Why drink water after a massage?

Question

I love massage, which can make me completely relaxed. But after a massage, I was always asked to drink water. Why drinking water is need after a massage?

Answer 1

Your masseuse would have asked you to make sure you drink several glasses of water when you get to wherever you were headed. There are two major reasons why you need to drink lots of water after a massage:

• The first reason is that massages are very dehydrating. Working and kneading muscles get your fluid pumping into your circulatory system through your soft tissue, from where it gets to your kidneys. This explains why several people pee immediately after they get a massage. According to Naumann Carlstrom, some of her clients are not able to get up from the massage bed before they pee. The only way you can replenish all that lost water is by drinking more water.
• There is then the problem of metabolic waste, which the muscle produces as the body performs its daily functions. When you get a major knot because your muscles are tight, it inhibits circulation of fluids in all those body parts, and this prevents the body from carrying out its waste excretion functions effectively. And, since you were motivated to get a body massage due to the tightness in your tight muscles, there are chances that some of your body circulations have been compromised. Massage helps your body to relax from tension, and releases the circulatory pathway which allows the dumping of nitrogenous metabolic pathways into your body system. The water you drink after a massage session leaves your kidneys with the water they need to flush these liberated wastes out of your system. So, the waste and water comes out as pee.

Answer 2

I disagree with the answer above. Most massage therapists are of the opinion that when you massage your body and drink water after you leave the massage table, toxins are flushed out of your system. The problem here is that no one can say which toxin gets flushed out and how the flushing out occurs. To several therapists, this is a vague theory, but to be on the safe side: apply precautionary measures like drinking lots of water after a massage. After all, drinking water never hurts anyone. Though over hydration which comes from drinking excess water can be a source of more problems that most people could ever imagine.

Offering post-massage water can be both polite and unpleasant, but no biological detoxifying need exists for this. It is just the same thing as following other health and fitness advice such as go for a walk more often to improve your blood circulation or eat more fruits and vegetables than processed foods. These are all beautiful but, tepid health advice.

Comments

I agree with this answer for why drink water after a massage more than the above one.