Aspartame (the debate)

I wrote an article at the beginning of the year titled Dieting Disasters.

In one section, I briefly mentioned that I feel people need to ditch the calorie containing beverages and focus more on drinking water. I basically went on a rant where I suggest that people should look into using Crystal Light or generic versions as a means to get more water in everyday. I rationalized my thoughts on the matter by saying that as long as one is dialed in with their diet and training consistently, a little artificial sweetener won't matter all that much.

In the discussions following the article, one person made a VERY important post, which perked my interest and I want to share it with you here in case no one had an opportunity to read it:

"Just like alcohol, even in small quantities aspertame causes the formation of ethyl alcohols in your body. Not to mention the ingestion of the fromaldahydes in the sodas that have become to warm during storage, as aspertame breaks down with heat, the formaldehydes increase the ethyl alcohol build up in the body above what normal (or aspertame that has not broken down) does.

After you ingest aspertame the liver has to go to work processing the toxins and alcohols out of your body, which just like consumption of grain alcohols causes your liver to stop processing fats, (as well as all the numerous other functions the liver is responsible for), while it is processing out the toxins and alcohol from the aspertame.

This only addresses the fat loss effects of aspertame, and does not go into near the list of other effects it has on the human body, which include brain tumors, spinal lessions, thyroid problems (graves disease), and more. It is a excito-neurotoxin which means that it reacts with and heightens the effects of any other drug in the body. Go do a search on Google or any other search engine and read about it, the stuff should not be on the market. My advice is any aspertame is too much, and as such I personally do not agree with Tony on the point of a little is OK.

But that is my personal opinion!

My personal advice on water is stop being a pansy, and drink it straight!!! It's just not that bad!

EDIT: to add....Did you also know that if you have an ant problem just sprinkle some nutrasweet in thier path and let them take it home, and NO MORE ANTS!!!

Not something I would be recommending!!"


Needless to say, Dave makes a lot of great points and I have to say that it definitely has me thinking twice whether or not aspartame is a good idea in the grand scheme of things.

Then my friend Carl Valle pointed me out to this website which talks about many of the myths pertaining to aspartame: Aspartame Information Center

I think the above website is a great resource which goes into great detail debunking many of the "myths." But I do have to question the efficacy of a website titled aspartame.org. Of course they're going to defend aspartame, right?

I just think this is a debate where the pendulum is either too far to the left or too far to the right. On one end, I see the studies which showcase that aspartame is worse than having repeated bouts of gonorrhea in the mouth. However, those same studies use dosages that no normal human being would ever use. On the other end, you have aspartame.org debunking every myth out there, and they do a darn good job in doing so.

In the end, I can see both sides of the debate, so I leave it up to you to make your own decision. Personally, I still do use Crystal Light to a degree (although I have drastically cut down my consumption) and I have changed my recommendations and just prefer that people use lemon or orange slices to add to their water.