As trends go, the increase in people focusing on hydration is a pretty good one. Dehydration can cause all kinds of problems for our bodies, both in the short and long terms, and it’s good news for our kidneys and other major organs when we get a sufficient amount.
It’s possible to go too far though, as Brooke Shields once discovered in a brief health scare.
Shields rose to fame in the 1980s with The Blue Lagoon and Endless Love, and she has since been a mainstay in film and TV and on the stage. You know someone’s had a busy career when their filmography has a separate page on Wikipedia.
In September 2023, she made news for something besides her acting chops: a rush to hospital after experiencing a ‘full-blown grand mal seizure’ in Manhattan.
It was triggered by overconsumption of water, leaving her ‘low in sodium’ and ultimately very unwell.
"I was waiting for an Uber,” she said. “I get down to the bottom of the steps, and I start evidently looking weird, and [the people I was with] were like, 'Are you okay?'"
Shields said she had left home, reached the corner and become confused about why she was on the street. She then walked into L’Artusi, a local restaurant, to 'go to the sommelier who had just taken an hour to watch [her] run-through', and from there she became increasingly ill.
"I go in, two women come up to me; I don’t know them," she continued. "Everything starts to go black. Then my hands drop to my side and I go headfirst into the wall."
She said that the seizure saw her 'frothing at the mouth, totally blue, trying to swallow my tongue'.
The horrifying ordeal didn’t end there. Shields said she remembered being admitted to an ambulance given oxygen in the presence of another movie star.
"And Bradley f**king Cooper is sitting next to me holding my hand," she said.
"I didn’t have a sense of humour. I couldn’t really get any words out. But I thought to myself, This is what death must be like. You wake up and Bradley Cooper’s going, 'I’m going to go to the hospital with you, Brooke,' and he’s holding my hand.
“And I’m looking at my hand, I’m looking at Bradley Cooper’s hand in my hand, and I’m like, 'This is odd and surreal'."
So what happened here? How did Shields get ill just from a little overindulgence in H2O?
Apparently, the water combined with low sodium levels in a manner than ‘flooded her system’. She said she essentially ‘drowned’ herself.
"And if you don’t have enough sodium in your blood or urine or your body, you can have a seizure," she explained.
The Mayo Clinic says that drinking too much water can leave your kidneys with too much to do, preventing them from properly removing excess water.
"The sodium content of your blood becomes diluted,” it explains on its website. “This is called hyponatremia and it can be life-threatening.”
It adds: "Drinking too much water is rarely a problem for healthy, well-nourished adults."
However, Medical News Today notes, "In severe cases, water intoxication can cause seizures, brain damage, a coma, and even death."
The NHS recommends drinking 6 to 8 cups of water a day, equating to around two litres. You should drink more in warm conditions, if you’re sweating, and if you’re exercising.
Featured Image Credit: Mike Coppola / Staff/Getty ImagesTopics: Celebrity
Rachael Davis