Does diet soda raise your blood sugar?

A product containing no sugar or carbs to convert can't raise your blood sugar. It has been hypothesized that diet soda and other artificailly sweetened foods "fool" you pancreas into thinkiing you did ingest sugar and cause an increase in insulin. The hypothesis is this causes overeating as the insulin subsides and thus causes just as much of a correlation for diet soda to obesity as regular soda. I recall seeing the hypothesis but not any peer reviewed studies that covered it. There could be some out there though.

High five!

A reason why moderation is advised is the amount of sodium and caffeine in soda adds up quickly. Cate

In terms of not metabolizing diet sodas, I think the person meant that they aren't metabolized in the same way, which is sort of true. It has more to do with the rate at which they're broken down though.

The word carbohydrate is synonymous with the word sugar, though the connotation people usually use for sugar is glucose, which isn't wrong. It's just misleading. All glucose are carbs, but not all carbs are glucose (upon entrance to the GI system). So while the pancreas is producing insulin to regulate fat and carbs, it's also storing converting then storing the now glycogen where it can. When your body doesn't produce insulin, or it's become insulin-resistant, you're considered diabetic and require an external source, so you don't become hyperglycemic, then ketoacidotic, then die.

So obviously it could be a problem if you're taking in too much glucose.

But guess what? Complex carbs aren't absorbed. They eventually get broken down into simple sugar as well. They're better for you because they take a longer time period to break down. So, don't ever buy into something like my Red Bull "Sugarfree" here which says on the back

Total Carb. 3 g
- Sugar 0 g

Eventually, those 3 g of carbs are going to turn into 3 g of sugar, and guess what? They're absorbed into the blood stream. And what happens to your blood glucose level when more glucose is added? It goes up. At least until your little insulin friends come and take it away.

I feel like it's a conversation I have pretty often with diabetic patients who ask me why they have to take insulin when their food says it contains "0g sugar" or is "sugarfree." lol

My point is, no matter what you do, your blood glucose levels are going to fluctuate. There is no avoiding it. There is always going to be a period of time between absorption by the GI and storage where it's in the blood.

No it doesn't. That's why diabetics drink diet soda, it's SUGAR-free. Aspartame is still very bad for you. Now that i"ve cut out soda completely, I've had it 3 or 4 times in nearly two months and once, I had a Diet Pepsi and it gave me headaches and made me nauseous. Can't believe I used to drink it a lot! I have to have regular soda now when I do drink it. To me, the fake sugar is worse than the real stuff.

No. The reason they are diet is because your body can't metabolize them. This means that there is no way for your body to convert these artificial sugars into sugars that your body can use (i.e. glucose) and subsequently, you will not have a rise in your blood sugar.

Well, actually, the body can (and does) metabolize them.

It has to or we'd be peeing it out in the same form as it went in.

Not a savoury thought and potentially very messy.

I'm thinking a lot of froth.

Could you imagine the feeling of peeing out carbonation bubbles!?!? Idk if it would tickle and make you laugh or what....

Interesting to think about!!!

that's exactly what I was thinking!! How funny would that feel? lol

I'm not sure about what it does to your blood sugar but it's very bad to consume. I would do some research on it and get all the facts just to be safe! Heres a good video about it. Sorry it's kinda long...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvFRLIjOLOU

Unfortunately the conclusions in the above video are not representative of the actual research.

Aspartame is composed of Phenylalanine, Aspartic Acid (amino acids) and methanol. If you don't have migraines from Aspartame, you're totally fine to consume it in reasonable dosages. You'd have to make a conscious effort to consume dangerous levels of the above listed substances, and natural foods such as a chicken breast and a banana will contain more of the above substances than 1 can of soda.

Given no intolerance to aspartame, it's perfectly fine in moderation.

You guys are trying to argue the accuracy of an opinion statement, you realize, right? You can't take someone seriously who tries to present factual information using opinion words and phrases like "bad" and "ultimately detrimental to your overall health" and "not made for human consumption." How is 'bad' defined, what does 'ultimately detrimental' mean? Death? Chronic disease? And who decided quality of 'overall health?' Are we including mental status, ADLs, etc.? And lololol at the last example.

Things like that should trigger you to realize that the person's credibility is shot. So there really isn't a point in debating with said person.

Trolls be trollin', dawgs. Or at least I hope they're trolls.

And Dextress, you're flat out wrong. I've seen diet sodas with zero 'sugar' and 'carb' content, but I've also seen diet sodas with zero 'sugar' but carb content, which breaks down into 'sugar,' as you view it, as I explained earlier. Furthermore, FDA guidelines set parameters for what's considered negligible amounts of certain nutritional values based on average daily maximums, determined by them. You'd be surprised how many products that say "0%" of anything have greater than zero but less than 1% in them. Not to argue semantics. The more important part is that diabetics understand that carbs do cause an increase in blood glucose, which is necessary for proper cellular function and metabolism.

Not all "sugar" is bad. Carbohydrates are relatively vital.

You guys are trying to argue the accuracy of an opinion statement, you realize, right? You can't take someone seriously who tries to present factual information using opinion words and phrases like "bad" and "ultimately detrimental to your overall health" and "not made for human consumption." How is 'bad' defined, what does 'ultimately detrimental' mean? Death? Chronic disease? And who decided quality of 'overall health?' Are we including mental status, ADLs, etc.? And lololol at the last example.

Things like that should trigger you to realize that the person's credibility is shot. So there really isn't a point in debating with said person.

Trolls be trollin', dawgs. Or at least I hope they're trolls.

The problem is, and I have seen this a lot, many people read this hyperbole and unfortunately believe it.

I agree with you, which is why I suggested the initial poster go to a reliable clinical source of information if monitoring types saccharides is important because of a pancreatic disease process. The correct information might be mixed into this jumbled discussion, but it's hard to tune out all the junk that's been said if you don't know that it's junk.

My sister has type 1 diabetes and she drinks diet soda. So I can't imagine it having much of an effect because she has to keep an eye on her blood sugar

This. /Thread