Diet Coke Consumption

If you don't drink it, will you replace it with something worse? Do you absolutely love it? If you answer yes to either/both of those questions, you may be better off drinking it. If it is something you could easily replace with something that has less questionable health benefits/detriments, then you might want to do that. I personally limit any consumption of any sodas, and try to keep it to special events.

there was a relatively recent study that showed that diet drinks (in particular, artificial sweeteners) not only don't help you lose weight, but they can have an opposite affect. Artificial sweeteners create cravings in your body because they aren't really food and have NO nutritional value. Instead, they cause an insulin spike which creates cravings. Sodas have other substances that are considered toxins to your body that also don't help with fat loss (but instead encourage fat storage).

Sure, you can lose weight while drinking diet soda...but you're likely having to fight cravings in order to do so.

I have had a total of 6 sodas since April something and, along with generally eating healthier, I have felt a TON better. I don't drink ANY caffeine and I have MORE energy these last 3 months than I had when I was drinking diet soda.

someone mentioned something about drinking water. One guideline I have found is that you should be drinking half your body weight in ounces of water each day...and for each ounce of caffeinated beverage you drink that day, add another ounce of water that you drink.

I am down to one can a day, and usually not even the whole can. However, I usually drink a crystal lite in the evening while my husband is eating ice cream (I used to eat the ice cream), so it helps with that. I went for two years once with no soda at all, I need to cutout all the diet drinks, but I can only do so much at a time!

It has a TON of sodium in it.

Hi,

My wife is a personal trainer, when she was training, she was told that drinking a lot of diet coke (750ml+ a day) would affect your weight loss, as one of the chemicals in it reduced muscle mass over a sustained period.

As we all know, the more muscle you have the better, as it burns up calories by just being muscle.

So I'd say in moderation, go for it, but like everything, if you have too much, there will be consequences.

My wife won't ban you from fries or ice cream (in moderation) but does ban ALL of her clients from fizzy drinks, its the only thing she bans, as they are habit forming.

MK

I love my various diet sodas mostly since they keep me from binging on things like chocolate bars, icecream, or just binging on food in general. I have at least 1 glass daily.

So IMO regardless of any negatives that come from the chemicals in the fake sweetners used in them, if It weren't for diet soda I could very well be 143 lbs heavier than I am now.

That being said I also drink 5+ liters of water a day as well.

This article is from the Huffington Post and there many more found in scientific journals:

Diet soda might not help you stay trim after all, new research suggests.

A study presented at a American Diabetes Association meeting this week shows that drinking diet soda is associated with a wider waist in humans. And a second study shows that aspartame -- an artificial sweetener in diet soda -- actually raises blood sugar in mice prone to diabetes.

"Data from this and other prospective studies suggest that the promotion of diet sodas and artificial sweeteners as healthy alternatives may be ill-advised," study researcher Helen P. Hazuda, Ph.D., a professor and chief of clinical epidemiology at the University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio's School of Medicine, said in a statement. "They may be free of calories but not of consequences."

In the first study, researchers collected height, weight, waist circumference and diet soda intake data from 474 elderly people who participated in the San Antonio Longitudinal Study of Aging. They were followed up an average of 9.5 years later, according to the research.

Researchers found that the diet soda drinkers had waist circumference increases of 70 percent greater than those who non-diet soda drinkers. And people who drank diet soda the most frequently -- at least two diet sodas a day -- had waist circumference increases that were 500 percent greater than people who didn't drink any diet soda, the study said.

Artificial sugar didn't produce any better results in the second study in mice. Researchers for this study found that diabetes-prone mice that were fed a diet that included aspartame for three months, had higher blood glucose levels than mice not given aspartame.

This isn't the first news illuminating diet soda's health risks. A study published earlier this year found people who drink the beverage every day have a higher stroke and heart attack risks. And UK researchers found earlier this month that sugary drinks can dull taste buds, leading consumers to crave the sweet stuff even more.
_____

Studies on artificial sweetners has been on-going for many years and the results are fairly consistent. There is another study that showed increased caloric consumption elsewhere in your diet after ingesting artificial sweetners. It is thought that your body is not fooled into believing you've ingested the sugar but is aware of how many calories your should have consumed with that soda and will make up for it later when you have your meal by making you eat a few more bites.

This makes artificial sweetners incidious additives and the drinks/ food/ etc that use it not worth the risks.

read the ingredients. would you feed any of them to a child or someone you loved?

wean yourself off it. I do sparkling water now 'cause I like the fizzyness, but seriously, diet coke is totally unhealthy for your body.

Some people say the artificial sweetener in it causes cancer...google it and decide for yourself.

Good luck...it is a hard addiction to quit!

I am in the 'I know it is not good for me but I drink a few every week cause I like caffeine.' I can't say with 100% certainty whether it has affected my pace of weight loss. I do know with 100% certainty that if I eat too much I gain weight so I focus more on that.

This is a very personal decision for each person here. I was a DC Addict, would drink a minimum of 12 oz Diet Coke per day, some days it was the 44 ounce for me, PLUS a refill!

As part of the 17 Day Diet I gave it up completely. Now if I drink some (usually 6 oz or less, and have only done this twice in the past 40 days), I get an upset stomach and horrible indigestion! I knew I needed to "get off the Diet Coke", and now I'm so totally glad I did! I feel SOOOOO much better, I'm sleeping better, it's just BETTER to drink water instead of sodas.

Diet Coke is actually quite low in sodium, but there are TONS of other research-supported issues that make one thing clear... at the very least it's simply NOT nutritious, and at the very worst it is linked to a multitude of health problems.

In short, soda of any kind (regular or diet) is NOT good for you. And we all know that. I'm not faulting anyone that continues to drink soda - I just recently gave it up, and you've gotta do what works for you.

So, back to my main point. Giving up sodas OR working them into your plan so you don't have to give them up is a very PERSONAL decision, and I don't fault anyone for making that decision either way. Everyone has to do what works for them.

As for those with weight loss success while continuing to drink soda, that's terrific! Most mention they also drink plenty of water, so that must help.

But it's still not good for you, no avoiding that fact. Does that mean YOU should quit? Again, it's YOUR choice.

I'll just say this - whether you currently smoke or not, I think we all agree that smoking is bad for you. But I'll bet you can smoke and still lose weight, yes? And as for it being bad for you... my mother will be 80 this December, and she has been a chain-smoker since she was 12 years old. She has the lowest blood pressure of anyone in my family. She's down to about half a pack a day now, but she'll never quit. Oh, and she's at a healthy weight for her age. Should she quit smoking? I THINK SO... but it must be HER decision. Will she quit? Absolutely not. Again... HER decision.

One last thing - a friend of mine's husband would give their TODDLER daughter drinks of his Coke during dinner. My friend told me this was an argument she decided she didn't want to get divorced over, so she had given up fighting him on this practice that she detested, but he continued. Once I was joining them for dinner, and when his daughter wanted in his lap, she reached for his glass of Coke and he helped her get it to her lips. As she gulped it down, I shot him quite the look, and he replied "Oh come on, she's had plenty of water today, drinking some Coke won't kill her".

My reply: "OK great, well I can also see she's been breathing plenty of oxygen today as well so let's let her light up a cigarette, one or two won't kill her"....

:drinker: :drinker: :drinker:

Ice