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Diet Sodas Stop Weight Loss!

By Mario Hostios

On July 23rd 2007, a story broke in the news of a study conducted by the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute and headed by Dr. Ramachandran S. Vasan (yeah I know…who?) of Boston University School of Medicine that suggests that drinking a single can of soda each day can increase your risk of “metabolic syndrome” (before I blast them I have to give them credit; they are finally starting to understand it’s all about metabolism). What is metabolic syndrome?

Basically, it means you get fat, your blood pressure goes up, type 2 diabetes sets in, and your risk of heart disease goes up. In response to the results, Dr. Meir Stampfer of Harvard Med School commented that “he was surprised by the magnitude of the association” of soda consumption to metabolic syndrome.

Susan Neely, president of the American Beverage Association stated “the assertions defy the existing body of scientific evidence…”blah blah blah. I am not here to quote her whole speech, you can find the link on my website if you want to ready the whole thing. Here is the bottom-line:

Are you kidding me? Have we become this dimwitted? When did we surrender our common sense, our observing eye, and our personal power to people with lab coats?

Drinking sodas might affect health? MIGHT? Why is anyone even waiting for science to chemically confirm what is obvious to the naked eye? YES, YES, drinking soda on a regular basis is an extremely bad habit! With all apologies to Coca Cola and Pepsi, because this is not an indictment of the soda business, all soda, diet or regular, tends to imbalance metabolism in at least three ways:

1. The sugar rush and crash leads to becoming fat and diabetic. Apparently, in at least some cases, even diet sodas create a similar insulin response despite the fact that it doesn’t contain real sugar.

2. Sodas tend to be highly acidic. High acidity in the body is well known to cause a domino effect of health problems in the alternative medicine model. Conventional health care i.e. disease and trauma care, continues to ignore this.

3. These things are carbonated. That fizz you love if C02, a metabolic waste product you exhale. Why are we consuming something that our bodies recognize as waste? Excessive waste in the body stops weight loss, because the body is more concerned with trying to dump the waste before it is concerned with burning fat.

Sodas have no place in a fitness lifestyle program. Sodas belong in your liquor cabinet, and should be consumed with the same moderation. Soda abuse in the long term can be as bad as alcohol abuse. Some people may disagree with me and insist on drinking their soda and to them I say, “Have a Coke and a smile…by the way good luck and I hope I am wrong.” But me, no way am I drinking that stuff. The human body is designed to drink water, not coke, not Pepsi, not coffee. Listen to me one last time. Soda is a silent killer; you can’t drink this stuff all the time and not have it affect you.

Now I am not suggesting that Coke or Pepsi should go out of business. Quite the contrary, they employ lots of people, and have contributed lots to society as companies. Just buy their water instead. “Metabolic syndrome” is not the soda industry’s fault anymore than McDonald’s should be held guilty of American obesity. It is our responsibility, we vote with our dollar every day and with our ballot only every couple years, and we have gotten what we said yes to.

Stop saying yes to soda and start saying yes to water. Some people feel that buying water is nuts because it is free form the tap. Wrong. Throughout history clean fresh water has been something people had to search for, pay for, even fight for. So buy their water. Maybe in 20 years Coca Cola and Pepsi will be selling health beverages, but really that will only happen if their customers begin to buy those products.

Don’t drink soda! If you do drink soda, then only do it once in a while. Never buy it at the supermarket, why do you need a case of that stuff in your fridge? Don’t buy the big drink at the fast food place. Or, you can have a coke and smile. Hey, it took years for science to concede that smoking is bad for you too.

Best,
Mario

About the Author:

Mario Hostios is a certified personal trainer in Los Angeles, Ca. To get more Mario, free ebooks, and audio, go to www.livefitla.com.