How to break the soda/sweet tea habit

Naughtlookin

I seriously DRINK most of my calories!! I have recently switched to half Splenda in my tea. (Hoping to switch to full Splenda eventually.)

I really cannot stand diet drinks but I do at least drink more water than I used to drink. I honestly used to not drink any water. Ever. I know that's awful right? But now I drink two or three bottles per day. Yet I'm still "always" thirsty and I drink southern style sweet tea and Mountain Dew aaaalllllllll day long.

Any suggestions on how to break this habit?? I know pounds will just fall off if I can master this.

Karliemyalgia

I feel you, pop is the devils nectar.

You can try diluting the taste, more water than pop in your beverages.
Although I'm more of an all or nothing type gal.

If I quit pop, I gotta put it down 95-100%, have it only as a special treat because it's so easy to slurp down those calories.

The more you get away from the sugar, the less you will crave it.
Don't be concerned, we need a lot of water in our day, we are made of mostly water afterall.
Dehydration is super common, a feeling of "thrist" is a sign of dehydration (after it's already begun). So drink up!

Have you tried flavored, fruit-infused water? To give you a fruity feel, a sweet taste.
Hot lemon water is also a nice alternative.

And also.
WILL POWER.
Like everything.
All advice is moot if you don't follow through with your wanted actions.
You got this.

Andy10725

Don't stock any at home. Don't eat any food that remind you of it. Or just force yourself to drink original flavour tea. There r a lot of option out there. Floral or minty is always solid. Make a large pot of it and chill it. That might give you the refreshing feeling you got for coke.

Like the poster above said, it's better to just cut loose sugar than gradually decrease the amount. The former will work better. And don't get fool by those 'diet' version of soft drink and sweetener. It's all marketing. They r just as bad if not worse than the original items they tried to substitute.

R_is_for_Rachel

think about your teeth! that's real motivation for me! seriously, tooth decay is caused by frequency of sugars and sugars in drinks are the main cause of decay in adults.
i just drink water or various types of teas-i find white tea and green tea and earl grey are perfect without sugar-normal 'builders tea' i need to have sugar-but thats why i dont touch the stuff anymore

Naughtlookin

Thanks!!

candoit05

What I did was give it up cold turkey. When you don't drink it for awhile you'll find it doesn't taste good anymore. Water will actually taste good.

TeaBea

Have you seen those 10 calorie sodas? 7-Up, A&W rootbeer, Canada Dry gingerale, Dr Pepper. They are diet sodas with just a bit of sugar. These taste really good.

Sweetened iced tea - brew your own tea and drop in a couple flavored tea bags. This will mellow the flavor. I start with a "family" sized tea bag and add 2 Twinings Mixed Berry (individual) bags. This makes 1/2 gallon of slightly fruity tea. I don't use sugar anymore...... I used a step down approach. 1/4 cup sugar for 1/2 gallon, then 3 Tbls...etc.

Jthanmyfitnesspal

General habit changing approach:

Write down the reasons you want to change. If weight loss is a factor, perhaps include a current picture. Choose your altnative strategies. Pick a start date and duration (forever is an option, but I like finite durations after which you re-assess). Enlist comrades. Print out your resolution, sign and date. Tape a copy to the fridge and take a copy to work.

A good alternative strategy for sweet drinks is flavored seltzer. I recommend getting a Soda Stream. Staples sells them along with the replacement cartridges. As for tea: if you're going to switch, see if you can tolerate unsweetened before going artificial. (I sweeten with Equal, myself.)

earlnabby

Naughtlookin wrote: »

I seriously DRINK most of my calories!! I have recently switched to half Splenda in my tea. (Hoping to switch to full Splenda eventually.)

I really cannot stand diet drinks but I do at least drink more water than I used to drink. I honestly used to not drink any water. Ever. I know that's awful right? But now I drink two or three bottles per day. Yet I'm still "always" thirsty and I drink southern style sweet tea and Mountain Dew aaaalllllllll day long.

Any suggestions on how to break this habit?? I know pounds will just fall off if I can master this.

It sounds really simple but . . . just stop making it. A sweet tooth is learned behavior and you need to unlearn it. Don't buy it; don't have it in the house; if you make your tea yourself, get the sugar out of the house for a while. Eventually, you will stop craving it.

Also, you say you drink a lot of Mountain Dew. In order to cut it out without the caffeine withdrawals, buy some caffeine pills. Each one is the equivalent of 2 cups of coffee (or 1 can of Mt. Dew). Take the equivalent of what your current intake is and each week drop by 1/2 tablet until you no longer feel the effects of the caffeine. Your other choice is to take a week's vacation and go cold turkey. I did that and was sleeping 18 hours a day for most of the week.

C130_RN

I had to give up both cold turkey. I tried cutting back but having it in the house was too much temptation and some days my self control would go right out the window! I had to completely avoid that aisle at the grocery store when I would go shopping. For the first month I drank nothing but water. No soda, no coffee, no unsweet tea, no milk, no juice, just plain water. I absolutely hated it but I kept going - one day at a time.

After that first month I added things like milk, unsweet tea, almond/coconut milk for smoothies. I totally lost my craving for soda and sweet tea. I accidentally picked up my daughters soda one day and took a big drink - it tasted nasty!!

There are a lot of great ideas here. Find what works best for you and go for it! You CAN do this!!

Momepro

Carbonated, fruity flavored water is my new favorite drink. Tastes like fruity sodas but without all the caffeine and other stuff, and 0 calories.

jackie_van_d

Hi, I gave up Coke back in June (had one recently with tons of ice an some rum)
I was drinking 3-4 cans a day... I slowly cut back cause I didn't want the caffeine and sugar withdrawal headache that go with it
Over a 2 week period I went from drinking 3 to 2&2/3 to 2&1/2 and so on but take as long as you need to do it and think of all the $ you'll save that you can use for other things!
Best of luck

GlitchyPengy

We just went cold turkey. We but diet lipton tea and flavored water. I dropped sugar and cream from my coffee and drink it straight.... Hadnt tried with tea yet.

cwolfman13

I used to drink 3-6 mountain dews daily...usually on the higher end. I just weened down over the course of weeks...started with just allowing myself 1 per day...then every other day...then one per week, until I wasn't drinking it anymore. I also started drinking more bubbly water...

fifiman

I used to drink a ton of pop, but now I switched to La Croix, which is flavored, carbonated water. It does the trick for me. It is 0 calories and there are a bunch of flavors. My favorite is the cran-raspberry.

bbell1985

Yo the diet mountain dew is actually really good. Ever try it?

goldthistime

I'm on my second week of no sugar in my tea. I almost abandoned my efforts a day or two in because I realized that I was looking for a blood sugar boost at times and found it so tough to not get one that I turned to food to accompany my tea. So I ended up having more calories than that little ol' teaspoon of sugar would have given me. But the sweet foods I chose had a decent amount of fibre and I think that helped. This week I'm having no problem drinking the tea without sugar and without having something sweet to go with it.

So I guess my suggestion is to have something sweet to accompany if you need to initially.

DananaNanas

I replaced diet soda with a can of la croix sparkling/flavored water. I like to think that the caffeine in my diet pop fix got me through the afternoon but I'm sure the caffeine was negligible compared to the amount of coffee I drink in the morning. Turns out it's the fizziness that I like... and that I would get a treat in the afternoons.

I still love my fountain diet coke though. But we don't keep it stocked in the fridge at work and I certainly don't have a soda fountain in my house lol

DananaNanas

bbell1985 wrote: »

Yo the diet mountain dew is actually really good. Ever try it?

This is the only thing I have found on this Earth that gives me heartburn. weird!