Why I Switched to a Water Filter

I was a hardcore bottled-water person for most of my life. It weirded me out to drink from a water filter knowing that the water came from the tap. I didn’t really mind with restaurant water because I wasn’t the one who was physically getting it from the sink. But when it came to drinking water from the sink or even from the fridge, I couldn’t do it.

But there are things that I have learned that have completed switched me over to using a water filter in the past few months, and these are some of them that will hopefully convince you to do the same:

It is a very well-known fact that Bisphenol A, also known as BPA, is found in the plastic of most bottled waters. It is also a well-known fact that BPA can be very harmful. BPA was originally created for women to help with their hormones, since it is an endocrine disruptor and can imitate the body’s hormones. But once it was linked with cancer (as well as other things such as reproductive disorders, heart disease, diabetes, etc.), it was banned as a ‘medicine’. However, it’s still commonly found in plastic bottles/containers, plastic toys, and even some dental sealants. A big, and easy way to decrease your amount of BPA exposure is to get and drink water from BPA-free bottles (pouring your bottled water containing BPA into a BPA-free reusable bottle won’t do anything). While BPA-free plastic bottled water is sold at many grocery stores and gas stations now, they are much more expensive and the cost adds up.

Chlorine and Fluoride
Chlorine was originally added into drinking water to protect against bacterias that could cause diseases. However, chlorine can form cancer-causing compounds in the water; and because of that, leads to increased risk of cancer from drinking tap water that isn’t filtered. In fact, people say that there is much more chlorine added to water than necessary to purify it. Even though the U.S. government has downplayed the increase in the risk of getting cancer from chlorine, there are tons of statistics that show otherwise.

Like chlorine, fluoride also can form cancer-causing compounds in water, leading to the same dangers and risks as chlorine. We’ve been told that it helps protect against cavities, even though it has long been proven otherwise. In fact, there are a lot of different opinions as to why fluoride has been added into our drinking water including similar reasons as to why Hitler used fluoride against the Jews during the Holocaust as well as an effective way to get rid of the waste product from the aluminum industry (which is sodium fluoride). There are a multitude of articles talking about how fluoride is a neurotoxin and how it can affect mental health. And just like chlorine, it has been linked to the increase of many different cancers.

Filtering your water helps you get rid of/drastically reduce the amount of these elements. And the presence of these elements should be a strong encouragement to switch to using a water filter.

My water filter (by ZeroWater) was about $30 when I bought it and that’s pretty inexpensive considering it is a good quality water pitcher/filter. Each filter fluctuates between $10-$15 (depends on when you buy it on Amazon) and it should be replaced every 3-5 weeks depending on how much water you drink (I’ve gotten away with 6 weeks while drinking a good amount of water for my body weight). However, a case of 24 bottles of water can be around $3-$6 depending on the brand, and those are the cheaper ones with BPA. I would go through about 3 cases a month, which would be just as much, if not more than just buying a new filter. So the filtered water did end up being cheaper than buying bottled water.

***It’s important to do your research when it comes to which water filter to purchase. Many popular brands are known to not do the best job at filtering out toxins, so make sure you look around to find the best one for your budget (but is still effective).

Some additional sources on BPA and Fluoride/Chlorine, although you could easily find plenty of scholarly articles and websites online:


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