Why Aspartame Isn't Scary

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  • useyourthorns
    useyourthorns Posts: 30 Member
    ccrdragon wrote: »
    useyourthorns wrote: »
    The early MSDS for it were not convincing, however. (The exact warning I believe was, "Safe if no more than a mouthful is consumed".) However, for some of us, it tastes like pure bitterness.

    I am assuming that this refers to the aspartame itself... and given that aspartame is 200+ times sweeter than sugar, I think your head would literally explode from the sweet overload if you tried to eat a mouthful of aspartame. If it refers to whatever the aspartame is in, I think that 50+ years of common usage across the entire planet has disproved that statement.

    Considering I was working with pure aspartame, I'd say the MSDS for it was for pure aspartame. Lol.
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 49,024 Member
    Hamiltonfamily2018 wrote: »

    ...and there you have it. Conclusive proof.

    I can possibly get cancer by going on a long run if I forget to put on sunscreen or accidentally inhale too many diesel fumes. Guess it's best to just sit on my couch all day.

    What I'd like to know is what about it/how it is possibly carcinogenic. You know...scientifically speaking.


    Right! This is my problem with the “clean eater” “food snobs” I mean I think we all know we shouldn’t down 20 diet Coke’s a day and eat more unprocessed foods. That’s a given- however Hard core vegans get cancer too, should we be somewhat responsible eaters. Sure. I’ll enjoy my diet soda on occasion and even eat my lower calorie tortilla that YES is processed and full of crap, who cares.
    I can’t stand food snobs. Huge pet peeve.
    Me too. I invited a couple from the gym to a backyard party where we had home cooked food, cake, ice cream, beer, etc. and they came with containers of "clean food" (they weren't prepping for any contests) and while there started conversing about the foods to my other guests. Needless to say, I've NEVER reinvited them again and broke off any contact after.

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  • ccrdragon
    ccrdragon Posts: 3,374 Member
    Analog_Kid wrote: »
    For those of us who suffer from migraine, it is well known that aspartame (and other artificial sweetners such as saccharin, acesulfame potassium, sucralose, and neotame) can trigger skull-splitting headaches.

    So can salt, but I don't see anyone jumping up and down screaming we need to ban salt...
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    I'm glad it was never a trigger for my migraines when I did elimination attempts to discover what were.

    Turns out carbonation was!!! ;)
  • Speakeasy76
    Speakeasy76 Posts: 961 Member
    I'm not convinced it's 100% safe, but I still use it a bit in sugar free coffee syrup and a diet soda a couple of times per week. However, I do think it makes me feel hungrier after I use it.

    It does trigger heart palpitations in my mom, so she has to avoid it.
  • durhammfp
    durhammfp Posts: 494 Member
    MikePfirrman wrote: »
    I'm not a scientist but found this interesting. Not sure the merits of the study. Basically, they found that the equivalent of two diet sodas causes your bacteria within your microbiome to attack the lining of the digestive tract, I assume potentially leading to inflammation.

    Aspartame and Sucralose were specifically named.

    It was all over the Microbiome publications last month. I'm certainly not qualified to evaluate the quality of the study/methodology, but it's the first thing that I've read that makes me wonder and actually has a potentially valid scientific reason for avoiding these sweeteners.

    I don't use artificial sweeteners but my wife did (massively) when she was younger. I often wondered if that had a lot to do with her Fibromyalgia. She knows a lot of folks, through support groups with Fibro and nearly 100% of them used heavy sweeteners. This might explain a lot about the ties between the two things, which have been just observational and correlational.

    https://www.ajc.com/pulse/study-shows-potential-dangers-of-artificial-sweeteners/BQ277ZOYPJGXXDKK7K6GPT7DFM/

    Replying only to link to the original study referenced in the ajc.com article above: https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/22/10/5228
  • stuntin666
    stuntin666 Posts: 15 Member
    So interesting, I knew this lady that would swear she was allergic to aspartame, that it would give her migraines, apparently it only gives her migraines when she knows she's eating it though, because I gave it to her a few times, when I gave her gum and diet soda she had nooooo idea, completely fine. Now, now don't judge me I was only a teenager when I gave her the stuff just so that I could prove she was not allergic.

    I might stop drinking it for awhile but then I always find myself drinking a nice diet soda, cause YOLO
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    stuntin666 wrote: »
    So interesting, I knew this lady that would swear she was allergic to aspartame, that it would give her migraines, apparently it only gives her migraines when she knows she's eating it though, because I gave it to her a few times, when I gave her gum and diet soda she had nooooo idea, completely fine. Now, now don't judge me I was only a teenager when I gave her the stuff just so that I could prove she was not allergic.

    I might stop drinking it for awhile but then I always find myself drinking a nice diet soda, cause YOLO

    I try to avoid making assumptions about whether or not something might cause migraines in a particular person or whether that response is "real" or psychosomatic. Maybe it does maybe it doesn't, as far as I know pretty much anything can be a migraine trigger (or be perceived to be a migraine trigger) but it clearly doesn't in everyone and there is no clearly defined causal link.

    If someone tells me they get migraines when they ingest aspartame I would say "oh okay, best to avoid then". But if they say I get migraines when I ingest aspartame, therefore its dangerous and everyone should avoid it...that is when I call BS.
  • paperpudding
    paperpudding Posts: 9,302 Member
    stuntin666 wrote: »
    So interesting, I knew this lady that would swear she was allergic to aspartame, that it would give her migraines, apparently it only gives her migraines when she knows she's eating it though, because I gave it to her a few times, when I gave her gum and diet soda she had nooooo idea, completely fine. Now, now don't judge me I was only a teenager when I gave her the stuff just so that I could prove she was not allergic.

    I might stop drinking it for awhile but then I always find myself drinking a nice diet soda, cause YOLO


    that doesnt neccesarily mean her migraines were not triggered by aspartame in soft drinks or whatever though.

    Many people have allergies that are not neccesarily to that product in all its forms - people with egg allergies can often still eat custard or baked goods, for example
    Does not seem unlikely that a person could get migraines from aspartame in some products.

  • MikePfirrman
    MikePfirrman Posts: 3,307 Member
    @Aaron_K123 -- I thought it might be a bit of a leap, especially being in vitro. Also, I understand they didn't mention Fibromyalgia. That's simply observational on my part. Seems to be extremely heavily correlated.
  • Speakeasy76
    Speakeasy76 Posts: 961 Member
    paperpudding wrote: »
    stuntin666 wrote: »
    So interesting, I knew this lady that would swear she was allergic to aspartame, that it would give her migraines, apparently it only gives her migraines when she knows she's eating it though, because I gave it to her a few times, when I gave her gum and diet soda she had nooooo idea, completely fine. Now, now don't judge me I was only a teenager when I gave her the stuff just so that I could prove she was not allergic.

    I might stop drinking it for awhile but then I always find myself drinking a nice diet soda, cause YOLO


    that doesnt neccesarily mean her migraines were not triggered by aspartame in soft drinks or whatever though.

    Many people have allergies that are not neccesarily to that product in all its forms - people with egg allergies can often still eat custard or baked goods, for example
    Does not seem unlikely that a person could get migraines from aspartame in some products.
    Yep, definitely agree with all this.

    My mom got heart palpitations whenever she drank diet soda. Once she stopped, they stopped.

    As someone with food sensitivities, I can tell you that I don't react to a food or chemical every time or even the same way each time.
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    edited July 2021
    MikePfirrman wrote: »
    @Aaron_K123 -- I thought it might be a bit of a leap, especially being in vitro. Also, I understand they didn't mention Fibromyalgia. That's simply observational on my part. Seems to be extremely heavily correlated.

    How is fibromyalgia heavily correlated to aspartame? Curious as to what you are basing that on.
  • MikePfirrman
    MikePfirrman Posts: 3,307 Member
    edited July 2021
    Aaron_K123 wrote: »
    MikePfirrman wrote: »
    @Aaron_K123 -- I thought it might be a bit of a leap, especially being in vitro. Also, I understand they didn't mention Fibromyalgia. That's simply observational on my part. Seems to be extremely heavily correlated.

    How is fibromyalgia heavily correlated to aspartame? Curious as to what you are basing that on.

    My wife had it for years. She formed a large support group with nearly 4K members online. She did multiple polls and found that most that had it (like nearly all of them) heavily used sweeteners. Like I said, very correlational, but I believe there's something there. My wife used sweeteners in her coffee for over 20 years. Nearly everyone in her group drank diet soda (and a lot of it).

    There have also been many cases (documented) where when someone with Fibromyalgia gives up Aspertame, their Fibromyalgia goes away.

    https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21176433/

    Do I think it's the only thing? Absolutely not. A lot of other factors. MTHFR genetic defect, toxin exposure, diet, other genetic predispositions and even most of them have had a severe physical accident in the years preceeding acquiring it.
  • mrfriendly1970
    mrfriendly1970 Posts: 1 Member
    If it were truly dangerous I would have been dead from my Diet Mountain addiction years ago:)
  • MikePfirrman
    MikePfirrman Posts: 3,307 Member
    edited July 2021
    @Aaron_K123 -- no, I'm not offended at all. I know what I don't know. And thanks for the empathy. To be honest, it's not a factor for us any longer. Neither of us really likes diet soda (or any soda). But what you said makes sense.

    I'm very much a layman, so I trust the scientists. What I appreciate about you is you don't assume you know everything as a scientist and have an open mind, while still respecting the science.

    My wife is like 99% better now, but it's hard to say what worked the most (again, too many variables). We eliminated fried foods, toxins, did green juicing for two years, she took supplements, ate a Mediterranean Diet and got rid of gluten (which has some pretty solid studies behind it for Fibro pain, MUCH more conclusive than anything else except maybe going vegan/gluten free) and eliminated cow dairy, which she tested allergic to.

    And I'm not even sure about the gluten. Because, if you remove gluten and cow dairy, it used to be (this has changed since she got it), that meant you're eating mostly whole foods and not heavily processed crap, which could have actually been what turned it around. Again, hard to say for sure.
  • ChaoticMoira
    ChaoticMoira Posts: 103 Member
    I hope this isn't considered off topic. I thought as this was a discussion on aspartame and it's safety it seemed a good place for it.

    I recently have started using low cal sweeteners myself, and having been trying several of them out. I am not diabetic, but would like to stay that way, and believe I was on my way to it. So sweeteners that do not spike blood sugar are important to me. One of the ones I have been trying out is Equal. But I noticed the main ingredient is a filler, dextrose. This confused the heck out of me. Equal supposedly is great for diabetics because it doesn't spike blood sugar, but how is that possible with dextrose as the main ingredient?
  • janejellyroll
    janejellyroll Posts: 25,763 Member
    ChaoticMoira wrote: »
    I hope this isn't considered off topic. I thought as this was a discussion on aspartame and it's safety it seemed a good place for it.

    I recently have started using low cal sweeteners myself, and having been trying several of them out. I am not diabetic, but would like to stay that way, and believe I was on my way to it. So sweeteners that do not spike blood sugar are important to me. One of the ones I have been trying out is Equal. But I noticed the main ingredient is a filler, dextrose. This confused the heck out of me. Equal supposedly is great for diabetics because it doesn't spike blood sugar, but how is that possible with dextrose as the main ingredient?

    I'm guessing it is because the amount is so small (even with the dextrose, it's less than 1 gram of carbohydrates).
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    edited July 2021
    ChaoticMoira wrote: »
    I hope this isn't considered off topic. I thought as this was a discussion on aspartame and it's safety it seemed a good place for it.

    I recently have started using low cal sweeteners myself, and having been trying several of them out. I am not diabetic, but would like to stay that way, and believe I was on my way to it. So sweeteners that do not spike blood sugar are important to me. One of the ones I have been trying out is Equal. But I noticed the main ingredient is a filler, dextrose. This confused the heck out of me. Equal supposedly is great for diabetics because it doesn't spike blood sugar, but how is that possible with dextrose as the main ingredient?

    High-intensity sweeteners like aspartame are often bulked with something like dextrose or maltodextrin just to provide you enough material to work with. Since the aspartame is 200x sweeter than sugar there is too little there to actually handle realistically. Bulking agents still need to be a food product, you don't want it to be talcum powder or something, but clearly it doesn't need to be what provides the sweetness. So typically companies use some sort of sugar as a bulking agent, dextrose or maltodextrin are common, but much less than you would need to actually sweeten anything.

    So yes, "zero calorie" sweeteners aren't zero calorie. But the amount of dextrose present in one of those packets is considerably less than what you would use to actually sweeten a drink.

    Aspartame itself actually has calories, equivalent to that of sugar. Its protein and its digested as such and protein has 4 calories per gram same as sugar does. The reason it is "zero calorie" is because you need so little of it to sweeten a drink. It isn't zero calories, its 200x less calories because you need 200x less of it to get equivalent sweetness to table sugar.

    Sweetener packets are probably going to have 2-4g of carbs in them that are caloric from the bulking agent, so you are talking like 8-16 calories worth of carbs. That is barely anything. Thats basically the amount you get if you stare too long at the bakery section. It is not an amount that is going to be a problem for someone who is diabetic let alone someone who is concerned about diabetes but not yet diabetic.

    If you really want to avoid this it is possible to purchase pure aspartame with a tiny little scooper but given how little you have to transfer to not be overpoweringly sweet its difficult to work with. But then you could technically cut it with whatever you want.

    I mean here you go, this would last you a looong time for $30.

    https://www.amazon.com/NuSci-Aspartame-Powder-Calorie-Sweetener/dp/B00566EPOA

    That is the equivalent sweetness to buying 45 kilograms of sugar. That is enough to flavor over 14 thousand drinks, you could use that to sweeten two drinks a day for 20 years. You'd probably want to cut it with something to be able to work with it but not sure what you'd cut it with other than sugar. I mean any sort of soluble powder that is digestible could work just that typically is sugar.
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    MikePfirrman wrote: »
    @Aaron_K123 -- no, I'm not offended at all. I know what I don't know. And thanks for the empathy. To be honest, it's not a factor for us any longer. Neither of us really likes diet soda (or any soda). But what you said makes sense.

    I'm very much a layman, so I trust the scientists. What I appreciate about you is you don't assume you know everything as a scientist and have an open mind, while still respecting the science.

    My wife is like 99% better now, but it's hard to say what worked the most (again, too many variables). We eliminated fried foods, toxins, did green juicing for two years, she took supplements, ate a Mediterranean Diet and got rid of gluten (which has some pretty solid studies behind it for Fibro pain, MUCH more conclusive than anything else except maybe going vegan/gluten free) and eliminated cow dairy, which she tested allergic to.

    And I'm not even sure about the gluten. Because, if you remove gluten and cow dairy, it used to be (this has changed since she got it), that meant you're eating mostly whole foods and not heavily processed crap, which could have actually been what turned it around. Again, hard to say for sure.

    Thanks, I'm glad to hear that you weren't offended and that your wife is doing much better now. Wish you the best.
  • Jthanmyfitnesspal
    Jthanmyfitnesspal Posts: 3,522 Member
    I stupidly just created a new thread on aspartame, because I only came up with very old posts when I searched "aspartame cancer." Well, this may be an old thread, but it is still very topical!

    Thanks to @Aaron_K123 for all the insight. It is really useful! Your original post is a great primer in the chemistry of aspartame. I only wish that you could refresh it to fix the broken links. It would make a good blog entry, if you haven't done that already. (Not that many people read the blogs.)

    What got me onto this are the recent publications, including this one in a large (ish) human population, which show small positive (more cancer) effects in the populations who use aspartame:

    https://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/article?id=10.1371/journal.pmed.1003950

    My comment on the above is that the positive effects are small or non-existent (within errors), and people who use aspartame tend to do so because they tend to gain weight or they may have other medical conditions inducing them to do so, so there could be a correlation but not a causality.

    People are also still banging the gong on the rat studies, such as this one

    https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33845854/

    @Aaron_K123 does have in interesting point about the rats chosen being prone to tumors in general. Also, it seems like a full-life daily dose of 2000ppm aspartame (where increased tumors seem to appear) is kind of extreme. No one would ever eat that much every single day starting in childhood. In an 80kg human, wouldn't that be 160 grams per day? That's thousands of packets or ~800 diet cokes. If I understand that correctly, I'm really glad I'm not a test subject!
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 49,024 Member
    I loved this debate thread when it was ongoing. Aaron provided so much information.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
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  • Jthanmyfitnesspal
    Jthanmyfitnesspal Posts: 3,522 Member
    ninerbuff wrote: »
    I loved this debate thread when it was ongoing. Aaron provided so much information.

    I totally agree. I found I had posted to it many years ago! I had stopped eating aspartame for a time, but I'm a bit chunky again, and I'm looking for every way to cut!

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