Attached is the document my coach shared with me regarding dangers of diet soda, which includes a paragraph on page 3 about aspartame. I have not verified the study listed here, but specifically about aspartame I have researched myself and the information here is true.
PS: oops just realized I put an "if" instead of "of" in the name of the PDF file, darn keyboard! :-)
Somebody posted this a while back on here, good info and probably very valid. I'm happy to be free from my Diet Coke addiction and don't plan on letting it start again after I'm done with IP.
Attached is the document my coach shared with me regarding dangers of diet soda, which includes a paragraph on page 3 about aspartame. I have not verified the study listed here, but specifically about aspartame I have researched myself and the information here is true.
PS: oops just realized I put an "if" instead of "of" in the name of the PDF file, darn keyboard! :-)
I was a huge diet pepsi drinker. I gave it up on Jan 1 when i started my diet. The other day I had one drink, and it was awful. I thought there was something wrong with it. Just goes to show your taste buds change, and change for the better. I hope to never go back to this bad habbit!
Methanol, the chemical trojan horse responsible for many modern diseases
In his study entitled Methanol: A chemical Trojan Horse as the root of the Inscrutable U, Dr. Monte evaluates the role that methanol plays in human health. Since methanol is a relatively new addition to the human diet, thanks to processing methods and chemical syntheses that did not exist prior to 1800s, it is vitally important to determine how this chemical substance affects the human body.
What Dr. Monte discovered is that methanol is converted by the body into formaldehyde, a highly toxic substance known to cause cancer in humans. He also uncovered the fact that methanol metabolizes in organs of the body other than just the liver which, based on all available evidence, is directly responsible for causing what Dr. Monte has termed "diseases of civilization" (DOC).
"Methanol is particularly dangerous to humans, more so than any other animal," says Dr. Woodrow C. Monte on his website WhileScienceSleeps.com. "When humans consume low doses of methanol it is metabolized directly into formaldehyde which is a cancer producing agent of the same level of danger as asbestos and plutonium."
Where Dr. Monte's research diverts from the mainstream view of methanol's toxicity has to do with the way dietary methanol is processed by the body. Rather than dissipate as is widely believed, methanol-induced formaldehyde tends to lodge itself into certain areas of the body that avoid filtering through the liver -- and these are the same areas of the body where DOCs tend to appear.
"Once methanol runs the gauntlet of first-pass metabolism, its detoxification is no longer exclusive to the liver," writes Dr. Monte in his study. "Methanol transports its potential to become formaldehyde past normal biological barriers in the brain and elsewhere that environmental formaldehyde itself cannot usually penetrate ... [formaldehyde] can then be produced within the arteries and veins, heart, brain, lungs, breast, bone, and skin."
Aspartame, a primary source of toxic methanol in the American diet
Where is all this toxic, methanol-induced formaldehyde coming from? It turns out aspartame is one of the primary sources in the American diet today. According to Dr. Monte, every molecule of aspartame, which is also marketed under the names NutraSweet, Equal, Canderel, 951, and AminoSweet, converts into a molecule of methanol when consumed. And in its dry form, aspartame is 11 percent methanol by weight.
This means that people who regularly consume "diet" foods and beverages laced with aspartame are taking in high amounts of a formaldehyde-producing, chemical poison that is drastically increasing their risk of developing chronic illnesses.
"As aspartame eventually became a major source of methanol in the civilized human diet, the incidence of DOC gradually began to rise," says Dr. Monte's report. "In addition to aspartame, and canned vegetables, fruits, and their juices, a major source of the methanol entering the modern civilized human body is cigarette smoke, causatively linked to atherosclerosis, multiple sclerosis, lupus, Alzheimer's disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and other DOC."
"It is my belief that diet soda has contributed to the rise of breast cancer and multiple sclerosis that has been preceded by the use of Aspartame as a food ingredient in every country that has allowed its use."
yep, I've read that too. Even the aspartame itself can be converted to formaldehyde when it sits in a hot warehouse, before it ever enters our body!
What I still wonder is whether the aspartame or sucralose actually trigger an insulin response in the pancreas. There was a recent study that showed the brain responds to any sweetener, natural or artificial, by causing us to crave more. So, is that the reason that people in the diet soda studies had insulin problems, and because they didn't 'waste' calories on soda, so they ate more of other things that did provoke the pancreas, or was it the aspartame itself? I'm thinking the acidic environment that any carbonated drink causes is also the problem. It would be interesting to see somebody study carbonated drinks with stevia, which is supposed to help control blood sugar.
At any rate, soda is bad...any kind. Tasty, but bad for us.
Soda & Aspartame
