of pure water to overcome dehydration and return to an average level of water in your body, so take as much water as you can to relieve thirst.
2. Damaging teeth enamel
Consuming too much lemon water can have a decaying sound effect on your teeth due to excessive amounts of acids present in lemons, which irritate gums and softens tooth enamel.
Frequent consumption of acid-containing products will ultimately destroy the enamel and expose underlying dentin, leaving teeth vulnerable to sensitivity and tooth decay.
Try drinking lemon water with a straw to avoid damaging teeth enamel or ensure you brush more regularly, probably twice a day.
Moreover, it would help if you swished your mouth with normal water after you drink lemon water.
3. Cause or worsen the symptoms of GERD or ulcers
Gastroesophageal reflux disease, otherwise known as GERD, is a chronic and severe type of acid reflux. Symptoms of which are vomiting, heartburn, stomach pain, nausea, trouble swallowing, and pain in your chest.
Lemon water is very acidic, so sometimes it can trigger GERD by irritating the lining of your stomach and your esophagus. It can also aggravate existing gastrointestinal problems.
If you have peptic ulcers, taking lemon water or other acidic foods can increase acid content only to make things worse, irritating the stomach lining and stopping the ulcer from healing correctly.
You should make sure to avoid taking lemon water if you have any allergies to lemon. People with ulcers should consult with their physician before incorporating lemon water into their diet.
4. Worsen the situation of canker sores
Canker sores are small open ulcers with a yellow, white, or grey base, enclosed by swollen soft tissue inside the mouth or the bottom of the gums, and they are painful.
The citric acid in lemons can worsen your mouth sore and even cause more.
Not only do acidic foods cause pain, but they also tissue irritation and slowing down the healing process.
Try to stay away from lemon water or acidic foods until the mouth sore has healed. Some people can develop cancer wounds from too much acidity in the diet.
5. Trigger migraine in some people
Citrus fruits such as lemon can trigger migraines because of tyramine.
Tyramine can cause blood vessel dilatation that triggers a migraine attack in susceptible persons.
Any foods rich in amino acid tyramine include citrus fruits, which stimulate your body to produce the hormone norepinephrine. It increases heart rate and blood flow, which trigger migraines.
If you are dealing with headaches or migraines from time to time, it is safe to tell you that you should consider avoiding lemon water or lower your daily intake to half a cup.
6. It can cause gastrointestinal problems
Taking too much lemon water may agitate your stomach because it retains its high acidity.
Also, lemons are fruits that are rich in Vitamin C. You get about 11.8 mg of vitamin C from an ounce of lemon water.
It provides you with 16% of your recommended daily intake of vitamin C.
Drinking too much lemon water can lead to an overdose of vitamin C, causing an upset stomach, concurrently with diarrhea, heartburn, abdominal cramps, nausea, vomiting, abdominal bloating, and indigestion.
Consider cutting back the amount of lemon water you drink if you have any of these symptoms.
Remember that while lemon water can be beneficial for your health, too much may harm you.
If you feel any side effects from drinking lemon water, stop drinking it. Ask your doctor before drinking lemon water for any medical reasons.