No Artificial Sweeteners, Please

Taking the No-Grain Diet means having to eliminate artificial sweeteners from your system, and top health expert Dr. Joseph Mercola says that getting rid of these sweet, “healthy” messiahs in colorful packets will definitely work in your favor.

Backed by cunning marketing minds, these artificial sweeteners entered public consciousness with claims of being a healthy, no-calorie substitute for sugar, a helpful aid for diabetics, and, on the surface, a good additive for anyone on a weight-loss program like the No-Grain Diet. The buying public has been smitten, and remains so through the years.

Splenda, for instance, was warmly received and quickly stole the limelight from then-dominant artificial sweetener brands like the aspartame-based Equal and the saccharin-based Sweet ’N Low. The brand name for sugar-derivative sucralose, Splenda surpassed Equal’s dollar-market share in January 2003, with the percentage of US households using its products rising from 3 to 20 percent between 2000-2004.

The Real Score on Artificial Sweeteners
Not unlike other artificial sweeteners in the market today, Splenda banks on its “healthfulness” and support of weight control. The important tales on its safety and real health value, however, are yet to be fully told.

Converted from cane sugar to a no-calorie sweetener, Splenda (with its marketing call “Made from sugar so it tastes like sugar”) has the ability not to be recognized by the body as sugar, and is therefore not metabolized. While derived from sugar, it has an entirely different chemical structure, one that is more similar to the fat-soluble substance DDT. Sucralose itself is a synthetic chemical.

Its makers McNeil Nutritionals haven’t also fully established long-term safety, given that there have been only six human trials to date, the longest lasting for three months. Dr. Mercola asserts that what the public doesn’t know is that most of the over 100 studies they claim to have been done on Splenda are mostly on animals.

Dr. Mercola also refutes claims that these artificial sweeteners – aspartame on your diet soda, for instance – contribute significantly to weight loss. Why take it, he asks, if it will increase your appetite and worsen your cravings?

He says that even while aspartame and other artificial sweeteners can truly contribute to dieting, will they be worth risking your health? Mercola adds that there are more adverse reactions to NutraSweet, for example, that are reported to the FDA than all other food and additives combined.

The No-Grain, No-Artificial Sweetener Way
Committing yourself to a grain-free diet means eliminating ALL artificial sweeteners from your meals.

Dr. Mercola, however, also doesn’t recommend natural sweeteners in the No-Grain Diet. Even the natural ones such as corn syrup, fructose, sucrose, and molasses, as soon as they hit your palate, make you respond and succumb to the addictive cravings again. The reaction, he says, could be likened to Pavlovian dogs, which salivate at the ringing of a bell because they have associated it with food.

You can start tasting them again when sustaining the No-Grain Diet, but only in minimal amounts so as not to stimulate an insulin surge. Of all the sweeteners, raw honey is most accepted by Dr. Mercola because of its live enzymes aiding your body to digest it.

He adds that you can take the No-Grain Diet as an opportunity to explore spices and fresh organic food, which will sustain you well on your way to optimal health.

The trick, after all, is always going after natural, not the artificial goods that promise you all kinds of sweet encounters.

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