For years, I've been drinking an average of about 2-3 cans of diet soda a day. It wasn't even for dieting purposes but because I like the taste better than regular soda. But now I'm wondering...is it good during dieting because it has zero calories or does the artificial sweetener sucker punch us?

TOTAL hindrance.

Phosphorous destroys your bones. I won't even touch the artificial sweetener subject.

Forget about weight... think about osteoporosis. Plus, it's expensive, isn't it?

I have to disagree - it depends on the person.

No, its not great to have every day, and yes, extended excessive use can lead to bone loss. HOWEVER - I drink diet soda sometimes (1-2 a week) and it has never been a hindrance to my weight loss.

Would like to add, though, that for some people, it slows weight loss pretty dramatically, so you have to experiment and see if it works for you.

I used to drink a lot of diet pepsi. I mean, a lot. It really increased my appetite. (It didn't matter if it was regular diet pepsi or caffeine-free diet pepsi so it was not the caffeine causing it.) I knew it couldn't be real hunger so I learned to ignore that false hunger feeling. But it definitely had that effect. I don't drink aspartame-sweetened drinks anymore. I don't notice the same false hunger effect from Splenda-sweetened drinks. For the most part, I have switched to lemon-water or Propel water. With an occasional Splenda-sweetened soft drink. I guess my message is that if the aspartame increases your appetite, it may sabotage you in that way. That has been my experience.

Wow, I didn't know about the boneloss thing! My husband switched to diet sodas and this has really aided him in losing weight, but I was still buggin him about how much he was drinking-- it just didn't seem right that he should be drinking that much.

oh yes, the bone loss. I am not sure if this is cause-and-effect or not. But I had been drinking diet sodas heavily for about 25 years, and I do show some bone loss (osteopenia) - could be coincidence but ????????

Now I am wondering................is it the artificial sweeteners that cause the boneloss? Because I thought that caffeine prevents the absorbtion of calcium and that's what caused osteoporosis

Your body pulls a small amt of calcium from your bones to buffer the acidity of the phosphoric acid in sodas. It doesn't prevent calcium absorption.

In moderation, though, there is no evidence of bone loss - this is something that occurs over many years of heavy use.

I agree. Moderation in all things. Having a diet soda when you go out to dinner every now and then is not going to cause bone loss...that is completely different than someone who drinks 7 Diet Pepsi's each day, and has for years.

I personally think diet sodas HELP me. I have them rarely, but when I go out to dinner or to the movies, sipping on one helps to keep me out of the bread basket/husband's buttered popcorn.

I feel the same way about artificial sweetener-a little now and then won't hurt you, but if you are having 10 servings a day in your drinks/foods, then that is excessive. Just like with anything else.

Thanks for all the answers! I probably won't cut it out completely but I can definitely reduce it to a can or less a day. My other thing that I tend to drink the most is Crystal Light Iced Tea. I know that has the sweetener, too, but I would probably end up drinking more of that if I cut out some of the soda. I don't hate plain old water but I can't force myself to gulp half a dozen glasses of it down every day either. I also don't want to be making constant trips to the bathroom at work or when I'm out. But...I guess small changes at first and see where I can go from there.

As far as the expense, I live in NYC. Everything costs more, even bottled water. Every week this month I've been buying up whatever low-cal frozen dinner line happens to be on sale that week. I'm not buying Lean Cuisine at $4.29 but at $2 a pop, I loaded up my little basket, lol.

I read of a recent study in my TOPS magazine (I'll have to see if I can find last month's issue to see who conducted the study) that it is now believed that only cola-type soft drinks lead to bone density loss. I think it mentioned that things liek lemon-lime sodas do not contain the same type of acid, so they don't have that effect. Good thing I like diet Sprite and diet ginger ale

As far as weight loss, though, diet sodas have definitely HELPED me. The carbonation gives me a full feeling in my stomach, so I eat less food when I have soda to drink with it. I've never gotten that false feeling of hunger from artifical sweeteners, so it doesn't affect me in that way. I drink at least 1 can of diet soda every day (WITH caffeine), and often 2-3 cans on the weekends, and I lost over 12 pounds in December, so I'll say no, it's not hindering my progress.

I also don't drink coffee or tea or anything, so any caffeine in the sodas is the only caffeine I have at all. For anyone concerned with caffeine, I would look to coffee before soda [5 ounces of coffee has, on average, about 100mg caffeine(and I know most people drink more than 5oz coffee at a time); Jolt, the most caffeinated soda, has 72mg caffeine per 12 ounces; Diet Pepsi comes in at about 36mg per 12oz].

I haven't drank soda since high school. Maybe some sips from my mom's diet pepsi or my friend's Dr. Pepper, but other than that I don't drink any. I refuse anything that contains aspartame as a sweetener. And as for surgar-free, my stomach does not tolerate it. Something in sugar-free candy expecially upsets my stomach. So until I get the willpower to get off regular candy, I'm stuck.

I used to get headaches. I don't anymore. It was the Diet Mountain Dew I was drinking. I have cut out all artificial sweetners. The only thing I eat with a sweetner in it is yogurt.