Something for me to keep an eye on - reactions to fake sugars

So, I'm trying to give up sodas. My reasoning, somewhat, is that they aren't healthy for me. Another part, is that I belong to a community that seems to frown upon soda consumption. Every time I drink a diet soda, I notice weird glances like, "you still drink that poison?" It's probably mostly in my head, but, I think I'm beginning to feel this crutch needs to go.

Now, another reason, is that I use Soda stream for making my sodas and it seems that the grocery store I frequent is starting to phase these out which means I would have to make a special trip to buy the syrups and carbonators and that just isn't going to happen. So, I need to get over my soda addiction.

This past week I haven't had a diet soda. BUT, I've had diet green tea. I'm having a hard time giving up the artificial sweetener - not the soda and I think I might know why and that is a bit troublesome. No conclusions yet, but I will experiment a bit.

The past and now, to keep me from feeling hungry I would drink a diet soda or diet green tea (Arizona brand). That would stop the hunger and help me keep from eating a bit longer. Good right?

Well, what if why it's keeping me from feeling hungry is that my body is interpreting the artificial sweetener as 'food' and thus releasing insulin. Is that insulin response what's making me feel less hungry in the moment? But overall making me more hungrier as I don't get the food it thinks I ate? I'm not sure! All I know is that drinking sparkling water or unsweetened iced tea does NOT help with keeping the hunger at bay. I just stay hungry feeling - and craving something sweet. My body is acting like, "where's the sweet thing?"

I do know, as I detailed in another post that I must not have a horrible response to artificial sweeteners as my blood sugars regulated, but maybe it does have an effect, but not a HUGE one - or huge enough one to give me diabetes.

What it really means to is that I need to give up artificial sweeteners - which I can do in almost everything except the protein bar I eat. I'll just to be of the mindset of getting rid of "most of it" is good enough.

More on gut bacteria with a new study

On a forum and my Facebook feed I'm seeing this pop up: Diet Soda May Alter Our Gut Microbes And Raise The Risk Of Diabetes.  And my husband just mentioned it while we were on vacation.

Basically: people, we are learning a lot about our gut microbes. We don't know all the answers yet, but we are beginning to learn that it's an additional digestive organ, not just "critters" who live in our gut.

But for me, I think I can safely say that I am not sensitive to artificial sweeteners. It does not raise my blood sugar levels like it does, in what appears to be 50% of people.

How do I know? Well, I had gestational diabetes with my youngest son. I had to test my blood sugars 7-8 times a day. Now, I didn't drink a lot of soda while pregnant, but I did have some and I did check my blood sugar after every, single meal and snack and I learned very quickly what spiked my blood sugar and what didn't. Basically, ANY grain or sugar - no matter the fiber content spiked my sugar levels. Only things that didn't were apples (paired with peanut butter) and potatoes.

Then, 5 years ago when my thyroid was completely out of whack, I had high blood sugars and a high HbA1C (sugar count over a long period in my blood). I was drinking one large soda a day, or adding a bit of Splenda to an iced tea (half a packet in a tall glass of tea). Again, I tested my blood sugars with every meal while I waited for readings to become normalized and again I saw the same triggers and I was not triggered by artificial sweeteners. Also,within three months of eating low carb and getting my thyroid in order, my fasting blood sugars were within normal and my HbA1C was near normal. Within 6 months it was well within middle range of normal.

With that said, I am wanting to wean myself off of diet sodas. Just yesterday I bought a few different brands of sparkling waters. I used to drink these waters instead of sodas, but stopped for some reason. I'm going to try to get back to that. Might be awhile before I stop slightly sweetening my iced tea, but baby steps it is. My protein bar has sucrolose (Splenda). So, I do get it, but I could cut back, but at least I don't appear to have the same problems these people in the studies are showing. Unless, of course, without the diet sodas and other things I would have a super low HbA1C result instead of being middle of normal range.