The TRUTH About Artificial Sweeteners

Just because some new chemical doesn’t seem to have any bad side effects now, doesn’t mean they won’t find one in 15 years after some rare form of cancer is discovered. Remember back in the day when cigarettes were prescribed as appetite suppressants? Aspartame has tomes of case studies stating how harmful it is to your system. If you have no problems with blood sugar, why not just drink regular soda? Any soda made with cane sugar (not corn syrup) is better for you in the long run that anything with aspartame.

Having through the years about the negative effects of artificial sweeteners, I make every effort to avoid them if at all possible preferring to use xylitol or stevia instead. But I must admit that when I don’t them I will use equal in my morning coffee

I rarely use sugar or artificial sweetners. My understanding is that the the body dumps insulin in response to either one – sugarless gum or a honeybun and that need for glucose makes me crave more! I believe both are harmful in large amounts – after 3 days of vacation -eating at restaurants and off my clean eating-my joints ache horribly and I feel like crap. To me they cause inflammation. But, I think everyone reacts differently – I don’t tolerate carbs – I bloat and gain weight quickly. My husband on the other hand does better eating them almost every meal. Overall I would prefer a natural sweetner like honey when I do use it.

@Peter – Check out Sun Warrior Protein if you want to try something without artificial sweeteners that is still pretty low cal. 70 cal per scoop (15 g of protein). Kind of expsensive but well worth it.

Regarding Aspartame – when I used it with coffee, I started having panic attacks which looked like: when I was calm, all of a sudden I would start crying and I felt like I couldn’t breathe very well – like something was on my chest. It would take a couple of minutes to pass. I finally decided not to use aspartame in my coffee and I never had another occurrence. I think this caffeine and aspartame also combo caused me a heart arythmia which took a year to get rid of by not having any caffeine at all. Now I can get away with coffee or caffeine occasionally.

Also when my father drinks one diet soda, his shoulders ache after.

It doesn’t seem worth the possible problems that can occur in our bodies.

yah i wanna hear bout this cause i lost a lot of weight when i switch to diet pop from the regular

I agree. What I have seen are numerous studies on what “real” sugar does to the body and how negative those effects are. I will continue to choose artifical sugar over real sufar until I see studies that prove otherwise.

I don’t drink diet soft drinks and I don’t use artificial sweeteners in my coffee. I’m very interested in what research you will be presenting to show that there’s nothing wrong with aspartame and Splenda. I have read Dr. Blaylock’s report on aspartame and it’s dangers to your brain and health and respect his opinion. I can’t find any protein drink, protein or energy bar or any other health or fitness food product which does not contain an artificial sweetener as an ingredient, usually Splenda or sucralose (another name for Splenda). This has bothered me. It’s also hard to find any low sugar food product which doesn’t contain aspartame or Splenda.

I look forward to tomorrow’s post.

I’ve currently got an addiction to Pepsi Max (admittedly I never have more than 2 cans a day – rest of the day water, but still…)

I already drink my coffee black and I’m working on getting the sugar out of my tea. I don’t use artificiaf sweeteners because I just can’t stand the taste of them. I don’t even chew gum anymore because they’re sweetener they use now just doesn’t taste right to me. Is learning to like things less sweet and using sugar better or worse than using artificial sweeteners and maintaining the same level of “sweetness” in your foods?

I don’t want to join the foil hat crowd, but I can’t help thinking that “manufactured” food is just bad for you.

i want to know since i drink diet cola – i hate the sugar residue regular leaves on my teeth.

I think you have 75 comments already. I switched to Truvia a couple of months ago after reading an article by Brad Pilon (I think) that most artificial sweetners more closely resemble the chemicla make-up of chlorine than anything else.

I would like to hear what you know. I drink diet soda but try to limit the soda period. I will go between sugar and the artificial sweetners depending on whether real sweet tea or something else. I would like to hear about sucrolose (sp) as it is used in many products and have been lacking any insight but RUMOR has it was being designed for some other purpose and was accidental discovery.
Thanks

Aspartame = EVIL!!!!

Just kidding! Actually, I REALLY just don’t like it at all. I have a very refined sense of taste when it comes to sweet things (real sugar) and Aspartame and all the other “artificial” sweeteners do not appeal to me at all. In a blindfolded test I could pick out the artificial sweetener in a drink every time. All the artificial sweeteners have a very “metallic” taste that really bothers me. About the only “diet” soda I was able to drink was Fresca because the grapefruit covered up about 95% of the flavor, however it was still there and eventually drove me away cause I get sick of the “tinge of artificiality” from the aspartame.

On the flip side, I can also tell when there is High Fructose Corn Syrup in the drink or food too because the sweetness has a very different “sharper” sweet flavor than regular sugar. That also bothers me and I really don’t like it neither.

Now why would I know sugar so well?? That would be because as a kid I used to eat it all the time in candy, honey, plain white sugar, powdered sugar, brown sugar, honey comb, fructose, real maple syrup (my absolute favorite!!) and any other method I could get it. Because of this, I’ve developed over the years a “sugar” sense when it comes to food and am somewhat of a sugar snob. I really enjoy being over here in Europe where they still use sugar in their soda and make it taste so much better than the garbage back in the States. Fanta here in Germany is phenomenal! Mezzo Mix (mixture of Fanta and Cola) is another phenomenal piece of work too! You can try these out at the Coca Cola Museum in Atlanta, just go to the room where they have all the sodas from around the world and try them and compare them with what is produced in the USA and you will taste a difference (I hope). Some people notice it and a lot of people don’t.

Oh yeah, I still think that Aspartame sucks and refuse to eat it because I don’t like the taste of aluminum foil mixed in with my food. So, it is usually an all or none thing when it comes to sugar for me. Kill the craving and don’t bother to try faking it out because it doesn’t work. Did I say that Aspartame sucks?
Tom

Hi Joel,
I’m intrigued to hear what you have to say on artificial sweeteners. I have cut out most sugars from my diet (especially my coffee and that is going a ways : ) ..on occasion though I do like a coke with my dinner out and tend to order (with guilt) a diet soda…wondering if I just added a huge dose of horrible chemicals to my system.

@Misschiff –
Thank you for a very clear description of the problems.

I’ve taken the liberty of copying the text of your mail and forwarding it to several people who could well be affected. I’ve also asked them to do similar for others who could be influenced by these problems.

Hope you don’t mind.
Fairly sure that you don’t. :)

How about just use Stevia (all-natural) and be done w/ the debate.

=)

Joel ~ Controversy here is breeding a heated mixture of opinion, fact, and life experiences. Personally, I can find no added value to artificial sweetners other than the often perceived notion of the reduction of the intake of calories. Perceived because many consumers will count calories saved with a diet coke, for example, as an excuse to eat something else laden with useless calories. Though sugar is not a suggested solution as it does have its own negative effects on the body, what sugar doesn’t have is a chemical mixture formulated to taste sweet.

The personal experiences of those having negative experiences linked back to artificial sweetners needs to be respected. Though it may be true that we can’t get enough artificial sweetner in a single day to impact the body, consider the lifetime accumulation and the potential breakdown of our cells being able to talk to each other in a healthy way.

Every person posting is able to defend his/her position based on personal experiences, something they’ve read or heard, or advice from a doctor. It’s easy to get stirred up on such a controversal subject because it evokes passion. That leads to great discussions. My opinion is such that a chemical in the body that the body doesn’t readily recognize isn’t something I would want to do on a consistent basis. Years ago the public wasn’t very concerned about the harmful effects of smoking either…

Respectfully,
Dawn

Joel,
I really do not care if it is a primary cause of cancer or liver failure, which I have seen nothing to prove it is or not, I just don’t add anything that is not natural that I can choose not to. Artificial flavours and sweeteners fall into this category. My coffee is good unsweetened. I get enough natural sugar from fruit and vegetables. Sugar and its friends just work against my goals.

Joel,

I appreciate your honesty and realism about artificial sweetener use! I do try to avoid using them TOO much because the sweetness sometimes causes my sweet-tooth to go crazy, but I do enjoy a diet soda, a little packet in my tea and sometimes even in baking from time to time.

Joel,
I am curious. There are so many studies on what is good and bad for you. The latest being artificial sweetners. Knowing well enough that too much of any one thing is bad for you, How much is too much? (per day) And I look forward to all your other posts.

I don’t use the sweetner nor do I drink diet pop I use regaler suger and I drink cola but I am very intrested in more info

Thank you for looking into this timely debate. What is the REAL deal on the artificial sweetners? I really do like my diet pop. Is it worse than the water we are drinking out of the tap?

I used to LOVE aspartame-based artificial sweeteners but I suffer from exercise induced asthma and somewhere along the line, a health professional recommended I just try replacing with zylitol (beet sugar, negligible effect on blood sugar, tenth of the calories of sugar). I did and I noticed a really big difference with shortness of breath and wheezing during interval training after a few weeks – since giving it up, my fitness levels have improved dramatically – as a matter of fact, I have reduced my asthma management medication – although this could be due to improved fitness levels (may be an egg and chicken situation).

I prefer the taste of aspartame based sweeteners to be honest… If anyone has any more respiartory related research, I would appreciate finding out more as at this stage, for all I know, the improvement may be in my mind :)

Personally I use only ‘Ultimate Life’ Birch Sugar. Its a granulated white sugar crystal.(Looks eXactly like Cane sugar. No after taste just natural compound sugar derived from birch-bark in Scandinavia.(I)Love it. Thanks for posting this info today Joel.