Don’t Think You’re Nutritionally Safe with Artificial Sweeteners

Many diets recommend using artificial sweeteners in place of sugar to keep the taste and lose the weight. These artificial sweeteners come in many forms including Aspartame, saccharine, Sucralose, and Acesulfame-K. They are readily available at the grocery store as well as in many foods and soft drinks. So let’s break a few of the main ones down...

Aspartame: a low-calorie sweetener commonly known as NutraSweet and is about 200 times sweeter than sugar. The Aspartame Consumer Safety Network reports “85% of all complaints registered with the Food and Drug Administration, the US government agency that overseas food and drug safety, conce
s aspartame’s adverse reactions” including menstrual changes, weight gain, and headaches to severe depression, insomnia, and anxiety attacks.

Saccharin: is a non-nutritive sweetener that passes through the body unchanged and is excreted in the urine. It is reported anywhere from 300-700 times as sweet as sugar. Studies have shown this to be a cancer-causing agent.

Sucrolose: a no-calorie sweetener commonly known as Splenda and is 600 times sweeter than sugar. James Bowen, M.D., a physician, biochemist, and survivor of aspartame poisoning warns, “Splenda/sucralose is simply chlorinated sugar; a chlorocarbon. Common chlorocarbons include carbon tetrachloride, trichlorethelene and methylene chloride, all deadly. Chlorine is nature’s Doberman attack dog, a highly excitable, ferocious atomic element employed as a biocide in bleach, disinfectants, insecticide, WWI poison gas and hydrochloric acid.”

Acesulfame-K: is used in packet and tablet form, but is mostly seen as a sweetener in sugar-free chewing gum. It is 200 times as sweet as sugar. Laboratory tests have shown this product causes cancer in animals.

Remember that all of these products were developed to extend the shelf life of products so companies could make a higher profit with less waste. Commercialism isn’t bad, as long as our health isn’t at stake. Note that each of these artificial sweeteners are 200-700 times as sweet. This causes our taste-buds to adapt to this extra sweetness to a point where whole foods, like an apple, no longer taste sweet by themselves. There has recently been a lot of documentation showing that people have increased cravings for sweet and fatty foods when artificial sweeteners are regularly consumed. New evidence is showing that many of the body’s sugar handling mechanisms are still fired when our taste-buds identify “sweet” triggering the release of unused, unnecessary hormones. They can also make you feel bloated and fat, which can cause you to not eat real, whole, nutrient-dense foods. It’s time to admit that there is no free ticket to eating all the sugar-free products desired without paying the high price of harming our bodies in the long run. Stick with natural sweeteners, like raw organic local honey, stevia, or maple syrup instead of sweeteners that have been “manufactured”.