Diet Soft Drinks

I've heard lately that diet soft drinks are "liquid poison." I'm lucky that I don't crave them.  I only drink 2 or 3 a week, but when you're thirsty and want something sweet, they sure do come in handy. What's your take on them? Bren

I'm not sure if it this way for everyone, but my mom drinks them everyday and is quite thin.  I think it's like everything else, just do it in moderation.  I allow myself so much artificial sweetener, but I try not to go nuts since we're not sure about the safety of these.  You hear conflicting stories all the time. Brenda

I read somewhere, maybe a year ago.... that sweet tastes trigger insulin just like real sugar. making you more hungry in the end.. and therefore sugar free items  can actually stall weight loss... or something close to that.

Me, I've dropped virtually all sodas (I've had 2 in 20 days)... I have one cup of coffee or tea (down from 8 or more) per day and I drink water like crazy... and for me it is working..

Violamom, Tell me, why did you feel the need to cut out the coffee ? I can drink up to two pots a days.  I have heard for every cup of coffee consumed, on should drink two glasses of water. I'm  starting on the water and gradually increasing daily. I can get in  about three  250 ml bottles a day now. Perhaps as I increase it, I'll want the coffee even less. After all, I can't spend all day every day, drinking !

two reasons...

1.  blood pressure

2.  I want my body to use fat stores for energy - not caffiene.... not sure if that is good science or not...

I'm not sure either but I have known people that dropped weight quite well JUST going off the diet soda. WHY that is... I don't know. But I have several friends that swear by it. I drink maybe one or two per week but did mix up some Chrystal Light I had in the cupboard... that with ice was good but almost TOO sweet. My SIL is a nurse and she thinks it's poison due to the phenalalinine in it... I likely just really messed up the spelling on that but it's there :)

I have tried to banish sodas out of my life completely. I don't even keep them in the house anymore. They contain so much sodium - even the diet ones. That makes you retain water and doesn't really quence your thirst. I will admit, I have broken down once or twice in the past month when the kids have been really stressing me out and have had a can of coke, but I made myself walk a mile there to get it and walk a mile home.  Here is an article I recently read about diet sodas......

MONDAY, July 23 (HealthDay News) -- Drinking more than one soda a day -- even if it's the sugar-free diet kind -- is associated with an increased incidence of metabolic syndrome, a cluster of risk factors linked to the development of diabetes and cardiovascular disease, a study finds.

The link to diet soda found in the study was "striking" but not entirely a surprise, said Dr. Ramachandran Vasan, study senior author and professor of medicine at Boston University School of Medicine. There had been some hints of it in earlier studies, he said.

"But this is the first study to show the association in a prospective fashion and in a large population," Vasan said.

That population consisted of more than 6,000 participants in the Framingham Heart Study, which has been following residents of a Massachusetts town since 1948. When the soda portion of the study began, all participants were free of metabolic syndrome, a collection of risk factors including high blood pressure, elevated levels of the blood fats called triglycerides, low levels of the artery-protecting HDL cholesterol, high fasting blood sugar levels and excessive waist circumference. Metabolic syndrome is the presence of three or more of these risk factors.

Over the four years of the study, people who consumed more than one soft drink of any kind a day were 44 percent more likely to develop metabolic syndrome than those who didn't drink a soda a day.

The findings are published in the July 24 issue of the journal Circulation.

A variety of explanations, none proven, have been proposed for the link between diet soft drink consumption and metabolic syndrome, Vasan said. That association was evident even when the researchers accounted for other factors, such as levels of saturated fat and fiber in the diet, total calorie intake, smoking and physical activity.

One theory is that the high sweetness of all soft drinks makes a person more prone to eat sugary, fattening foods. Another is that the caramel content of soft drinks promotes metabolic changes that lead to insulin resistance. "These are hotly debated by nutritional experts," Vasan said.

Vasan, who noted that he is not a nutritional expert, said he leans toward the theory that "this is a marker of dietary behavior" -- that people who like to drink sweet soda also like to eat the kind of foods that cardiac nutritionists warn against.

"But we cannot infer causality," Vasan said, meaning there is no proof that soda itself is the villain. "We have an association. Maybe it is a causal one or maybe it is a marker of something else."

Carefully controlled animal studies might resolve the cause-and-effect issue, he said.

Dr. Elizabeth G. Nabel, director of the U.S. National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, which funds the Framingham Heart Study, said in a prepared statement: "Other studies have shown that the extra calories and sugar in soft drinks contribute to weight gain, and therefore heart disease risk. This study echoes those findings by extending the link to all soft drinks and the metabolic syndrome."

Dr. Suzanne R. Steinbaum, director of Women and Heart Disease at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, said, "There is no safe way of eating junk food, just as we learned the lesson from trans fats and partially hydrogenated oils often found in fat-free or low-fat cookies. Diet soda does not protect us from the development of what we are trying to avoid by consuming it."

Great article, Heather!  But I'm not really sure what it is saying.  There were some pro and con remarks.  But I guess it's best NOT to drink them.  All that chemical, artificial stuff can't be good for you!

complete and utter bullsh*t that it is poison.  BUTT...

...I will say that as with all things, balance is key.  i asked myself, hmmm, I want to drink something calorie-free and wet?  why NO****er???

The fake sweeteners are THE most widely studied food supplement and so far, there has been a couple of studies that suggest that MAYBE they play with blood sugar levels and pick up hunger.

I have quit them for a full year and gained weight.  I felt just as hungry, maybe more hungry without them. i just try to stay at 1 diet pepsi (12 oz can) a day.  I have a friend who sucks down a bladder buster size every day, at least....and that feels wrong. Same exact argument for coffee, I've lived with it and without it, and with it is better.  Just like my Diet P. Too much is not good.

Poison or not, no one needs the caffeine, the corrosive effects, or the sodium.  I quit cold turkey in February 2007. Drank diet soda all day long since 1982.