Diet drinks

A lot of people really overreact about the diet soda thing. Just my opinion.

As for personal experiences. I've lost over 130 lb and maintaining that for several years now. I won't go into the carbs/sugars discussion because I'm no expert and honestly never paid a whole lot of attention to that beyond trying to stay within my MFP-set guidelines for both (and sodium). When I was obese for years, I didn't like water. I didn't drink water very often at all. I drank coffee and/or juice in the morning, a 12 oz can of diet soda with lunch and a 12 oz can of diet soda with dinner. That's literally all I drank in a typical day. I had a lot of problems with migraines and I believe it was a combination of higher than average blood pressure and dehydration, because it's been years since I've had a migraine. When I started getting serious about health & weight loss, I started adding in as much water as I could and it wasn't easy to make myself drink it. Now I drink water from dawn til dusk and that feels normal to me and I don't have to rush to the restroom all the time, either...a lot of my friends/relatives watch me drinking water and complain that they would have to go every 15 minutes if they drank water so much, but I think your body will usually adjust to it.

Maybe you already drink a ton of water and that has nothing to do with what you posted about. haha sorry!

ANYWAY! I do still drink diet soda. About 3 cans a week. We have it at work in the fridge and once in awhile I'll grab a diet Mountain Dew as an afternoon pick me up. At home, we buy a 12 pack once a month and between me and my husband, we always finish it - I like it with certain meals, like homemade veggie pizza. It just hits the spot to me, taste wise. No ill effects that I have noticed. I haven't studied up on artificial sweeteners, and I know a lot of people think they are the devil, but I tend to view it like anything else...don't go crazy with it, use moderation...

GREAT decision to stop smoking btw...I know you already realize it is, but that's awesome!!

NO - diet soda is not bad for you. Some people have sensitivities to artificial sweeteners but that doesn't make it bad for everyone. My preference is diet a&w root beer. I could easily drink a liter of it everyday.

Concentrate on tackling pre-diabetes and smoking. Once that is under control if you really feel that it is important to cut out diet soda work on that. To be honest though - 2 diet cokes a week is hardly anything to be worried about. If you enjoy it I wouldn't give it up.

I definitely agree with the others, tackle the bigger rocks first. Once you have those under control, it's easer to consider things like gut health and inflammation.

That being said, I definitely disagree that they aren't "bad" for you. As someone who consumed her fair share of artificial sweeteners, I can tell you it has eventually had a really disruptive effect on my gut health to the point where I had to eliminate all sweeteners for a long time to heal my gut and then reintroduce them.

However, I was consuming mass quantities of artificial sugar in everything: drinks, syrup, supplements, protein waffle mix, protein bars, and coffee daily. It sounds like you have it under control if you're only talking a couple times a week.