Diet Coke Strikes Back

After I broke the habit of Diet Coke I started to have a coffee in the morning and a coffee or tea in the afternoon and my main soft drink was sparkling mineral water. 

After a while this started to become a tad boring so I decided to look for a non cola caffeine free soda to have....the slippery slope had begun!!

Fruit "Zero" sodas have a fairly high calorie count of around 10 calories per 500ml so I didn't feel very happy about having those as a 500ml Diet Coke has just 2 calories; so began my new reading of labels in supermarkets quest. 

After some consideration I opted for Tesco Firey No Added Sugar Gingerbeer which weighed in at 1 calories per 330ml can and off I went. 

After drinking this for a few weeks my mind said to me "hey what's the problem, just have a can of Diet Coke a day", I duly complied and after only a few days this can became, two, became three, became four 500ml bottles....you get the picture, it was a Diet Coke relapse!

Lucky I've realised this in time and stopped again and as soon as the Gingerbeer is finished at home that will be cut out too, I'm considering adding fruit juice to my sparkling mineral water like you would with squash for a bit of variation. 

This little experience got me thinking firstly about Diet Coke and then Diet sodas in general and what exactly is so addictive about them, it can't be just caffeine as I found caffeine free Diet Coke just as addictive and also had problems with the Gingerbeer. 

So I did a bit of digging and found that it's an interesting combination of the caffeine, fake sugar and psychological addiction caused by the rituals and habits around drinking diet sodas. 

I can highly recommend reading this interesting CNN article on the subject:

http://edition.cnn.com/2011/HEALTH/03/01/diet.soda.health/