Artificial Sweeteners & Health Dangers

The word “diet” holds many ideas, thoughts, feelings, and even worries. It encompasses many plans, many goals and many marketing campaigns. Let's face it, we all want to be in better shape. We all want to be healthier. Live happier, more fulfilling lives. But how do we accomplish that if our body constantly aches, has symptoms of underlying problems, and just doesn't feel right? It's not easy.

But there are steps we can all take to improve our body and therefore, our lives.

And the one of the biggest mistakes most people make is falling into the trap of things like “diet” products being healthier. Most notably- soda.

Major companies across the US have been replacing natural sugar in their products with artificial sweeteners such as Aspartame, Equal, Splenda and the like. And by cutting out the sugar it was their belief that their products would cut carbs, calories, and hopefully stored fat. If they didn't put real sugar into their products, they thought, the by product would be people would become slimmer, and therefore healthier.

But, skinny does not always mean healthy. And in the case of artificial sweeteners and their ''diet'' related products the after affect is most definitely the opposite of healthy.

Artificial sweeteners are not recognized by your concious cells which make up the body as an actual food for it to process. That is why artificial is in the name. And if the body cannot recognize a food which it has taken in, it doesn't know what to do with it. This causes what Purdue professor of psychological sciences and behavrioal neuroscience, Susan Swithers calls, “metabolic derangements.” Susan states in her research, ''Findings from a variety of studies show that routine consumption of diet sodas, even one per day, can be connected to higher likelihood of heart disease, stroke, diabetes, metabolic sundrome, and high blood pressue, in addition to constributing to weight gain.” (Trends in Endocrinology and Metabolism). The problem, she states, is that the consumption of these artificial sweeteners confuses the body by tasting something sweet with no caloric intake involved in consumption. Basically, when you eat a piece of fruit, and it tastes sweet, the body know how to process the carbs from the sugar upon ingestion. However, when we consume an artificial sweetener that has no caloric intake, the body doesn't know how to process the chemicals as it cannot recognize the food which has been ingested. And this is not good. Because the body will store whatever it does not recognize in order to keep you going, which will result in weight gain, instead of weight loss. Taking this one step further, what happens when the body tastes something sweet, is ready to digest what it believes to be these carbs, but it can't, because there is no substance? The body's hormones become imbalanced- most notably, insulin. Regardless of whether there is any caloric intake, the body will release insulin upon ingestion of something sweet, spiking it in your blood, which will increase cravings, and cause, you guessed it...diabetes. Furthermore research has suggested that artificial sweeteners prevent your body from producing GLP-1, a hormone that controls blood sugar levels and feelings of satiety. In combination, the unregulated imbalance of these two hormones will lead you to feel hungry more often, and eat more- again, causing weight problems. So what is the best method of consuming something sweet such as soda? Do we go with natural sugars? Well to put it simply and plainly...no. Get rid of the sugary drinks in your life! Get rid of the added artificial sweeteners in your coffee! Stick with fruit as your main source of sugar intake. It was designed for the body and therefore can be digested by it. And DO NOT consume any store bought ''diet'' drink. Otherwise you may end up being on a ''diet'' for the rest of your life.