Week 3: Fat People Drink Diet Drinks

Think about the title to this week's health post. While I hope you will read and benefit from this post, if you meditate on the title you already have all the information you need on this topic. 

First let's talk about non-diet drinks. In a study of the obvious the following conclusion was drawn:

Researchers from the University of Virginia in Charlottesville surveyed the parents of 9,600 children born in 2001 from across the nation, asking questions about their TV-watching habits, socioeconomic level, and children’s consumption of sugary drinks. The completed study, published in this month’s issue of the journal Pediatrics, reported that five-year-old children who drank beverages sweetened by sugar every day were 43 percent more likely to be obese than those who drank the beverages less frequently or not at all. 

If you have young children what are they drinking? The answer for my household is mixed. My daughter has never drunk a soda. She does however use sweetened tea on occasion. She takes the sweet tea we buy and cuts it by 50% with water. So progress is being made. She is also gradually reducing the sugar she puts into tea. I am trying to lead by example by not drinking such items myself.

Note that an exercise in the obvious is beneficial. We often miss the obvious, at least I do. Most of what I will discuss over the next year is obvious, yet we as a nation do not do it! 

Why do sugary drinks have this effect? The reason may be that we do not fully register the calories when we drink something sweet. 

“Sugar provides empty calories, and sugary drinks are unnecessary calories which often do not register and help—children or adults—feel full,” Young tells TakePart. “We also usually eat something along with the drink, so it is getting a double dose of calories. This is a huge concern as they are forming habits, and drinking sugary drinks is a bad habit.” 

In addition the body has to process a sudden increase in sugar and a lot of insulin is produced. This will produce hunger later as blood sugar drops. Sorry, but fruit juices are not much better. 

Diet drinks have no calories so they must be all right, right? But remember my title. We all know it is true by observation, but it is also been studied. Here are the results of one study: 

Results. Overall, 11% of healthy-weight, 19% of overweight, and 22% of obese adults drink diet beverages. Total caloric intake was higher among adults consuming sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) compared with diet beverages (2351 kcal/day vs 2203 kcal/day; P = .005). However, the difference was only significant for healthy-weight adults (2302 kcal/day vs 2095 kcal/day; P < .001). Among overweight and obese adults, calories from solid-food consumption were higher among adults consuming diet beverages compared with SSBs (overweight: 1965 kcal/day vs 1874 kcal/day; P = .03; obese: 2058 kcal/day vs 1897 kcal/day; P < .001). The net increase in daily solid-food consumption associated with diet-beverage consumption was 88 kilocalories for overweight and 194 kilocalories for obese adults.

I am not a fan of such studies since the groups being compared are so very different. It may actually be that these people would be even heavier if they did not drink diet drinks. Maybe. But psychologically it may lead to eating more, with the internal self talk of "I had a diet drink so I can eat that dessert." 

The Arteriosclerosis Risk in Communities Study showed that diet soda drinkers were 34% more likely to have Metabolic syndrome.

Metabolic syndrome is a disorder of energy utilization and storage, diagnosed by a co-occurrence of 3 out of five of the following medical conditions: abdominal (central) obesity, elevated blood pressure, elevated fasting plasma glucose, high serum triglycerides, and low high-density cholesterol (HDL) levels. Metabolic syndrome increases the risk of developingcardiovascular disease, particularly heart failure, and diabetes.[1] Some studies have shown the prevalence in the USA to be an estimated 34% of the adult population,[2] and the prevalence increases with age.   

At the start of my journey toward better health I had all five of these. Now I have two, maybe three depending on what the cutoff for high blood pressure currently is. I will be talking about metabolic syndrome later. But note that the study did not really prove that diet drinks caused metabolic syndrome. It may be that those with this problem tend to use diet drinks, not the other way around. 

So should you be using diet drinks? While it may be coincidental, I can only point out that personally limiting diet drinks was to some degree associated with my weight loss. 20 years ago I used 8 8oz servings of diet drinks a day. Now I drink about 1 16oz serving a month. My goal is zero. 

I have noticed that my taste buds have changed with the elimination of diet drinks. I was crunching on a Brussels sprout and noticed how sweet it was. I was shocked. While you may never move Brussels sprouts to the top of your personal vegetable hit parade, without the overload of sweetness your perception of food will change. This is why I am suggesting limiting diet drinks so early in the one year journey we are on. The sooner you change your tastes the better. 

I have always had a nagging feeling about diet drinks, and asked myself, "What does the body do when it thinks you are drinking a large number of calories due to the sweetness in the diet drink?" If it produces insulin in response, then you will be hungry. Research tells us that I was not alone in wondering this. It is known that if you drink diet soda with a meal the artificial sweetener will cause more insulin to be produced. But it was not significant in one study. However, GLP-1 was increased.  Although as is normal for the health field, another study disagrees. 

Click here for a popular level discussion of these issues. This article is the first of your homework for this week. 

The second part of your homework this week is Dr. Hyman's presentation on diet drinks. I will be discussing all the diet gurus like Dr. Hyman later. I did find this presentation convincing and watching it led to my decision to reduce diet drinks. 

But you can't beat something with nothing so I suggest you try other drinks instead. The biggest problem for me is traveling. You may have heard of my first choice--dihydrogen monoxide. Another choice is a carbonated bottled water like Perrier. If you plan ahead, you can buy a 26 oz flavored Perrier for $1.50 at Walmart. 

You might try a soda stream machine. It makes carbonated water cheaper, but to my tastes not quite as good as the purchased product. Note that the link to SodaStream contains samples that I do not recommend. 

What I did at first was drink more coffee. I am backing off this and am trying to limit myself to two cups a day. I try to drink a minimum of four cups of green or black tea a day. There is good evidence that green tea is very good for you. This link is your final homework assignment for this week. 

No, do not take the green tea concentrate pill. The modern desire to think that we just need a pill to solve everything is one reason we are in the health crisis we are in. I will be talking about the pill mania for the next two weeks.  

Action Plan for Week Three: Dramatically reduce all sweet drinks, real or artificial. Replace them with dihydrogen monoxide and green tea. 

Remember the wisdom of Socrates, "The unexamined drink is not worth drinking."

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