I take a large dose of vitamin C every day. Out of habit because I’ve been taking my pills for over 30 years, every morning. But also because I believe in the benefits. I know that vitamin C dissolves in water, and that whatever your body doesn’t need gets flushed out. The advantage of this is that it’s highly unlikely to take too much vitamin C and face negative consequences. The downside is that many people think the extra vitamin is essentially a waste of money since you just pee it out. I’ve heard that argument several times, but I feel differently.

Water is also something your body can easily get rid of. You simply urinate it out. If you drink a lot of water, you need to go to the bathroom more often, but that’s not the whole story. Drinking lots of water means you might urinate more frequently, but your body can efficiently carry out all functions requiring water. Water is used almost everywhere in your body. All your bodily processes benefit from good water availability.

If you drink only a little bit, water becomes a resource your body must handle more cautiously. Your body is incredibly good at using the resources it has efficiently, but why make it harder on yourself? I like to drink an extra glass of water because I believe in its advantages.

It’s the same with vitamin C. If it’s available, it can be utilized. If there’s an excess, well, then you urinate it out. What the optimal availability is, that’s the question, and the answer varies for everyone. I believe that much more of the vitamin I take is used compared to relying only on eating oranges. I believe my body adopted to a high availability of vitamin C by slowly removing self imposed restrictions it had for its use.