Diet drinks will NOT undermine your weight loss. However, diet drinks (as well as coffee/tea/etc) do not count as water and will dehydrate you, so make sure that you still drink at least 8 glasses of H20 per day.
Aspartame is NOT harmful (unless you happen to have the genetic disease phenylketonuria). As I've stated previously, my father (who worked as a food chemist from 1959 to 1992 when he retired - also has a medical degree from UNC) worked with aspartame starting in the 70's. My three sisters, myself, and most of our friends were consuming aspartame pretty regularly (Dad brought home "testers" - formulas he was working on - as well as a giant sack of NutraSweet gumballs) well before any aspartame products were available on the market in the US. None of us have been affected by any of the so-called "diseases" that aspartame is said to cause. I have never been pregnant (by choice) but my sisters all drank aspartame drinks (and used products containing aspartame) during their pregnancies - all seven children were born healthy and remain so today (my eldest nephew is a star athlete and honor roll student, in fact).
Dad used to get people asking about aspartame's safety. His response would be akin to "Do you think I would feed POISON to my children?"
Following is a Q&A I copied from the Mayo Clinic's website:
http://www.mayohealth.org/home?id=HQ00267
"Aspartame is a low-calorie sweetener composed of two amino acids, aspartic acid and phenylalanine, and methanol (an alcohol). The amino acids are found naturally in milk, meat and dried beans. Methanol is a natural component of fruits and vegetables.
After consuming food or drink containing aspartame, the body breaks down the sweetener into its various components. So aspartame itself no longer exists and never enters the blood stream. The amino acids and methanol are then processed the same as if they'd come from foods. The amino acids are used by the body for building muscle or for energy. The methanol is converted into carbon dioxide and water. (Although methanol is an alcohol, foods sweetened with aspartame yield a very small amount of it. In fact, the amount of methanol that results from drinking a 12-ounce can of soda sweetened with aspartame is less than half that obtained from drinking an 8-ounce glass of fruit juice.)
It's important to note that individuals with the genetic disease phenylketonuria (PKU) cannot properly utilize the amino acid phenylalanine. They must strictly limit their intake of foods containing this amino acid, such as meat, milk, nuts — and foods sweetened with aspartame.
If a food contains aspartame, it will appear on the ingredient list on the product's label. The terms NutraSweet and Equal are brand names that also indicate the product contains aspartame."
Here's a Quackwatch article with lots of links to FDA Consumer, the Multiple Sclerosis Foundation, Urban Legends, etc. regarding aspartame:
http://www.quackwatch.com/04Consumer...aspartame.html
On Michael Fumento's website
http://www.fumento.com/ check for an article called "NutraSweet Fuss Amounts to Sweet Nothings".
Aspartame also doesn't have
anything to do with 'insulin spikes' since your bod doesn't recognize it as sugar - since it doesn't contain sucrose, fructose or any of those other -oses that signal the presence of sugar.
I checked the CDC website and I believe the article you are referring to is
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/00000426.htm - "Evaluation of Consumer Complaints Related to Aspartame Use" which basically states that the results were 'inconclusive' as to whether the wide myriad of symptoms complained about by the consumers had ANYTHING to do with the use of aspartame.
Sorry to get so lengthy - just cutting through the rumors and BS that has long been associated with this product! Take care.
