7 Gross Side Effects of Drinking Diet Soda. Deceivingly "Diet". Does Drinking Diet Soda Make You Fat? Aspartame. Hitler Is Führer. Iraq Invades Kuwait.

 

For “Foodie Friday”:

7 Side Effects of Drinking Diet Soda, Why you need a diet drink detox—stat!

“This August marks the 30th birthday of Diet Coke.  The beverage you probably feel pretty good about drinking—No calories! No sugar!—is anything but good for you. 

Unfortunately, what seems like a healthier habit—hey, it’s not like you’re drinking a can of empty calories, right?—could actually be making you fat. In fact, a University of Minnesota study of almost 10,000 adults found that even just one diet soda a day was linked to a 34% higher risk of metabolic syndrome, a group of symptoms including belly fat and high cholesterol that put you at risk for heart disease.

Is Diet Soda Bad For You?  Read this and come to your own conclusions!

Kidney Problems

Here’s something you didn’t know about your diet soda: It might be bad for your kidneys. In an 11-year-long Harvard Medical School study of more than 3,000 women, researchers found that diet cola is associated with a two-fold increased risk for kidney decline. Kidney function started declining when women drank more than two sodas a day. Even more interesting: Since kidney decline was not associated with sugar-sweetened sodas, researchers suspect that the diet sweeteners are responsible.

Messed-Up Metabolism

According to a 2008 University of Minnesota study of almost 10,000 adults, even just one diet soda a day is linked to a 34% higher risk of metabolic syndrome, the group of symptoms including belly fat and high cholesterol that puts you at risk for heart disease. Whether that link is attributed to an ingredient in diet soda or the drinkers’ eating habits is unclear. But is that one can really worth it?

Obesity

You read that right: Diet soda doesn’t help you lose weight after all. A University of Texas Health Science Center study found that the more diet sodas a person drank, the greater their risk of becoming overweight. Downing just two or more cans a day increased waistlines by 500%. Why? Artificial sweeteners can disrupt the body’s natural ability to regulate calorie intake based on the sweetness of foods, suggested an animal study from Purdue University. That means people who consume diet foods might be more likely to overeat, because your body is being tricked into thinking it’s eating sugar, and you crave more.

Cell Damage

Diet sodas contain something many regular sodas don’t: mold inhibitors. They go by the names sodium benzoate or potassium benzoate, and they’re in nearly all diet sodas. But many regular sodas, such as Coke and Pepsi, don’t contain this preservative.

That’s bad news for diet drinkers. "These chemicals have the ability to cause severe damage to DNA in the mitochondria to the point that they totally inactivate it - they knock it out altogether,” Peter Piper, a professor of molecular biology and biotechnology at the University of Sheffield in the U.K., told a British newspaper in 1999. The preservative has also been linked to hives, asthma, and other allergic conditions, according to the Center for Science in the Public Interest.

Since then, some companies have phased out sodium benzoate. Diet Coke and Diet Pepsi have replaced it with another preservative, potassium benzoate. Both sodium and potassium benzoate were classified by the Food Commission in the UK as mild irritants to the skin, eyes, and mucous membranes.

Rotting Teeth

With a pH of 3.2, diet soda is very acidic. (As a point of reference, the pH of battery acid is 1. Water is 7.) The acid is what readily dissolves enamel, and just because a soda is diet doesn’t make it acid-light. Adults who drink three or more sodas a day have worse dental health, says a University of Michigan analysis of dental checkup data. Soda drinkers had far greater decay, more missing teeth, and more fillings.

Reproductive Issues

Sometimes, the vessel for your beverage is just as harmful. Diet or not, soft drink cans are coated with the endocrine disruptor bisphenol A (BPA), which has been linked to everything from heart disease to obesity to reproductive problems. That’s a lot of risk-taking for one can of pop.”

More at: http://www.prevention.com/food/healthy-eating-tips/health-risks-drinking-diet-soda

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Deceivingly "Diet"

“pH levels are extremely important, and doctors and dietitians have linked having unbalanced pH levels to cancer and other medical problems. Diet soda is extremely acidic, with a pH level of 2.5. Confused at how acidic that is? According to reports, battery acid shows up as a 1 on the pH scale.”

Doctors found the woman had extremely low potassium levels and a heart condition called QT syndrome which can cause erratic heart beats. She had no family history of heart problems.   The woman was told to stop drinking soda for one week—and her symptoms disappeared.

Not so fast. Before you pop the top off the caramel-colored bubbly, know this: guzzling diet soda comes with its own set of side effects that may harm your health—from kick-starting kidney problems to adding inches to your waistline.

Some of the components used to make diet sodas can block certain things your body needs, like magnesium, calcium, along with blocking the excretion of certain hormones.

Diet drinks make you hungry for real food.”

More at: http://www.prevention.com/food/healthy-eating-tips/diet-soda-bad-you#ixzz2aQyEXtly

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Does Drinking Diet Soda Make You Fat?

“When is a diet drink not a diet drink. When it is made with artificial sweeteners.  Dr. Mark Hyman shares exciting new research that sheds light on the stunning link between artificial sweeteners and weight gain.”

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 The Real Facts on Artificial Sweeteners

“Diet sodas can harm the body on many levels. Literally from head to toe. The caffeine can have adverse effects on the brain and nervous system; the acid in them can lead to tooth decay and loss of bone density; and the artificial sweeteners may possibly, well, pre-embalm your organs. Throw in recent research linking caramel coloring used in colas to cancer, and you’ll start to rethink your daily consumption of these drinks. But before you decide anything, let’s take a closer look at just what’s in diet soda, and the research that’s been done surrounding it.

Aspartame, which is the basis for other artificial sweeteners such as NutraSweet and Equal, is used in most diet sodas. The reason being that it provides the sweet flavor you expect from drinks like Coca Cola Classic and Pepsi, without giving you all the calories from the sugar in them. Great, right?

Well, it should be noted that aspartame was denied eight times by the FDA before it was finally approved in 1974, for dry foods only. And even then it wasn’t smooth sailing. New research found adverse effects caused by the sweetener. Neuroscientists warned that it should not be permitted for consumption. But it somehow still made it’s way into products. Finally, in 1996, aspartame was approved for use in food and beverage products, without restriction, despite recognizing that ninety-two different symptoms can arise from ingesting it, including memory loss, nerve cell damage, migraines, reproductive disorders, mental confusion, brain lesions, blindness, joint pain, Alzheimer’s, bloating, nervous system disorders, hair loss, food cravings and weight gain. So many people have been made sick by aspartame that there is even an aspartame victims support group, titled aptly Aspartame Victims Support Group.

One of the components of aspartame is methyl alcohol, which, when digested, is converted into formaldehyde. Formaldehyde is not only used to preserve flesh, as in embalming fluid, it is also a deadly neurotoxin. Second guessing that Diet soda habit yet?

Aspartame also contains the amino acid phenylalanine, which occurs naturally in the brain. But when it exists in high levels, phenylalanine can increase the chance of seizures and lead to depression and schizophrenia.

But let’s not just bash aspartame; let’s look at that other artificial sweetening giant, Splenda. Splenda is created by chlorinating sugar, which changes its molecular structure and forms sucralose. The company claims that Splenda is zero calorie and great for diabetics. Even the FDA calls it 98% pure. But what’s in the remaining 2%? Oh, just some heavy metals, methanol and arsenic. Splendid! As a result, sucralose has be found to cause diarrhea, organ, genetic, immune system, and reproductive damage, swelling of the liver and kidneys, and a decrease in fetal body weight.

Do I really need to say any more? If you want something sweet, do it with natural sugar. And just be responsible with your caloric intake.”  More at: http://dishmag.com/issue120/health/13775/the-secret-dangers-of-diet-soda/

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On This Day:

Hitler becomes Führer, Aug 2, 1934:

“With the death of German President Paul von Hindenburg, Chancellor Adolf Hitler becomes absolute dictator of Germany under the title of Führer, or "Leader." The German army took an oath of allegiance to its new commander-in-chief, and the last remnants of Germany's democratic government were dismantled to make way for Hitler's Third Reich. The Führer assured his people that the Third Reich would last for a thousand years, but Nazi Germany collapsed just 11 years later.

His regime exterminated nearly six millions Jews and an estimated 250,000 Gypsies in the Holocaust, and an indeterminable number of Slavs, political dissidents, disabled persons, homosexuals, and others deemed unacceptable by the Nazi regime were systematically eliminated. The war Hitler unleashed upon Europe took even more lives--close to 20 million people killed in the USSR alone. Adolf Hitler is reviled as one of history's greatest villains.”

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Iraq invades Kuwait, Aug 2, 1990:

“At about 2 a.m. local time, Iraqi forces invade Kuwait, Iraq's tiny, oil-rich neighbor. Kuwait's defense forces were rapidly overwhelmed, and those that were not destroyed retreated to Saudi Arabia. The emir of Kuwait, his family, and other government leaders fled to Saudi Arabia, and within hours Kuwait City had been captured and the Iraqis had established a provincial government. By annexing Kuwait, Iraq gained control of 20 percent of the world's oil reserves and, for the first time, a substantial coastline on the Persian Gulf. The same day, the United Nations Security Council unanimously denounced the invasion and demanded Iraq's immediate withdrawal from Kuwait. On August 6, the Security Council imposed a worldwide ban on trade with Iraq.

On August 9, Operation Desert Shield, the American defense of Saudi Arabia, began as U.S. forces raced to the Persian Gulf. Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, meanwhile, built up his occupying army in Kuwait to about 300,000 troops. On November 29, the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution authorizing the use of force against Iraq if it failed to withdraw by January 15, 1991. Hussein refused to withdraw his forces from Kuwait, which he had established as a province of Iraq, and some 700,000 allied troops, primarily American, gathered in the Middle East to enforce the deadline.

In the Persian Gulf War, 148 American soldiers were killed and 457 wounded. The other allied nations suffered about 100 deaths combined during Operation Desert Storm. There are no official figures for the number of Iraqi casualties, but it is believed that at least 25,000 soldiers were killed and more than 75,000 were wounded, making it one of the most one-sided military conflicts in history. It is estimated that 100,000 Iraqi civilians died from wounds or from lack of adequate water, food, and medical supplies directly attributable to the Persian Gulf War. In the ensuing years, more than one million Iraqi civilians have died as a result of the subsequent U.N. sanctions.”

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Yesterday:

After getting all the usual things done, my main goal was to get some paint mixed up that matches the country blue trim on my house. 

I had some blue paint that I had bought at Walmart, and Ray really liked the way it went on.  As it was not quite the right shade, I was hoping that they could add some grey to it.  But they said I would have to do that myself.  So I picked up a bunch of paint samples so I can really match them to my trim.   I had something to return but the lady wouldn’t let me without the receipt as my drivers license had lost a corner, she said it was ‘altered’, and not legal. 

Renewing my license was on my list anyway, so I went to the DPS.  I have to do it in person as I am a legal resident, but not a US citizen.  The wait wasn’t too long, and now I am ‘legal’ again with a new horrible picture, of course.  I hope I don’t look that bad when the laminated one comes in the mail.  Golly, I am getting old!

St. Marks Thrift Shop is right by the DPS, so I stopped in there, and bought a nice blue and white floral Corelle platter for 50 cents, and a beige sleeveless top. 

At Krogers I did a lot of people-watching.  I see people a lot younger than I am, with their fat legs and butts jiggling, or hobbling and wobbling around, or in electric carts.   Then when you look in their baskets you are amazed at the amount of processed foods that they are buying.  Nearly everyone has internet these days, don’t they see the warnings about consuming that stuff.  “You are what you eat”.  It was the plethora of diet sodas that they are buying that got me fired up to write this today.