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Artificial sweetener

B

Blastedkane

Newbie
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Hi all..

New to the forums and looking for thoughts/references.

What is the consensus regarding artificial sweetener instead of sugars..

I have seen that they can potentially cause other issues and am looking for the best resources. Am just overwhelmed. New diagnosis and a plethora of data to wade through..
 
Depends on which you use and how your body responds to them. Artificial sweeteners are often toxic to gut bacteria, and if those die off you're in a world of hurt, and are looking at potential years of healing. Depending on how much damage is done, of course. I may use a smidge of a stevia/erythritol mix sometimes, (read, once or twice a week) which seems to agree with me, but all diet soda's and the like are out, for me, for life. Things just got too bloody and painful, constipation ruining my intestinal trackt. Stevia doesn't give gut problems, BUT, it might cause some reaction between your pancreas and liver. The mouth and nose register something sweet, and can prompt the pancreas to release insulin pre-emptively.... And then it's not actually needed, so the liver dumps glucose to avoid a hypo. And if we're insulin resistant, that might be a bit of an overshoot of glucose, resulting in a spike. So the sweetener doesn't directly spike your blood glucose, but it does indirectly, if you're one of those where that happens. Your meter'll tell you whether you're okay with it or not, really.

So.... I used to put five spoons of sugar into my espresso. Now I either drink it straight, or with a bit of cream. No sugar in my tea anymore either. Just took a little while to get used to it. Decide what works for you, between your loo visits and your meter.
 

There was a meta analysis of studies on this published recently. You need a subscription for the full paper here: https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article-abstract/112/4/1002/5872362 but Ted Naiman kindly posted a screenshot of the main findings on Twitter

 
 
I don't think there is a consensus as such. I am currently using artificial sweeteners but I am planning of reducing them with the aim of getting rid of them completely. I currently have a bit of diet jelly most days. I was also eating some chocolate available in Australia with very low arbs but using artificial sweeteners- that has helped me since diagnosis. I am slowly having lower amounts - I've substituted cream with some peanut butter for the chocolate and that is woking for me. Next step- next year is giving up the diet jelly. I currently have diet drinks for mixers but will work on that next. It has to be sustainable and my mental health meant I couldn't have done this a year ago. I really grieved for sweet tasting things and artificial sweeteners really helped my mental health- well that and the amazing g support here.

I think you need to find what works for you- for me artificial sweeteners really helped but I hope that in the next......years that will be in the past.

Good luck.
 

I sometimes make my own jelly, using a flavoured tea bag for taste and beef gelatin with the hot and cold water mix. I do use some stevia in it. It's not bad I found.... or I just add beef gelatin to hot tea if I don't want to wait for jelly to set....lol
 
What a great idea!
 
Erythritol seems to be quite harmless at least for me... I must admit not having any added sugar in my food for past 10 years i may not be able to give exact comparison but what I do know is using this in cakes or even in tea and coffee recently when I started monitoring my BG using CGM i have not found it to be causing any rise in my BG levels... also using it I have not had any tummy problems so if you do want to have something sweet I think its worth a shot.
 
Hi,

Since being diabetic changing from sugar to a sweetener is the only thing I’ve managed to stick to, I use Sweetex.
 
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