3 days

Three very long days. I decided to give up drinking diet sodas and any drinks containing sugar substitutes. I have/had a huge addiction, and I didn't realize how bad it was until I decided to quit drinking them. I've always heard that aspartame wasn't good for you, but I read this book over the weekend called "Skinny Bitch", and it went in a little deeper about the dangers and that caused me to do more research on my own. I'm having some pretty bad headaches and pain in some of my joints (mainly my shoulders). I haven't given up caffeine completely (yet). I substitute my morning coffee with tea (no sugar) and that's been a lifesaver!

But enough about the negative stuff, let me tell you how things are changing for the good. My skin and hair are looking better each day. My appetite has really decreased. That was something else I learned about the diet sodas. Each one you drink is a constant surge of insulin. This is taken from a website when I did my "researching"


That may be just what happens when we offer our bodies the sweet taste of diet drinks, but give them no calories. Fowler points to a recent study in which feeding artificial sweeteners to rat pups made them crave more calories than animals fed real sugar.

"If you offer your body something that tastes like a lot of calories, but it isn't there, your body is alerted to the possibility that there is something there and it will search for the calories promised but not delivered," Fowler says.

Perhaps, Bonci says, our bodies are smarter than we think.

"People think they can just fool the body. But maybe the body isn't fooled," she says. "If you are not giving your body those calories you promised it, maybe your body will retaliate by wanting more calories. Some soft drink studies do suggest that diet drinks stimulate appetite"

I really this is something I can continue long-term. I have initially set a goal for me of two weeks, cold turkey, no diet sodas. I know this will get easier!