Anybody else given up artificial sweeteners?

I eliminated them too. I do admit to sneaking a small glass of diet coke every few days, but way less than I did before. At first I put a tsp of honey in my coffee, but now I got used to drinking it unsweetened, and I prefer it that way now. I sometimes put about 1/2 tsp coconut manna in my coffee. It gives it a barely there nutty almost sweet taste and with my full fat cream makes a yummy coffee. Once I cut out all the added sugars, it makes my fruit and dark chocolate taste much sweeter and more satisfying. I don't feel guilty for enjoying them because I have so little sugar elsewhere in my daily diet. Bye bye sweeteners. Nice to have known you.

This is a good idea. I use stevia at home in coffee every day, but to be honest at work they only have sweet n low, out and about they usually only have splenda. So I know I have one of these almost every day and I am going to try stopping and see how I feel.

I used to be a queen of artificial sweeteners! LOL, I would put artificially sweetened flavored coffee syrups into my artificially sweetened pepsi! Oh man... Talk about SWEET! I used to love it though. I would chew sugar free gum on top of that, multiple pieces a day, and drink Snapple (the sugar free, artificially sweetened!) as well.

I quit cold turkey about a year ago. No withdrawal symptoms, although it was hard for me to stop chewing gum. I feel SO MUCH BETTER now though. It's amazing how sluggish just consuming that type of junk makes you!

I did, however, drink a HUGE Snapple about a week ago. LOL, guilty pleasure, but yes, I did have it. Feels good to have them every once in a while as a TREAT though, instead of regular every day occurrence.

I'd like to cut them out completely also. I am convinced that artificial sweeteners give me headaches and an overall icky feeling.

I gave up Splenda about 2 weeks ago. I don't feel any different, but I have noticed I'm using about 100 calories a day in sugar for my tea and coffee. So I need to cut that down.

Nursing is usually a very busy, high stress work environment, and oncology can be particularly so. You have my admiration. I'm also a nurse (public health now, but I worked for a long time at the hospital), and I've used coffee, tea, and soda to stay alert and energetic, not to mention hydrated. I used to drink from 3-5 diet sodas a day, but I read some scary things about the possible safety artificial sweeteners, and cut them out of my diet about 3 years ago. (I know there are many that would argue that they are safe, but I'd rather not take the chance.) I'm still a bit of a caffeine fiend, so drink a lot of tea, and I use about a teaspoon of sugar per 10 oz cup. I don't eat a whole lot of sugar otherwise, and I log in the calories. When I want something sweet, I try to choose foods that are sweetened with sugar, molasses, honey, or occasionally stevia.

I gave up artificial sweeteners 4 days ago. I've used them since I was 16, so this is quite a change. I have had headaches and some brain fog. I'm using raw sugar and coconut Palm sugar instead. My understanding is that artificial sweeteners cause inflammation which may block my body from assimilating and disposing nutrition properly. Have you heard anything like that before?

i give up nothing…

but I actually prefer real sugar over stevia, artificial stuff, etc...

Likewise. I avoid them but only because sugar tastes better

The weight of the evidence that I've seen indicates that they're safe. If you really want to be safer then don't get a motor vehicle, make sure that you maintain a healthy body fat percentage, don't drink alcohol to excess, and if you have children under 4 make sure they know how to swim.

I too gave up artificial sweetners a year ago when I started MFP. They were something I used alot, and have always had my doubts about long term effects. I didn't want to add alot of regular white sugar, so I try to do without. When I can't, I use honey. I have a cappucino or mug of coffee with skim milk twice a day. That I can usually enjoy without sweetening. I've switched to fruit teas because I can drink them plain. I cannot say I noticed a difference cutting out artificial sweetners---good or bad. It just gives me peace of mind. I've never been a diet soda guzzler. You don't want to touch that on here--people get defensive.

I've never used them. I hate the after-taste. I swore off sodas altogether, rather than going to diet sodas. :noway:

I personally gave up all artificial sweeteners years ago because they made me hungry.

I am one of those people that find artificial sweeteners seriously make me more hungry. I was gaining weight year after year and switched to artificial sweeteners in an effort to stop gaining weight. Instead my weight started going up even faster! So during the next six months i kept track of what i ate in a log book and also noted when i was hungry (this was days before smart phones so it was much more difficult). I found during those weeks i was using artificial sweeteners I was a lot more ravenous. I snacked more and always seemed to go back for seconds.

So I just decided to quit Soda and sweet drinks altogether. In the next year after I slowly lost 20 lbs and stayed at that weight for years. Though now i am working on getting back to a more healthy weight.

The good thing is after a few months my craving for constant sweets went away.

I should have also known better. In my youth when I worked as a bartender at a Pizza place, I always thought it odd that the fat folks would always order huge pizzas with lots of toppings... with large diet sodas. And the fit folk would order smaller pizzas with fewer topping and order small sodas (with sugar).


...and in response to some of the others comments.... as for aspartame I have a few friends with horror stories. Yes i had a one friend that had seizures, others had some other reactions but harder to prove, but the worse was a friend who reacted with a change to his personality. He went from a mild mannered introvert to a foul mouthed angry jerk. Luckily it was caught in time before it completely destroyed his life.

I have been a coca cola/pepsi addict for years, particularly the diet stuff. recently made the switch to flavoured waters to ween myself off. I had a glass of regular pepsi the other day as the boyfriend had bought some and i really didn't enjoy it as much as i thought, I prefer the flavoured waters. massive victory for me there. have real sugar in my tea/coffee rather than sweeteners.