There’s no evidence to support claims that drinking urine is beneficial. Research suggests it can introduce bacteria, toxins, and other harmful substances into your blood, as well as stress your kidneys.

Taking a golden shower. Drinking from your own spigot. Sipping a warm cup of herbal pee.

Whatever you want to call it, the practice of drinking urine goes back millennia. Known today as urine therapy, urophagia, or urotherapy, the medicinal use of urine is still practiced in some parts of the world.

Reports dating back to ancient Rome, Greece, and Egypt suggest that urine therapy has been used to treat everything from acne to cancer. There was a time when doctors tested for diabetes in urine by taste.

Today, proponents make similarly broad-based claims about urine’s curative powers. So, should you be mixing your morning pee into your morning smoothie? Probably not.

Urine is composed of fluid and waste products that your body doesn’t need. Your kidneys work as filters, removing excess water and cellular byproducts from the bloodstream. This waste is sent down to the bladder as urine.

Water makes up 91 to 96 percentTrusted Source of your urine. The rest is made from salts, ammonia, and byproducts produced during normal body processes.

Your urinary tract extends from your kidneys to your urethra. You have two kidneys, one on each side of the body. The kidneys send urine down to the bladder through two muscular tubes called ureters. When your bladder is full, nerve endings send a signal to your brain that it’s time to find a bathroom.

When you empty your bladder, urine exits the body through a small tube called the urethra. The urethra is home to some types of bacteria. Normally, these bacteria don’t cause any problems, unless they grow out of control. ResearchTrusted Source on urine composition, however, shows that these bacteria can contaminate urine as it exits the body.