Diet drinks

[Beancounter298]

I've just been diagnosed T2, I don't drink alcohol but do drink flavoured sparkling water up to one litre a day

They are low calorie but contain sweeteners - can anyone advise whether I need to cut these out, or the thinking about sweeteners in general?

Thanks

 

[Sally71]

Sweeteners should be fine in small amounts. Be aware that if you consume them in large amounts they tend to have a laxative effect. As to whether they are bad for you in other ways, I don’t know. I drink far too much Diet Coke and I’m still here…

 

[RBZ5416]

A part of your new T2 life will be scrutinising the labels on food products for the carb content. You need to be looking at total carbs & not sugars. I would expect your water to be as near to zero carbs as makes no difference, but the label will tell you.

 

[Docb]

Can I suggest that you read around the forum and check out the learning zone on the red tab above? As somebody who is newly diagnosed I think it more sensible to look at the bigger picture if you are looking to control your diabetes by diet. You will soon begin to work out that the key is carbohydrate intake and in the overall scheme of things the carbohydrate content in a drink sweetened by artificial sweeteners rather than sugar is not an important contributor. In very simple terms, if you ate a thick crust pizza it really would not matter what you drank with it, any carbohydrate from the drink would be swamped by that in the pizza!

If you are going to go down the diet controlled route, as many of us do with great success, then it is worth starting with the HbA1c result that led to your diagnosis. That will tell you how big is the hill you have to climb. Wanting to loose a bit of weight if you have to is another factor to take into account.

My two top tips are, one, take a bit of time to work out what diabetes is all about and where you fit into the wide spectrum of people with diabetes and two, take the long term view, diabetes is perfectly manageable but getting things sorted is a marathon not a sprint.

 

[eggyg]

Sweeteners should be fine in small amounts. Be aware that if you consume them in large amounts they tend to have a laxative effect. As to whether they are bad for you in other ways, I don’t know. I drink far too much Diet Coke and I’m still here…

I’m a total Diet Coke addict, but in my defence I don’t drink coffee which seems to be a more acceptable addiction which baffles me. It doesn’t affect my BGs at all, goodness knows what it does to my innards though!

 

[Martin.A]

Coke Zero is my soft drink of choice, decaf coffee and strong tea my hot drinks. I also have a large glass of water with my evening meal (it used to be milk, but that's a dim & distant memory now).

 

[snowball12]

Soda water, tea and when out and about Coke Zero

 

[Leadinglights]

I have the flavoured sparling water, diet coke and have not had any problem. I do find some drinks with sweeteners have an unpleasant aftertaste like cheap lemonade so avoid them usually if it has saccharin in.

 

[nonethewiser]

Drank diet drinks since day one 41 years ago, like Asda's no added sugar Orange & Mango squash & another who likes Diet Coke.

 

[Sarahp]

I loved flavoured water but find they make me crave sugar, I have a terrible sweet tooth following artificial sweeteners, sends me into cravings. My dietitian class at weight management told us to stay away from them as well due to similar reasoning but you need to figure out what works for you!