Is Your Water Making You Sick?

Distilled Water

Distilled water is boiled and evaporated away from its dissolved minerals. The water becomes acidic and can absorb and eliminate toxic substances from your body. That’s not bad, right? The problem is the acidic water also draws trace minerals like magnesium right out of your body. We need minerals! The triple whammy is, that distilled water will also draw contaminants from the container it’s stored in, making it even less desirable.

Studies show there are benefits of drinking distilled water for a few weeks at a time when your goal is to cleanse and detoxify.

There’s no need to detoxify for 15 years! After having a hair mineral analysis done and discovering both the kids and I (the hubby hasn’t had the test) are deficient in minerals, I had to go digging.

Bottled Water

What exactly is bottled water? There’s a high chance that the bottled water you’re paying for is nothing more than, you guessed it, tap water.

Not to mention the fact that drinking water from plastic bottles is never a good idea. It isn’t good for your health, it costs more, and it’s a huge source of consumer waste.

Living Water

Living Water is in its raw, natural state. The way nature intended. It’s not too acidic or alkaline but is an ideal neutral pH of 6.5 to 7.5. You can find a natural spring in your area by logging onto Find A Spring. It’s a pretty cool idea!

Let’s be real though. Not many of us have time to hike to a natural spring to gather living water in our glass jugs for the week. It would be a fun thing to experience, for sure, but probably not realistic weekly unless you live nearby.

Reverse Osmosis

Reverse osmosis systems include an ultraviolet light designed to kill bacteria and a granulated activated charcoal filter. They are commonly mounted under the sink and may require hiring a plumber for installation. Reverse osmosis removes trace minerals from your water which you will want to add back in.

Granular carbon filters and carbon block filters work a lot alike with one important difference. Granular carbon filters allow water to create pathways through the loose carbon without being filtered. Carbon block filters are compressed with carbon in a solid form which eliminates channeling. Carbon filters are generally gravity-based and leave trace minerals in your water.

After both our naturopath and internal medicine doctor asked us to consider purchasing a water filtration system, I went on a mission to figure out which water system would work for our budget and health needs.

We are working to undo the damage done by drinking distilled water for so many years. Not only are we supplementing trace minerals, but we have also purchased a Berkey which filters our water and leaves trace minerals in place.

The Berkey uses a compressed carbon filter, which is gravity-based, free-standing, and easy to use. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t cheap. I went to work selling on eBay and used the proceeds to purchase our Berkey. Where there’s a will, there’s a way!

Reasons We Chose The Berkey

1) For our Health

Since trace minerals have been depleted in our bodies, it is super important for us to drink water that contains those trace minerals naturally. The Berkey allows trace minerals to remain in our drinking water! To learn more about how the Berkey works, click here.

2) Emergency Preparedness

The Berkey doesn’t rely on plumbing. It is a free-standing unit in which you pour water into the top chamber and it uses gravity to filter down to the bottom chamber. People have tested chlorinated pool water, lake water, water with red dye, and rainwater in the Berkey. Every time the Berkey produces great water to drink. Of course, the lifespan of the filters was tested on regular tap water. The harder the Berkey works to filter your water, the more often you will need to change the filters.

3) Cost Factor

Although the Berkey has a large upfront cost, its cost per gallon is under two cents!

We averaged three, five-gallon jugs from the bottling company and paid $22/month. That’s $1.47/gallon!

Okay, I’m going to get a little math-y here: with the cost of the Royal Berkey with two black elements, the Berkey stainless steel wire stand, glass level water spigot, and six sets of the PF2 Fluoride/Arsenic filters, my cost would be $584.93 plus tax. Why six sets of the PF2 filters? Because each set is good for 1,000 gallons. Each set of black elements is good for 6,000 gallons. See where I’m going with this? I told ya I was going to get all math-y!  Of course, we didn’t purchase six sets of the PF2 filters. I’m simply trying to do the math! Moving right along, $584.93 divided by 6,000 gallons = .10/gallon! Of course, you need to factor in your tap water too but I’d say that’s not too shabby!

4) Removes Fluoride with Optional PF2 Filter

Fluoride has been deliberately added to many municipal water supplies. This addition has become incredibly controversial and, in my opinion, unnecessary.

5) Environmentally Friendly

We are no longer using 5-gallon plastic jugs that will someday end up in the landfill. The Berkey also allows us to easily use our Life Factory glass bottles eliminating the need for store-bought plastic water bottles.