How Diet Foods Can Sabotage Your Diet

 Sugar Substitutes

In terms of your health, there's nothing sweet about sugar. Sugary treats often lead to fluctuations in your blood sugar that can cause mood swings, fatigue, and symptoms of depression. Over time, chronic sugar consumption may deplete B vitamins and raise your risk for developing diabetes and obesity. If sugar is so bad, you might think the solution is to reach for sugar-free foods. However, if you think guzzling diet soda all day will keep you looking and feeling your best, here's a news flash! One recent study, published in the Journal of General Internal medicine, found an association between increased risk of cardiovascular disease and drinking diet beverages. All that soda pop may also increase your risk for diabetes and expand your waistline! Artificial sweeteners are used to replace regular sugar, but they don't add any nutritional value. In fact, sometimes these sweeteners may be up to 200 times sweeter than regular sugar, which can trick the brain into preparing the body to metabolize a calorie load that doesn’t exist. As a result, the body is left craving more food, while you are left with a sweet tooth! Diet drinks, baked goods, powdered drink mixes, candy, puddings, canned foods, jams and jellies, some dairy products, and many other foods and beverages may contain artificial sweeteners—so be on the lookout.

In addition to artificial sweeteners, many products contain sugar alcohols in place of sugar. Sugar alcohols are naturally-occurring carbohydrates found in fruits and vegetables. Only a few calories less than sugar, these sugar substitutes are also found in scores of processed foods and products such as gum, toothpaste, beverages, candy, and baked goods. While they occur naturally, their main drawback is that they often cause bloating and gastrointestinal discomfort.

Be a savvy shopper about sugar: Read the ingredients on all products and steer clear of the following artifical sugar names: sucralose, aspartame, acesulfame potassium, neotame. To avoid sugar alcohols, watch for the following names in the ingredients: erythritol, hydrogenated starch hydrolysate, isomalt, lactitol, maltitol, mannitol, sorbitol, xylitol.

For a natural alternative to sugar that won’t wreak havoc on your waistline or blood sugar, try Stevia, made from the stevia leaf. As always, moderation is key!

Forego Fat-Free Foods

Here’s a common misconception: cutting fat from the diet will improve chances of weight loss. Fat is an essential nutrient that our bodies require for multiple functions, one of which is to absorb vitamins. Fat also gives flavor to food and provides a feeling of satiety, so you won’t feel like you are chewing on cardboard! When manufacturers remove fat from a food, they often replace it with sugar and additives to make it more edible. As a result, you and your taste buds are left unsatisfied, which may tempt you to consume more calories. Instead of limiting fat in your diet, learn to decipher between heart-healthy fat and artery-clogging trans fats. While overconsumption of saturated fats can raise your risk for heart disease, eating small amounts may actually benefit your health. Organic eggs and coconuts can provide healthy benefits when enjoyed in moderation. In addition, mono- and polyunsaturated fats like nuts, olives, seeds, and avocados are other heart-friendly foods that should make an appearance your plate. The health benefits of omega-3 fatty acids are well documented, so enjoy delicious, oily fish like wild salmon and sardines, flaxseeds, walnuts, and chia seeds.

To ensure that you avoid any foods that contain trans fats, look for the words “partially hydrogenated” in the ingredient list.

Diet Cola/ Sweet poison? A true story

>            SWEET POISON...
>
>  A MUST READ TO THE END!
>
> In October of 2001, my sister started getting very sick She had
> stomach spasms and she was having a hard time getting around.
> Walking was a major chore. It took everything she had just to get
> out of bed; she was in so much pain.
>
> By March 2002, she had undergone several tissue and muscle biopsies
> and was on 24 various prescription medications. The doctors could
> not determine what was wrong with her. She was in so much pain, and
> so sick she just knew she was dying.
>
> She put her house, bank accounts, life insurance, etc., in her
> oldest daughter's name, and made sure that her younger children were
> to be taken care of.
>
> She also wanted her last hooray, so she planned a trip to Florida
> (basically in a wheelchair) for March 22nd.
>
> On March 19, I called her to ask how her most recent tests went, and
> she said they didn't find anything on the test, but they believe she
> had MS.
>
> I recalled an article a friend of mine e-mailed to me and I asked my
> sister if she drank diet soda? She told me that she did. As a matter
of fact, she was getting ready to crack one open that moment.
>
> I told her not to open it, and to stop drinking the diet soda! I e-
> mailed her an article my friend, a lawyer, had sent. My sister
> called me within 32 hours after our phone conversation and told me
> she had stopped drinking the diet soda AND she could walk! The
> muscle spasms went away. She said she didn't feel 100% but, she sure
> felt a lot better.
>
> She told me she was going to her doctor with this article and would
> call me when she got home.
>
> Well, she called me, and said her doctor was amazed! He is going to
> call all of his MS patients to find out if they consumed artificial
> sweeteners of any kind. In a nutshell, she was being poisoned by the
> Aspartame in the diet soda.. and literally dying a slow and
> miserable death.
>
> When she got to Florida March 22, all she had to take was one pill,
> and that was a pill for the Aspartame poisoning! She is well on her
> way to a complete recovery. And she is walking! No wheelchair! This
> article saved her life.
>
> If it says 'SUGAR FREE' on the label; DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT IT!
>
> I have spent several days lecturing at the WORLD ENVIRONMENTAL
> CONFERENCE on 'ASPARTAME,' marketed as'Nutra Sweet,' 'Equal,' and> 'Spoonful.'
>
 In the keynote address by the EPA, it was announced that in the
> United States in 2001 there is an epidemic of multiple sclerosis and
> systemic lupus.. It was difficult to determine exactly what toxin
> was causing this to be rampant. I stood up and said that I was there
> to lecture on exactly that subject.
>
> I will explain why Aspartame is so dangerous: When the temperature
> of this sweetener exceeds 86 degrees F, the wood alcohol in
> ASPARTAME converts to formaldehyde and then to formic acid, which in
> turn causes metabolic acidosis. Formic acid is the poison found in
> the sting of fire ants. The methanol toxicity mimics, among other
> conditions, multiple sclerosis and systemic lupus.
>
> Many people were being diagnosed in error. Although multiple
> sclerosis is not a death sentence, Methanol toxicity is!
>
> Systemic lupus has become almost as rampant as multiple sclerosis,
> especially with Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi drinkers.
>
> The victim usually does not know that the Aspartame is the culprit.
> He or she continues its use; irritating the lupus to such a degree
> that it may become a life-threatening condition. We have seen
> patients with systemic lupus become asymptotic, once taken off diet
> sodas.

 In cases of those diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis, most of the
> symptoms disappear. We've seen many cases where vision loss re-
> turned and hearing loss improved markedly.
>
> This also applies to cases of tinnitus and fibromyalgia. During a
> lecture, I said, 'If you are using ASPARTAME (Nutra Sweet, Equal,
> Spoonful, etc) and you suffer from fibromyalgia symptoms, spasms,
> shooting, pains, numbness in your legs,
> Cramps,
> Vertigo,
> Dizziness,
> Headaches,
> Tinnitus,
> Joint pain,
> Unexplainable depression, anxiety attacks, slurred speech, blurred
> vision, or memory loss you probably have ASPARTAME poisoning!'
> People were jumping up during the lecture saying,'I have some of
> these symptoms. Is it reversible?'
>
> Yes!
> Yes!
> Yes!
> STOP drinking diet sodas and be alert for Aspartame on food labels!
> Many products are fortified with it! This is a serious problem. Dr.
> Espart (one of my speakers) remarked that so many people seem to be
> symptomatic for MS and during his recent visit to a hospice; a nurse
> stated that six of her friends, who were heavy Diet Coke addicts,
> had all been diagnosed with MS. This is beyond coincidence!

Diet soda is NOT a diet product! It is a chemically altered,
> multiple SODIUM (salt) and ASPARTAME containing product that
> actually makes you crave carbohydrates.
>
> It is far more likely to make you GAIN weight!
>
> These products also contain formaldehyde, which stores in the fat
> cells, particularly in the hips and thighs. Formaldehyde is an
> absolute toxin and is used primarily to preserve 'tissue specimens.'
>
> Many products we use every day contain this chemical but we SHOULD
> NOT store it IN our body!
>
>A doctor has said  that once free of the 'diet
> products' and with no significant increase in exercise; his patients
> lost an average of 19 pounds over a trial period.
>
> Aspartame is especially dangerous for diabetics. We found that some
> physicians, who believed that they had a patient with retinopathy,
> in fact, had symptoms caused by Aspartame. The Aspartame drives the
> blood sugar out of control. Thus diabetics may suffer acute memory
> loss due to the fact that aspartic acid and phenylalanine are
> NEUROTOXIC when taken without the other amino acids necessary for a
> good balance.
>
> Treating diabetes is all about BALANCE. Especially with diabetics,
> the Aspartame passes the blood/brain barrier and it then
> deteriorates the neurons of the brain; causing various levels of
> brain damage, Seizures, Depression, Manic depression, Panic attacks,
> Uncontrollable anger and rage.

 Consumption of Aspartame causes these same symptoms in non-diabetics
> as well. Documentation and observation also reveal that thousands of
> children diagnosed with ADD and ADHD have had complete turnarounds
> in their behavior when these chemicals have been removed from their
> diet.
>
> So called 'behavior modification prescription drugs' (Ritalin and
> others) are no longer needed.Truth be told, they were never NEEDED
> in the first place!
>
> Most of these children were being 'poisoned' on a daily basis with
> the very foods that were 'better for them than sugar.'
>
> It is also suspected that the Aspartame in thousands of pallets of
> diet Coke and diet Pepsi consumed by men and women fighting in the
> Gulf War, may be partially to blame for the well-known Gulf War
> Syndrome.
>
> Dr. warns that it can cause birth defects, i.e. mental
> retardation, if taken at the time of conception and during early
> pregnancy. Children are especially at risk for neurological
> disorders and should NEVER be given artificial sweeteners..
>
> There are many different case histories to relate of children
> suffering grand mal seizures and other neurological disturbances
> talking about a plague of neurological diseases directly caused by
> the use of this deadly poison.'