<story><title>Artificial Sweeteners May Change Our Gut Bacteria in Dangerous Ways</title><url>http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/artificial-sweeteners-may-change-our-gut-bacteria-in-dangerous-ways/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>beat</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m currently trying to kick a Diet Coke habit (my equivalent of smoking), which I think is contributing to several health problems, not the least of which is carrying about 40 pounds more than I should around.&lt;p&gt;Part of it, which isn&amp;#x27;t covered by these studies, is how a reliance on diet soda affects your diet overall. It serves as a lubricant, for lack of a better word, for dense starchy carbs and salt. I can wolf down french fries with diet soda, but it&amp;#x27;s a lot harder with just water, which doesn&amp;#x27;t cut the salt or grease.&lt;p&gt;My real warning to cut back came from my mouth. I have an autoimmune problem that causes sores similar to cold sores. My salty, sour, spicy diet aggravates it, and the diet soda enables that diet (and is itself acidic). I&amp;#x27;m tired of pain, so I&amp;#x27;m cutting back.&lt;p&gt;Lost five pounds in an instant.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>jheriko</author><text>Well done for cutting something out and losing weight to try and improve your health, this is an admirable goal.&lt;p&gt;However, from your tone I would hazard a guess that the problem is not your diet coke so much as your desire to consume so much that you are choosing diet coke as an optimal lubricant to enable that.&lt;p&gt;You can&amp;#x27;t compare a habit like this to smoking imo, which is chemically addictive with a reasonably well understood chemical pathway and requires considerable willpower to stop due to physiological withdrawal symptoms as well as the psychological aspects of addiction.&lt;p&gt;Maybe you have some underlying problem which is causing your behaviour, because most people do not require very much willpower to not eat when it is uncomfortable to do so without &amp;#x27;lubricating it&amp;#x27; optimally with some specific drink. Or maybe I am just misunderstanding and overreacting based on how shocking I find your comment...</text></comment>
<story><title>Artificial Sweeteners May Change Our Gut Bacteria in Dangerous Ways</title><url>http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/artificial-sweeteners-may-change-our-gut-bacteria-in-dangerous-ways/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>beat</author><text>I&amp;#x27;m currently trying to kick a Diet Coke habit (my equivalent of smoking), which I think is contributing to several health problems, not the least of which is carrying about 40 pounds more than I should around.&lt;p&gt;Part of it, which isn&amp;#x27;t covered by these studies, is how a reliance on diet soda affects your diet overall. It serves as a lubricant, for lack of a better word, for dense starchy carbs and salt. I can wolf down french fries with diet soda, but it&amp;#x27;s a lot harder with just water, which doesn&amp;#x27;t cut the salt or grease.&lt;p&gt;My real warning to cut back came from my mouth. I have an autoimmune problem that causes sores similar to cold sores. My salty, sour, spicy diet aggravates it, and the diet soda enables that diet (and is itself acidic). I&amp;#x27;m tired of pain, so I&amp;#x27;m cutting back.&lt;p&gt;Lost five pounds in an instant.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>snarfy</author><text>I believe it&amp;#x27;s the carbonated water that cuts the salt and grease.  I used to drink a lot of soda and switched to carbonated water so I understand what you mean by lubricant.&lt;p&gt;My wife has a similar autoimmune problem.  She also drinks 4-5 diet cokes a day.  I wonder if there is a connection.  There are flora in your mouth too.</text></comment>