Diet soft drinks ADD belly fat....

Today's Post: Friday, 7-1-2011

I had read that diet soft drinks caused even other mammals (who do NOT have access to junky treats and snacks or regular soft drinks) to eat more and add fat.

I had read that one of the ways this happened in people was that after drinking a diet soft drink, they often got the same rebound hunger later for sugary foods they would have gotten from regular soft drinks.

More recently, I read that this happens because when your body gets the sweet taste, you release the same insulin you would if you had drunk a sugary drink.

But insulin surges directly fatten you -- instructing your body to store fat and not release it when you need its energy. That’s so even before you eat more from the rebound hunger – and even if you override that & eat normally instead.

So, despite the fact that some motivated people who do cut back calories in other ways and drink diet soft drinks to reduce calories more -- have lost weight, diet soft drinks DO tend to fatten you if you drink them.

I suspect the people who drink diet soft drinks and still lose weight would have lost more fat or done it more easily had they drunk water instead. In addition, the extra hunger from the diet soft drink effect likely makes it less likely they will keep off the fat.

AND, recent articles show that huge numbers of Americans now get 25% or more of their calories from soft drinks, and junky treats and snacks. That’s because they often have them 3 or more times a day in addition to eating real food.

The second problem in people with diet soft drinks is that eating this way plus drinking diet soft drinks is about 80% the same as doing it with regular soft drinks.

This lifestyle also tends to have excessive TV watching which is a proven fattener.

Diet soft drinks can only help even motivated people who drop the junky snacks and treats and cut back or way back on TV watching. (And these people likely would have done even better with water, tea, water that’s carbonated only, or vegetable juice instead of diet soft drinks.)

I believe strongly that the results that show diet soft drinks to be just as fattening as regular actually have these two causes.

Between the basic biology of the body’s response to the sweet taste and the fattening lifestyle soft drinks are a part of, it should hardly be surprising.

Two days ago Google Health featured an article based on two studies.

One study supported that the basic biology of the sweeteners in diet soft drinks are directly fattening.

The other study found that regardless of which cause operated or operated most,

People who drank diet soft drinks had more belly fat and significantly bigger waists than people who drank no soft drinks at all.

That’s extremely important!

Most people who want to lose weight want to lose it from their waists the most. (That’s certainly true of me!)

Belly fat is also the kind that is most likely to help cause diabetes and heart disease and other diseases– or the lifestyle that produces large bellies does so.

My bet is that they both do!

Here’s a quote from the Google article:

“For one study, researchers at the center followed 474 diet soda drinkers, 65 to 74 years of age, for almost 10 years. They found that diet soda drinkers' waists grew 70 percent more than non-drinkers. Specifically, drinking two or more diet sodas a day busted belt sizes five times more than people who avoided the stuff entirely.

And as waist size grows, so do health risks - including diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and other chronic conditions.”

(The second study in mice found that, like fattening you, the connection to the sweeteners in diet soft drinks may connect to diabetes and heart disease even more directly.

In that study, the mice which ate food with aspartame for three months had higher blood sugar levels than the mice eating normal food.)

When asked if both regular soft drinks and diet soft drinks are fattening what should we be drinking?

Dr. Helen Hazuda, professor of medicine at University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, said:

“"I think prudence would dictate drinking water." “

As we’ve posted before here, tea, water that’s carbonated only, or vegetable juice instead of diet soft drinks also works.

In addition, for fat loss, that may work even better if the drink is chilled because your body burns calories dealing with the cold!

Green tea over ice works. Low sodium spicy V8 works over ice. Iced black tea with lemon juice and chilled club soda with a twist of lemon works.

Iced coffee with a bit of cream works too. (It does have some calories but you can eat less of something else or exercise more for that. Just don’t add sweetener or use nondairy creamer -- which has very questionable ingredients.)

Even ice water works. Best of all, if you are trying to save money you can often get it at no charge when you are eating out.