By now most folks who have visited my site have realized that I had a huge addiction to Diet Coke and struggled with quitting for so long, but could never do it because the withdrawal symptoms were just too much to take and I always ended up drinking it again. The real sad part to my story is, every time I tried to quit and couldn’t do it, the more addicted I became. If you haven’t read my whole story, stop and read through the pages on the left side navigation bar and then come back to this post and I will share more information about the addiction to aspartame and the withdrawal symptoms that most experience when they try to quit.
If you read my entire story then you know that I am going to start with the punch line first in this post. When I finally quit drinking Diet Coke almost 4 weeks ago, I experienced NO WITHDRAWAL SYMPTOMS at all!! The catch is, this time was different from all the other times that I tried to quit and experienced a ton of withdrawal symptoms that always brought me back to drinking it.
The first time I tried to quit drinking Diet Coke, was about two years ago. At that time, my side effects were just starting to arise. For the first time ever, I experienced a migraine. For those folks who have had migraines, you know what I am talking about, migraines are different from a regular headache. In fact, I went to a neurosurgeon, who did all the scans and didn’t find anything and then prescribed Imitrex. The medication was great, it usually took care of the migraine with one dose, but a year later, one pill just wouldn’t do it. This past year, the migraines became more frequent and typically when one set in, one Imitrex was not enough to knock it out. I remember times when a migraine would set it and it got so bad I had to go home early from work, would usually down a can of diet coke, take a couple Imitrex, put a hot towel over my face and crawl into my bed to try and sleep it off. This is not how a young, active 40 year old wanted to live his life.
Shortly after the migraines and headaches began, I started to notice problems in both my knees. I would wake up in the morning and feel pain in my knees that made it hard to just stand up at times. The joint pain would come and go, but most of this last year, it increasingly became worse. One of my hobbies is go-karting. I race at two local tracks, travel to other tracks around Iowa and race at the countries largest street race, the Rock Island Grand Prix. When you are at the track your go-kart sits on a stand and when you are ready to go out to race you and your pit person have to lift it off the stand onto the ground. My knees pain was so bad at times, I could no longer put the weight on my knees to lift my own kart off its stand. Realize, I am a pretty healthy individual, very active and to have this kind of problem effect my life this way, was not how I wanted to live.
Near the beginning of 2008 I went to my doctor one day and asked him about all the problems I was having. After talking, my addiction to Diet Coke came up. As I shared in my story, my doctor was not too happy to find out how much I was drinking daily and for how long I had been doing this. He didn’t come out and say, Mike, the Diet Coke is causing your problems, but I could tell in voice that he knew my addiction could be the cause. Of course, me being naive, I couldn’t see how a soda could cause that many side effects, but at that time, I had no clue what Aspartame was or the effects it could have on the body. I continued to drink my normal 7-8 cans plus a day and kind of just wrote off what my doctor seemed to urge me to do, it just didn’t seem to make sense to me at that time.
Well, here is the final punch line and how my Diet Coke addiction ended, or new chapter in my life began, however you want to look at it. As I share in my story, a very good friend of mine came to my office one day and wanted to share a product with me that he had been trying, he thought I might like it, knew I had a pretty stressful job and thought I might like some extra energy. He gave me a couple samples and said drink one in the morning and one later in the afternoon and see what you think. I won’t share the ending here, you can read it on my Diet Coke Addiction Busted!! page, but what I want to get across to all of the people who struggle with the same type of side effects and symptoms associated with Aspartame and other artificial sweeteners, is that with the help of a healthy replacement, I was able to break my addiction in 5 DAYS, and not experience one withdrawal symptom at all. NONE. I know that there are people who can ween themselves off, or stop cold turkey but can everyone, I couldn’t. The truth is there are many people who can’t because the addiction is too strong and the side effects are too much to handle.
I know that the side effects of artificial sweeteners is real, I experienced them. To this date, nearly 5 weeks after my last Diet Coke, every side effect that I shared above or on my other posts has gone. I have not had one headache, not one migraine, no more joint pain, and finally I feel like a healthy 40 year old should. If you haven’t checked out Drink ACT, then do it. Maybe you don’t have a diet drink addiction, maybe it’s coffee, tea, un-healthy energy drinks or your third run to Starbucks for a double late espresso. Whatever the addiction, I recommend you take the ACT three day challenge.
If you are ready to break that diet drink addiction, give Drink ACT a try, I think you will start to see a much healthier life begin to form!! Email me, wittmc@msn.com if you have any questions, I’d be glad to help out.
Thanks again to all those that have visited my site, read my story and give Drink ACT a shot. Watch for a new page coming soon with all the testimonials of people who have had great results with ACT.
Mike Witt
Davenport, Iowa
13 responses so far ↓
1 manon doyle // May 11, 2008 at 1:51 pm
Hey Mike,
Thanks for leaving a comment on my blog. I’m a very healthy person and I felt the aspartame was extremely unhealthy for me. I think I really liked the cold fizzy pop. I’m now drinking unsweetened iced green tea. Much better for me.
I appreciate your encouragement.
-manon
2 wittmc // May 11, 2008 at 8:59 pm
Hi Manon,
You are more than welcome, I am glad to hear that you have realized the dangers of diet soda and have kicked the habit. Your body thank you in the long run.
Thanks,
Mike Witt
3 Carlene // May 13, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Hi, I have been doing research on Aspartame and came across this site. I have been drinking it for probably 10 years now in my iced coffees that I get everyday. I am now shaking, depressed, moody, and feel like my mind is going crazy and dizzy like an off equilibruim. I am not going to drink or eat anything with aspartame in it, do u think I will go back to normal? I am 30 years old and feel like I am getting ms or parkinsons or something. I went to the Dr. last week and all my blood tests were normal but now that I have found all this info on aspartame I feel like I have done irreversable damage to my body. Does it really take 60 days to detox it out of your system? Please help! Thanx,
Carlene
4 wittmc // May 13, 2008 at 5:47 pm
Hi Carlene,
Thank you for the comment and information. I am not a doctor but I can bet that some of what you experience might be from the aspartame and or caffeine or both. As far a detoxing, everyone is a little different, but I have read the same things that you have, and for some it can take a couple months, but usually after stopping the intake people start to feel better everyday. The challenge is making it through the withdrawal symptoms and trying to replace your habit with something more healthy. If I can kick my Diet Coke habit, I know you can kick yours as well.
Thanks,Mike
5 Amy // Jul 2, 2008 at 11:32 am
what about splenda (sucralose)
6 wittmc // Jul 2, 2008 at 2:22 pm
Hi Amy,
Thank you for the comment and question. In doing a little research, Splenda or sucralose is a better alternative than drinks with Aspertame, but overall, from what I read, that same type of side effects found with Aspertame are also found with most other artificial sweeteners, but not quite at the same level and some depends on the person and how much they absorb. The best alternative today, hands down is a natural sweetener called Stevia. Do some searches on Stevia, nothing but positive stuff and my family uses it all the time. Drink ACT also uses Stevia. Thanks again for the comment, hopefully I have helped to answer your question.
Mike Witt
7 Jill // Jul 28, 2008 at 2:32 am
Thanks, Mike, for the great information here. I was starting to think I was crazy. I have been a Diet Coke addict since the age of 13 (I’ll be 38 next week). I had half a can last Thursday and went cold turkey after reading some articles e:mailed to me by a friend who was concerned about my enormous intake of the stuff. I typically drink 6 - 8 cans a day, coupled with coffee in the morning and at night, with an energy drink or two thrown in for good measure if I need to stay up late to work. Three days with no Diet Coke and I feel like I’m going to die. I can’t think straight, my head hurts so bad I can’t pick my head up off the pillow, my feet feel numb and I’m actually wearing my computer glasses all the time because I feel like I can’t see straight. For me, it’s not so much that I want to be off the caffeine, it’s the Nutra Sweet. I’ve tried to replace the Diet Coke with more coffee, etc., but I feel absolutely horrible.
Thank you for sharing your experiences with the rest of us - it’s really very helpful to know that I’m not alone!
8 wittmc // Jul 28, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Hi Jill,
Thank you for the comment and information. You are right, you are not alone. The things you are experiencing are the withdrawal symptoms of Aspartame. I had many of these myself when I tried to quit cold turkey. They are horrible. Keep fighting, it will eventually get better and when it is all over, your body will thank you. If you need help, don’t hesitate to contact me.
Thanks,
Mike
9 David // Oct 1, 2009 at 12:44 pm
I used to drink 3 - 5 diet cokes per day (it was a free office perk). I don’t believe I was addicted, just a habitual “user.” After about two years of this habit, I developed a kidney stone. At the emergency room, covered in puke from pain so intense that it was nauseous (you migraine people might be familiar with that), several hospital workers asked me if I drank a lot of diet sodas (this was after the diagnosis). I quite cold turkey. I’ve had two cups of sprite in the last four years. I lost ten pounds in my first month without diet sodas. I became very conscious of what I eat and switched to a whole foods type eating regiment. I’ve now lost almost 100 pounds and I am approaching my ideal weight. I just tossed my aspartame laced chewing gum pack in the trash - no more of that either.
I did not notice any withdrawl type symptoms after kicking diet coke but I did keep automatically reaching for that free soda button on my way past the machine to get some free water at the other end of the cafeteria instead. Took almost a month before I quit reaching.
10 Todd // Nov 4, 2009 at 10:44 am
I just gave up Diet Coke last Thursday. It has almost been a week. I don’t feel well. Foggy eyes, they feel dry and irritated, body aches and pains, insomnia (which I thought it would be the opposite), low energy, headaches (but not severe). I can’t even eat gum anymore - every brand is filled with aspartame. Other bad food additives are high fructose/maltose corn syrups and hydrogenated oils. Plus sucralose. If you go to your grocery, it is next to impossible to find anything without these products in them. Unless you go to Whole Foods - which I am doing today. How long until I feel healthy? I must say over time I have been feeling less and less healthy. I was drinking 6-8 cans of Diet Coke a day for many years now. Before that it was Diet Mountain Dew. I just feel out of it, have anxiety, feel like my brain is now functioning normally. On top of it all, I quit smoking a couple months ago. I am trying to start being healthier, but it is just make me feel horrible.
11 Steph // Nov 5, 2009 at 10:52 am
I’m on my like 10th attempt to quit drinking diet pepsi. OMG is it horrible. I’m going through a lot of the stuff detoxing heroin addict go through; sweating, anxiety, cramps, cold sweats, chills, diarrhea, feeling like I had a fever. I had a massive headache that encompassed my WHOLE head (not just one lobe) with a bad case of nausea and vomiting.
I didn’t tell my husband what I was doing. lol He just thought I was being grumpy/snappy for no reason. He probably thought I was nuts while I cried from the extreme pain and puking in the shower.
UGH!!! It’s let up some now that my stomach has started letting me take some pain medication.
The last time I did this my “withdrawals” went on for 4 days and I just couldn’t take it anymore and gave in to my diet Pepsi habit (It’s just diet pepsi too for some reason. Diet Coke is like drinking liquid exlax for me. LOL)
12 Nancy // Nov 13, 2009 at 11:24 am
I have a question about detox symptoms from aspartame… my eyes looked as if they have been sunburned… all around my eyes and down my cheeks where my tears fall looks as if it has been chemically burned… could this be from detoxing the toxins… thanks
13 Bob // Mar 8, 2010 at 9:29 am
Wow. I’m quite glad that I found this blog. About 10 days ago I went cold turkey on Aspartame and other fake sweetners (except some gum the other day that I later noticed also has it in). It has been destroying me since. My head feels like I have a migraine/heaache 24 hours a day. I feel nauseous down through my throat and stomach. I shake constantly and it is so difficult to focus.
I originally thought it may be a diabetes thing because it really acts up a while after eating and munching on some food makes it subside again, but i still feel the headaches pretty bad right after eating too. I had a physical a few weeks ago, however, and everything appeared fine.
I sure hope this is it and will go away soon. It is just blistering. I work durign the day and take a night class, and the headache is so bad that it is hard to study at night when I need to get stuff done.
I am a pretty healthy person and thought i was helping myself eating the No Sugar food (diet soda, no sugar jam, jello, pudding) etc. I thought I may have a headache for a day or two, but 10?? And from reading posts, it seems like it could be a few more weeks…..AHH
One question, I noticed mentions of coffee….is the caffiene from coffee tied into this in some way? Is there a reason people are giving up coffee as well as this sweetner?
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