i haven't read any of the the quitting soda threads, but i have one word:
neurotoxins!
aspartame is really a powerful thing.
i was a diet coke addict for 20 years. starting when i was 14 drinking Tab and working at a fast food restaurant part-time - it was free, and i would have big cups of it all day. the night before big exams in high school and college, i would drink a 2-liter bottle of diet coke while studying. later i cut back to 2 cans a day but religiously i had those 2 cans, for years and years.
2 years ago due to health problems/concerns i stopped having it and it was hard. i can still look at a glass full of bubbling liquid joy and just want to guzzle it down, but i have been cold turkey in all this time. i still crave it.
i also stopped having artificial additives, colours, sweeteners, flavourings. yes it is incredibly hard to find food, especially prepared food that i can just grab off the supermarket shelf, but my health is worth the bother.
regarding MSG, i have always gotten migraines and thrown up from even the tiniest amount of MSG, but when i learned that it comes in 60 different chemical names on food labels, and that even "organic" "additive-free" foods can have MSG-related chemicals in them, i was forced to pay very close attention or otherwise suffer these frequent headaches and periods of ill health. there are websites out there with all the different chemical names it can be called on food labels if you want to look into it.
i think aspartame/nutrasweet does a huge number on our bodies, especially our brain cells. it mimics brain chemicals, which is why people with the brain chemical disorder phenylketonuria can't drink it. i think it alters the serotonin balance.
if you are interested in learning more about what some people have against aspartame/nutrasweet/artificial sweeteners/msg, there are books and websites about it - some of their writings & rantings can seem a bit far-fetched, but people whose bad, honest experiences are not believed or honoured by the majority often can get a little strident in their tone.
even if a product is "approved" for human consumption by the FDA (just as the cancer-causing red food coloring was for decades) of course the FDA is not perfect, is not immune to political bias, is not immune to commercial interests. donald rumsfeld was the CEO of Nutrasweet when Bush senior's government forced the FDA to approve it even though it's the most-complained about substance in FDA history.
you've got to judge for yourself. do a steve-type experiment for 30 days and see how you feel.
personally i feel a hundred times healthier after giving up all the artificial additives, especially my beloved diet coke.
i lost 17 pounds as well, which i've kept off for 3 years, but i don't think that was due to stopping drinking diet coke. i actually think the weight loss was due to stopping exercising so much, paradoxically (see steve's post of about a year and a half ago about weight and food and exercise - it's not simply calories in, calories out the way some think it is)
to ease my craving for carbonation (which carbonated mineral water does NOT do for me), i drink 4-8 ounces every once in a while of additive-free tonic water, which is delicious and bubbly.
the additive-free kind is hard to find. even normal soft drinks (non-diet ones that are loaded with sugar) like Schweppes normal tonic water have saccharine and aspartame in them now. it's a chemical onslaught on consumers for no good reason... now, i wonder why they put aspartame and saccharine in a sugar-filled drink that was made and happily consumed for 40 years without it? would it be for the stealth physical effects of it on consumers? this stuff is not without effects.
when i think about what we are allowing growing children to consume, i am not surprised at how mixed-up, disordered, distressed, and obese many of them are. and we as adults are. why is the richest country in the world so unhealthy and unhappy? it is such a shame.
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