Why is too much water bad?

I know that cats are notorious for being chronically slightly dehydrated, so I was really happy that two of my three are visibly always at the water dish.  When I took one to the vet, she asked about water consumption and I told her the cat drinks a whole lot.  She was actually concerned, but she didn't say why drinking a lot is bad.

Excessive drinking can indicate a medical condition such as diabetes. There may be other symptoms of illness as well. Common signs of diabetes besides excessvie water drinking are being constantly hungry and eating a lot but losing weight, and peeing large amounts of sticky sugary smeling urine.

Some cats just like to drink water and are perfectly healthy.

If the vet was concered she could have had blood work done to check your cat's various blood values.

Drinking a lot of water might indicate diabetes or kidney failure. With diabetes, the kidneys try to flush the sugar out of the system, leaving the cat (or a person) very thirsty. If the kidneys are not functioning properly, the water is just passing through and not accumulating waste as they should. The vet can easily run tests for either of these two conditions. You didn't say when you took them in, but if it was recent, she may have taken a blood sample and is waiting for the results.

My cats drink more water than any other cats I've ever had. One is a senior cat and I've brought it up to my vet but after looking at standard blood work there's nothing wrong my cats just love to drink water. They also eat mainly dry food and they need more water than cats that eat mainly wet food. Good luck

LTS3 said:

 
Excessive drinking can indicate a medical condition such as diabetes. There may be other symptoms of illness as well. Common signs of diabetes besides excessvie water drinking are being constantly hungry and eating a lot but losing weight, and peeing large amounts of sticky sugary smeling urine.

Some cats just like to drink water and are perfectly healthy.

If the vet was concered she could have had blood work done to check your cat's various blood values.

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That's actually reassuring.  The cat isn't losing weight, in fact the vet was happy she was a couple pounds too much, she said that nearly all 17 year old cats they see are skin and bones.  The urine is normal, she has a bad habit of hanging her butt out the litter box so we have a rubber mat to catch it and are cleaning it every day.  (Why can't she turn around before doing her business like the boys do?)

The same with the other cat, he's not starving, and the litter box doesn't smell sweet and the litter clumps normally, not sticky.