Do you let your children have artificial sweeteners?

[SilkLabrador]

Do you let your children have artificial sweeteners? Since the sugar tax was introduced it's hard to find awash without them so we have cordial or diluted fruit juice.

I'm by no way strict about what they eat but for some reason I struggle to allow them drinks with artificial sweeteners.

Am I basing this on fact or am I just being silly?

I try very hard to avoid them if at all possible but I won’t police what they are drinking/eating at parties or other peoples house etc.
At home we drink water, milk or fruit juice (with fizzy water for a treat 😀).
Sometimes in their water bottles I add lemon juice and frozen raspberries or strawberries and ice cubes. Makes a pretty great healthy low sugar drink.

I'm fairly strict about highly processed food, but if they have squash or fizzy drinks it's always the sugar free stuff.

I’m not a fan. I try to avoid them but if they turn up in a meal deal and there’s no alternative I tolerate it since it’s not often.
DD (6) gets high juice squash with sparkling water for a treat or one of the other cordials with full sugar. But day to day it’s water or milk only

Yes. We use artificial sweeteners. Doctor's orders. Seriously don't think he would have told us to if they were harmful.

No. Sugar is fine in moderation. Chemical junk is not.

Two of my migraine triggers also happen to be artificial sweeteners so I am especially skeptical of the entire class of products.

Oh and just for the record: No we do not use artificial sweeteners due to obesity, overweight, or anything like that. Just to inform you before someone "woke" jumps on my throat and demands that my skinny children lose weight.

Our regular drinks are water or plain tea. None of us enjoy drinking milk. Dd has been obsessed with tea since she was about 3 so I stock a lot of herbal and decaffeinated choices.

Yep, everything is sugsr free here - we don't buy full sugar drinks, why would you???

Yes, dilute squash. That's all

No because he developed stomach problems. We avoid anything with sucralose etc in now. Luckily he doesn't like 'pop' anyway. Full fat only in our house. Took a year to get him right. It was the Virgin v flavoured water from the school vending machine that did it.

This is what we try to avoid

sucralose
saccharine
neotame
advantame
acesulfame potassium-k.
Aspartame

No.

I’d rather sugar and full fat all the way rather than artificial crap.

They only drink milk or water mainly anyway.

I avoid them mainly because they taste so evil to me!! Just wrong. My body says they are bad - maybe I react to them more than some. For my kids, if they get a fruit shoot at a party they have quickly wet themselves. It has happened with squash too but I think fruit shoots are to be avoided as much as possible, maybe the levels are higher. I give them diluted fruit juice if I want them to drink more and they’re being moany about water.

I buy full squash, always have.
My kids don’t drink a lot of it, and when they do it’s with a meal.

No - all artificial sweeteners were and still are banned. I will always but the full sugar versions.

Luckily I can afford to as the only brands that haven't caved to the sugar tax were expensive already. The tax makes very little difference to the overall cost at that price point.

I do miss Dr Pepper though ....

@MrsJBaptiste

Yep, everything is sugsr free here - we don't buy full sugar drinks, why would you???

Because they taste nasty?

I can taste artificial sweeteners and find then deeply unpleasant.

Yes i do. I think all the hooha about sweeteners is ridiculous. Especially if as an alternative you want to give other sugary cordials

No sweeteners don't even taste nice.

I let my children have some very very weak normal (containing sugar) squash, but only one drink per day. I don't forbid anything completely.

my kids, if they get a fruit shoot at a party they have quickly wet themselves

This. I find artificial sweeteners make my children struggle to hold a wee and wet the bed more.

Depends on the age. I think DD was 9 or so when we finally allowed diet coke. I think that's the only drink with sweetener she has but with 14 there is obviously a certain not-knowing when she is out and about.

She had milk, water and diluted pure juice with the odd Sprite or Fanta thrown in on holidays or when we were eating out when she got older.

She knows about the side effects of artificial sweetener, they covered it in science.

No. They only drink water anyway. Orange juice for weekday breakfasts. They're teens.

Full sugar coke on high days and holidays.

Never. Water, milk and occasionally juice when at a restaurant