Friday, January 23, 2015

Diet or Deadly?

With the Holidays drawing to a close many people reflect on the good times with family and friends, the fun they had opening presents and just how much they enjoyed the abundance of good food!  It’s about this time that attention turns from holiday cheer to the scale and waistline!

Some research has shown that people can gain in excess of ten pounds during the holiday season!  Unfortunately it goes on much easier and with a lot less work than it comes off. January is usually the busiest times for health clubs as people have a renewed focus on getting in shape through exercise and eating right.

Unfortunately for many diet soft drinks have worked their way as a staple for healthy eating.  The argument is they contain no calories and no sugar or high fructose corn syrup so they must be healthy and provided some relief to any lingering sweet tooth.


While this logic on the surface seems sounds, consumers of diet soft drinks should be wary of the ill effects diet soft drinks pose to their health. Aspartame, an artificial sweetener found in many foods including diet soft drinks is considered by Mercola.com as “by far, the most dangerous substance on the market that is added to food!

Aspartame is the technical name for the brand names NutraSweet, Equal, Spoonful, and Equal-Measure. It was discovered by accident in 1965 when James Schlatter, a chemist of G.D. Searle Company, was testing an anti-ulcer drug.




According to Dr. Mercola, Aspartame accounts for over 75 percent of the adverse reactions to food additives reported to the FDA. Many of these reactions are very serious, including seizures and death. A few of the 90 different documented symptoms listed in the report as part of aspartame dangers include headaches, insomnia, joint pain, memory loss, breathing problems and countless others.

Further research highlighted by Dr. Mercola by researchers and physicians studying the adverse effects of aspartame, the following chronic illnesses can be triggered or worsened by ingesting of aspartame: brain tumors, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, chronic fatigue syndrome, Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's, mental retardation, lymphoma, birth defects, fibromyalgia and diabetes.          
         
  
If the above isn’t bad enough, let’s look at the reason people drink Aspartame laced diet soft drinks in the first place, to lose weight (it surely can’t be for the taste!) While zero calories seems to be logical for promoting weight loss, aspartame does the exact opposite.

According to research shared on Mercola.com, aspartame and other artificial sweeteners are primarily promoted to diabetics and those concerned about their weight. This promotion continues to manipulate the general public despite the fact that artificial sweeteners have repeatedly been shown to produce the exact opposite effects.


Research shows that aspartame worsens insulin sensitivity to a greater degree than sugar.  The insulin response to sugar is what triggers fat storage in the body. This, Artificial sweeteners have also been found to promote weight gain, in more ways than one.  The very reason you may be drinking diet soft drinks to lose weight is likely having the exact opposite effect in weight gain, not to mention all the other ill effects noted previously.


HERE’S TO BEING FIT FOR LIFE! Chris is a Certified Personal Trainer, USA Triathlon Level 1 Coach, Group Exercise Instructor, exercise and endurance enthusiast.  He competes yearly in numerous running races, marathons, ultra marathons, triathlons and other endurance events.