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.