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Liquid Intake and Urinary Retention

Posted , 12 users are following.

hank1953
hank1953

I've read so many prostate books but one stood out in which a well established author suggested that people generally do not need to drink any extra in addition to the liquid that is already in the foods. Does anyone remember the name of the book ? In a way it makes sense since less liquid intake -> less urine -> less urinary retention. I've been self cathing for over 2 years and I know for a fact that the more you drink, the worse your retention is. So far, I found the best way to lower retention is to drink less. Control liquid intake, control your retention!

Perhaps we should consume less fluid. Would we have other problems like constipation, bladder stones, kidney stones, etc ? Hank

1 like, 46 replies

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  • Light1
    Light1 hank1953

    Posted

    Hi Hank,

    I've been macrobiotic and vegan for over 10 years, and there is a lot of water in the cooking I do, so I don't have to drink much. I do have a bowl of soup once a day and sometimes a hot drink in the morning. If I am thirsty later, I drink a little something too. And since I'm self-cathing, I know I'm urinating about 1.2-1.6 litres per day. You want to keep an eye on your urine volume and urine color (dark is concentrated, meaning you need more fluid) because kidney stones are no fun.

    Best wishes,

    Fred

    • hank1953
      hank1953 Light1

      Posted

      Thanks Fred. I am measuring my urine volume also, and it's about 2 liters a day. I might try to bring it down to your level of ~1.5 liters first, and then maybe 1.0 later. I will to check on kidney stone. Hank

    • Light1
      Light1 hank1953

      Posted

      Hank,

      I forgot to mention, if you eat meat and other animal foods, you will need more liquid

    • richp21
      richp21 hank1953

      Posted

      Just want to concur that a kidney stone is really no fun at all. My uro doc said most important factor fpr prevention is to make sure I drink a lot every day.

    • hank1953
      hank1953 richp21

      Posted

      I agree that drinking prevents kidney stones, but 'a lot' is too vague, can can lead to drinking too much. Hank

  • Howard31850
    Howard31850 hank1953

    Posted

    That's funny that you posted this now as I was just a few minutes ago commenting to my wife that my residuals today were down from 350ml to 250ml and the urine color was deep yellow and smelly ( also my natural voids were down from 250 to 150) and we were discussing the reasons why that might be. I usually drink 2 spring water bottles each day, 500ml each which I did today as well. But I did 6 CICs today whereas I usually do 4 to try and bring down the residuals which seems to have worked.

    I know that it is really important to drink a liter of water a day throughout the day and to keep the pee color a light straw color as bladder stones can form in concentrated urine.

    • hank1953
      hank1953 Howard31850

      Posted

      Howard, one poster made a lot of sense when comparing peeing with doing weight lifting, the muscles can only do so weight (obstruction) for so many reps. One's bladder can only pump so much, especially with obstruction, or being overstretched, or just being tired from aging. After a certain volume, urine can't be pumped out anymore. If you are cathing, then you'll need to cath more, or lower the load.

      Hank

    • rdemyan
      rdemyan Howard31850

      Posted

      Hi Howard:

      This relationship between voided amount and post void residual (PVR) is something I'm trying to make sense of.  A natural void of 250 sounds pretty good to me, but I guess you are saying that even with that amount voided you still have 300 ml or so of PVR??  How do you know that?  Are you measuring the PVR by self cathing after natural voids. Is this amount of 250 during the daytime?

      I use a bladder scanner.  I've noticed that my PVR is around 75 to 120 mL during the day time after natural voids of 150 to 175 mL.  At night time, however, PVR is much higher as is the voided amount.  It's hard to do a bladder scan at night because it's hard to fall back asleep.  I've only done it about twice, but have noticed that the PVR was over 220 mL for a voided amount of around 320 mL  I would love to figure out a way to reduce the PVR at night with these larger voidings compared to the daytime voidings.  I'll probably start doing more testing at nightime, even though it will mean that I'm going to lose sleep.

    • Howard31850
      Howard31850 rdemyan

      Posted

      Hi rdemyan,

      Sorry for the delay. I self-cath 4 times a day. I have one of those measuring "hats" that sit in the toilet bowl and can measure accurately up to 800ml. You can but them at any drug store for $2.00. So first I do my natural void into them before CIC. During the day it is around 200ml. Then I do my CIC void into the hat and it is usually 250 to 300ml. So the total is around 500ml which is higher than the the 400ml total that jimjames recommends for bladder rehab.

      At night it is a different story as you note. I CIC before bed at 11 pm. But I am always awakened by a lot of bladder pressure in the middle of the night. I stumble to the bathroom and usually cannot natural void at all. I then CIC anywhere from 500 to 800ml which is a lot. I then try to get back to sleep but have a lot of trouble with that.

      My uro says it is important not to have such high volumes at night. I try taking some salt in the form of salted sunflower seeds and that helps with my big water dumps at night .

      It is important to properly hydrate ourselves. The best indicator is the color of the pee. If it is a pale straw color then we are ok regardless of how much water we drink. Howard

    • bob31550
      bob31550 Howard31850

      Posted

      Like you, my bladder produces up to 2L in 8 hours, but only at night!

      Also, my blockages all occurred starting at 11:30pm, except for the blood clots.

    • Howard31850
      Howard31850 hank1953

      Posted

      Hi Hank -I agree. I try to space out throughout the day drinking my 2 - 500ml bottles spring water. If I drink too much at one time I go into full retention  and have to CIC. Also if I have to pay and hold it in for more than 15 min then I cannot natural void and have to CIC. Sometimes I feel I am fighting a losing battle but I do not want a surgery and don't mind CIC. Tomorrow I have an ultrasound of my kidneys and bladder and they want me to drink 3 full glasses of water an hour before - I don't think so! I'll just drink one glass otherwise there will be problems. Good luck. Howard

    • hank1953
      hank1953 rdemyan

      Posted

      rde, your PVRs are very good. You might be able to cath less often. Hank
    • rdemyan
      rdemyan hank1953

      Posted

      Hi Hank:

      I don't cath at all and have never cathed.  I'm monitoring my condition as much as I can to try and avoid a bad situation.  

    • hank1953
      hank1953 rdemyan

      Posted

      If I have your PVR, I'd be tempted to stop cathing. Good thinking in monitoring the situation. Hank

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