No more diet soda

[ChristySmiles]

I know we've talked about how bad diet soda is but there are still a lot of people who think that "diet" means weight loss. It was designed for a "specialty diet" for people who have diabetes and other people who can't have regular sugar.

That said, Johns Hopkins University has just published the results of TEN YEARS of study showing that people who drink diet soda EAT MORE CALORIES every day!

So if you're drinking diet soda to help you with your weight loss you're actually MAKING IT HARDER TO DIET.

Sorry for all the caps. I don't normally write like that but I really want people to stop poisoning themselves and making it harder for them to lose weight.

Diet Soda: Fewer Calories In The Glass May Mean More On The Plate : The Salt : NPR

[treehuggertodd]

I find this whole thing very frustrating. I think that this should be enough to force them to change the labels from "Diet" soda to something else so that they stop suggesting that it's a weight loss product.

[bruceH]

I just don't get this. In my mind, if it doesn't have any calories, it should mean that it helps you to lose weight when compared to drinking regular pop.

[sarah]

I just don't get this. In my mind, if it doesn't have any calories, it should mean that it helps you to lose weight when compared to drinking regular pop.

It's not the calorie count that is the problem here. It's the effect that the artificial sweeteners have on the body. The actual taste of sweet sets off certain processes in the body that expect to have to deal with an increased blood glucose level from the sugars in the sweet food. But when that doesn't happen, it messes everything up.

What the study shows is that people who are trying to lose weight and who are drinking diet soda typically end up eating more calories in total. Which means that the calories in the soda don't have anything to do with it. It's what you end up eating with or after the soda that matters. The artificially sweetened soda may be enocuraging people to eat more calories.

[tara]

It's a real problem that all of those sweeteners they use to keep the calories down are essentially new to the market. They may have been aroudn for decades, but that means that it's only just now that the long term effects of using them are actually being understood. We know that dieting and losing weight isn't just a matter of slashing back calories. There are tons of other things that come into play. So just looking at the can and seeing that pop has zero calories is just the start.

[kellykatt]

This doesn't make any sense to me. If you drink diet soda and you watch your calories for the rest of the day while you're dieting, then you should be able to cut back on your beverage calories and stick to your strategy. Pop doesn't make your calories magically increase. So you can still choose a diet beverage to help you lose weight.

[Paplo]

This doesn't make any sense to me. If you drink diet soda and you watch your calories for the rest of the day while you're dieting, then you should be able to cut back on your beverage calories and stick to your strategy. Pop doesn't make your calories magically increase. So you can still choose a diet beverage to help you lose weight.

It's true, but if this makes you want to eat more, then it'll be harder to stick to that calorie limit.

[Nelly]

It's true, but if this makes you want to eat more, then it'll be harder to stick to that calorie limit.

That really is the problem. What I found really notable about that study was that the people who were not trying to lose weight didn't seem to eat any more calories when they had diet soda than they did when they had regular soda. So is it the chemicals in it that are having some sort of impact on us, do artificial sweeteners have a different impact on overweight people than they do on normal weight people, or is it a mindset that we have when we're dieting and have diet soda. Is it that concept that you can eat more because you didn't have calories in your drink? Like the typical example of the big mac, large fries, and diet soda?

[suzie]

If you're choosing a treat for yourself and it's not a decision that you're making for weight loss, then diet will save you calories. But if you're trying to use it as a replacement so that you can lose weight, it won't work.

[jenny25]

It seems to me that unless you really need to choose chemicals like artificial sweeteners (such as if you've got diabetes), then there really is no practical reason for you to use them. I personally don't want to be a guinea pig to prove whether or not these things are safe over the long term. There are enough chemicals in our foods already that cause dementia, cancer, and everything else. I'm not going to volunteer to add one more!

[Paplo]

That really is the problem. What I found really notable about that study was that the people who were not trying to lose weight didn't seem to eat any more calories when they had diet soda than they did when they had regular soda. So is it the chemicals in it that are having some sort of impact on us, do artificial sweeteners have a different impact on overweight people than they do on normal weight people, or is it a mindset that we have when we're dieting and have diet soda. Is it that concept that you can eat more because you didn't have calories in your drink? Like the typical example of the big mac, large fries, and diet soda?

Ya I guess that's just it. It's funny that the main impact that this was having on people was in trying to use it as a part of a weight loss diet! Really isn't a diet soda.

[madscientist]

That's really well said doubletaurus. I think that's exactly what we should all thing. NO soda is good for you. Just avoid all of it!