The Word “Die” Is in “Diet Soda” for a Reason
Regular sodas contain sugar, and sugar is bad, right? Plus, look at the calorie count on a regular soda! But you love soda. You HAVE to have it. So you feel like you’re making the healthier choice by going with diet soda--no “sugar” and no calories.
It sounds too good to be true because it is.
Diet sodas are filled with artificial sweeteners such as aspartame, saccharin and sucralose. These sweeteners produce a more intense flavor than real sugar, thus building up the body’s tolerance to naturally sweet foods (like fruit). What’s more, sweeteners trigger insulin (just like real sugar) and send your body into fat storage mode, causing weight gain. Calorie count has nothing to do with it.
Consuming diet soda can lead to increased risk of:
Obesity
A decade-long study from the University of Texas found that diet soda drinkers had a 70 percent greater increase in waist circumference than non-drinkers. AND, participants who imbibed in 2+ sodas a day experienced a 500 percent greater increase.
For some, diet soda might contribute to obesity issues from a psychological standpoint: No calories with your drink, so how about dessert instead?
Type Two Diabetes
According to a study performed by the University of Minnesota, one diet soda per day could increase your risk of metabolic syndrome (high blood pressure, blood sugar handling issues, high cholesterol) by 36 percent.
Headaches
Migraine sufferers often eliminate diet soda from their diets as aspartame can be a trigger.
Rapid Tooth Decay
Citric acid weakens and corrodes tooth enamel over time.
Gentle Dentistry journal found the same level of tooth decay in the mouths of cocaine users, meth users, and diet soda drinkers. Ew.
Rapid Intoxication
The body can process artificial sweeteners faster than real sugar, and this might open up the bloodstream to faster absorption of alcohol in mixed drinks as well.
Osteoporosis in Women
While women are more susceptible to osteoporosis than men to begin with, soda (regular and diet alike) compounds the situation. Studies show lower bone mineral density in the hips of soda drinkers than women who do not drink soda.
Vascular Disease
Just one diet soda per day can increase your risk of stroke, heart attack or vascular death.
Want an alternative option? Good ol’ water.
Since the body is made up of mostly water, drinking water is one of the best things you can do for yourself. If you like the fizziness of soda, try sparkling or mineral water or kombucha (fermented drink sold in the healthy food refrigerator section at most grocery and specialty stores). Also, it will be easier on your pocketbook. Let’s say you drink a 12 pack of diet soda per week (1-2 cans per day). If the average cost of a 12 pack is $5, you’ll be saving around $20 per month, and $240 per year. Think of all the things you could buy with that, and it wouldn’t involve medically related purchases due to the risks of consuming diet soda.
While my title for this blog (The Word “Die” Is in “Diet Soda” for a Reason) might be a tad dramatic, it clearly isn’t doing anything good for you. So go on a diet soda diet. Don’t put it in your cart at the grocery store, and you won’t be tempted to drink it at home. In fact, don’t even go down the soda aisle at all. Don’t bring cash when you pass the vending machine at work. Don’t look at the soda fountain machines when you’re out to eat--sit with your back to them.
Start small. Many people who are habitual soda drinkers can’t quite cold turkey. If you drink multiple diet soda beverages per day, cut it down to just one per day for a week or two. Then maybe one every other day. Then try it as just a treat for getting through the work week, or month. Soon you will find that you don’t “need” soda to help you “get by.” You might even start craving water. And if this one small change starts to make you feel better, think of how making other small changes to your diet (and lifestyle) might have an impact.
Also, this is hard. The diet soda companies make it hard on purpose. Cutting out sugar from your diet is a necessary step toward health. It lurks in more than just diet soda though! Download your FREE 4 Types of Sugar Guide
for a first step to getting you on the right path toward better health today!
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Heidi Toy Functional Medicine Blog
Did you know most people didn’t have refrigerators in their homes until well into the 1900’s? It wasn’t even invented for large scale commercial use until the mid 1800’s [1]. So how did people keep their milk cold and make their food last longer? Fermentation. It sounds like a gross concept, because we often associate fermentation with a bad odor, but foods like cheese, yogurt, sauerkraut and pickles are all fermented foods. And those aren’t gross, are they? Well, some might disagree with me about sauerkraut, but that’s beside the point. Fermented foods are digestive aids. Microscopic living organisms in fermented foods help extend the food’s shelf life, enhance flavor, and help the body absorb minerals. These organisms pre-digest the food, getting rid of harmful components, and create more vitamins and enzymes than the food began with. Enzyme-rich foods have many benefits including [2]: Increase digestibility of food we eat Boost immune system Increase alkalinity; neutralizing pH levels Provide a healthy balance of friendly flora in the gut (Learn more about your microbiome in my other blog posts ) Tone the colon and help with elimination Control cravings for unhealthier foods Eliminate toxins and undigested wastes in the body In the “old days,” people use to ferment all kinds of foods through pickling, canning, pasteurization and added salt. Nowadays, however, large scale fermentation has lost many of its nutritious benefits due to the need for speed to get the product on the shelf as fast as possible and as cheap as possible. The only true fermented foods you will find are sauerkraut, kombucha, yogurt and kefir, beans, wine and beer, some meats (such as salami and pastrami), legumes and nuts (such as tofu, soy sauce and miso), sourdough bread, and various kinds of vegetables [3]. Fun facts about sauerkraut: The Germans “stole” it from the Chinese! Sauerkraut (probably not labeled as such for the Chinese, but the same recipe) was one of the main foods for those who built the Great Wall of China. Genghis Khan brought it to Eastern Europe during an invasion. It also contains high levels of vitamin C, and sailors often took it on long journeys to prevent scurvy.
How can we best keep blood sugar stable? Do what our body is designed to do – use fat for energy. Our species did not survive the Ice Age because of vanilla coffee lattes and cheesecake. Throughout most of our history, we ate a diet that was likely 50-70 percent fat. Look at the old family photo albums, specifically pictures of people in the first half of the 1900s, before we had so many processed foods. You won’t see many fat people--in fact, most look darn skinny. If they lived on the farm, they ate lots of eggs, meat, milk, and vegetables out of their own backyards. “Diet foods” were non-existent. Heart disease was almost non-existent. Our metabolism is designed to work much better with fats better than with sugar. Fats provide the slow and steady fuel our body likes to use for energy. Think of fats as a slow-burning log on the fire. One log (i.e. one meal containing fats) lasts for hours. Starchy carbs, on the flip side, are like kindling. You constantly have to throw more twigs (chips, pasta, bagels) to keep the fire burning. The first step is to know your sugars by reading the labels, and then avoid said sugars as much as possible.
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