This thing about your body treating sweeteners the same as sugar - any evidence for this?

[PassTheTwiglets]

I've heard this a few times but is there any scientific evidence for this, does anybody know? Obviously diet drinks aren't healthy but I can't bear the thought that they may be adding to my weight problem as well! Surely it's not true.... is it?

I've not heard that ever, and really don't see how it can be true. Sugars are carbohydrates which are broken down and stored as glycogen in the muscles and liver and used for energy. Sweeteners aren't formed of anything useable in the energy cycle so can't possibly be treated in the same way as sugar. They don't contain the right molecules to be broken down to cause energy.

They can, however, cause water retention so aren't necessarily the best thing for weightloss but they won't cause you to gain fat.

I can't see how it can be true either but I've heard/read it a lot. Of course I can't find a single link now though :)

www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1711763,00.htm

I've keep reading about this as well . Sugar and all it's imitators seem to be the new enemy .

Was it something presented in diet literature or something a personal trainer said (disclaimer, I did a PT course and was horrified at the lack of knowledge required to pass)?

I still can't see how it is true, unless the reasoning is that the sweetener is treated in the same way as the same amount of sugar - eg you have 1g of sweetener for the same effect as 20g of sugar (made up comparison) and therefore your body treats it as it would 1g of sugar.

Am clutching at straws here - I guess my main reason for being sceptical is that I drank a lot of diet coke and was skinny. It's only when I replaced it with wine that I started to pork out...

I think it affects your blood sugar in the same way as sugar, so if you're avoiding sugar to keep energy levels stable - as I am - diet drinks are a bad plan. Watching with interest as not totally sure.

It was something to do with the body recognising a sweet taste and producing extra insulin (though not sure how that affects fat-burning - I had gestational diabetes but know so little about how sugar is processed!)

cremeeggs (love your name!) it wasn't from one camp or the other, I just heard people say "oh, of coruse you know that..." etc. and there is another thread here where it's mentioned.

goodegg, I can't see how it can affect your blood sugar..... this is what puzzles me!

I wasn't criticising, Twiglets, just trying to understand, and with my limited knowledge it's probably not going to happen.

I thought insulin was released when your blood sugar increased, not when your body recognises a taste, which surely can only happen once the sugars you have ingested have been metabolised - I don't know at what point it spikes.

It may just be an extrapolation of carbs are the energy, sugar is the energy, what's next? Oh yeah, sweeteners must be bad.

I think that going back to your original query though, the odd diet coke won't sabotage your diet too much. I managed to sabotage mine today with a big lump of cheese which surely will do more harm to my hips (and arteries) than a diet soda

No worries, cremeeggs, I know you weren't criticizing! The odd Diet Coke is fine, but what about 4 a day? Addict? Moi?

One thing I read said that it may be a psychological thing - your body tastes something sweet and expects a lot of calories which it doesn't then get - therby giving you a craving for said calories. Reading a bit more, I think there was a proper study done which said that you are far more likely to be overweight if you drink diet drinks but the results said that this of course didn't mean that it was the drink that was making you overweight, just that there was some common link between drinking it and being overweight.

I read - probably on here - that the body detects the sweetness, thinks it's sugar, and produces insulin. You then get low blood sugar which makes you crave something sweet to eat.

This is supposed to be the explanation for the phenomenon that some people who drink a lot of Diet Coke can lose loads of weight by stopping drinking it and doing nothing else consciously diety.

I personally think its bullshit - certainly that it doesn't impact weightloss, anyway. There may be a tiny physical response but calories in, calories out prevails in my opinion.

Sure, some people may find that they make them hungrier - others will find they are enough of a filler or prop that it keeps them on the straight and narrow.

The only exception you might find is in low carb ketogenic dieting (where you are in benign dietary ketosis) - Atkins, Lighterlife, Cambridge, etc - and its not the sweetner, but the citric acid. Citric acid can interfere with the body's Krebs Cycle, which is complicated but relevant if you are on a ketogenic diet. Diets like Cambridge and Ligherlife dont allow diet drink anyway for this reason, but I dont think Atkins mentions it, but he possibly should. Its not the sweetner though, its the citric acid, and that is the same for water with a slice of lemon in it too.

If you are low carbing and in ketosis but ravenously hungry, which you shouldn't be in ketosis, quit all citric acid and you should notice a big improvement.

Calories in, calories out is what I've always thought too, Tatty. Another thing I thought of today - if it were true then we'd probably have heard about it from diabetics who obviously can't afford to have their bodies treat them both the same way!

But the insulin production theory is just that the un-needed insulin in your body, produced by the body thinking "Oh! Sweet taste! Me make insulin to deal with this sugar that's just been drunk," makes you eat more calories to deal with the low blood sugar you have been left with.

Diabetics already monitor their blood sugar and adjust their eating/medication accordingly.

I also thought the weight loss when giving up thing only applied to people who drink litres of the stuff a day.

DP is diabetics and has never been warned off diet drinks because they will impact his blood sugar levels, in fact he was told to switch to diet drinks, sugar free squash etc. I think if the dieticians had been concerned/believed it would impact his insulin response they would have told him water only.

BalloonSlayer not all diabetics monitor their blood sugar as closely as that and adjust their insulin dose. It is only if they inject insulin they need to do this (so type 1 where they don't produce their own insulin or type 2 where attempting to control with diet and oral meds hasn't worked). But all diabetics need to pay attention to diet so I think as the dieticians don't tell you diet drinks will impact your blood sugar levels it can't be accepted medically as proven.

Oh I know it's not medically proven, Claire, it's just one theory of many.

From time to time you will hear of someone - there was a thread on here recently - who used to drink a large amount of Diet Coke a day, say 6-8 cans, giving it up because they feel they are addicted then hey presto! they lose about 10 lbs without even trying. So perhaps if it is true, it only applies when you drink a LOT.

It may be something as prosaic as they are now no longer filling their stomach to such a volume and it shrinks and they eat less.