Hey, I'm Dr. Josh Axe and welcome to Transformation TV.
This week I'm going to be talking about artificial sweeteners which are some of the most deadly
compounds on the planet.
You and your family want to stay completely away from artificial sweeteners.
Now, artificial sweeteners, most of the time they came about accidentally, not even on
purpose, but people found they had a sweet texture and taste to them and actually the
number one used sweetener of the past two decades has been artificial sweetener known
as aspartame.
Aspartame first started being used in diet coke and actually they saw, in 1981, when
Diet Coke was introduced on the market, brain tumors increased with it exponentially and
so they rose in correlation with it and that was just one big side effect.
Now, another study down at the University of Texas found that aspartame caused kidney
damage and weight gain.
Lots of you think, "Well, I'm drinking a Diet Coke or a diet soda.
Shouldn't that cause my weight to decrease?"
Actually, at the University of Texas they found for every diet soda you drink, your
chance of weight gain goes up by 41%, and the reason is that these are toxic chemicals.
Toxins get stored in your fat cells if you're drinking lots of diet soda.
It's going to be stored in your cells and your body cannot burn fat and lose weight.
So if you're trying to lose weight, kick the diet soda immediately.
One of the most dangerous things and facts to know about aspartame is what it breaks
down into.
Actually, aspartame breaks down in your body into wood alcohol, formaldehyde, and ethanol
which are toxic chemicals and they're known to be carcinogenic.
They actually cause cancer, and that's why you want to stay away from these.
There's a great documentary out there called "Sweet Misery."
If you want to get a whole DVD series on this, again you are going to want to go watch the
DVD, "Sweet Misery."
Another artificial sweetener that is shockingly dangerous is Sucralose, and it's found in
a product called Splenda.
A lot of people think, "Well, Splenda, I thought that was a health food or I thought it came
from sugar."
Splenda started off coming from sugar, but they add a chlorine ion, a chlorine molecule
onto the sugar and so basically what happens, if you're drinking Splenda or Sucralose, it's
breaking down in your body as chlorine.
I actually recently had a patient come into my clinic and they told me about a friend
of theirs who had just been hospitalized for three days for chlorine poisoning, and the
doctors told them it was from her using too much Splenda.
She was actually using cups of Splenda in her baking and sweetening and actually found
that it caused chlorine poisoning in her body.
So if you are doing Splenda, again, plan on or just know that it's chlorine.
It's like drinking chlorinated water.
It causes cancer.
You want to stay completely away from these artificial sweeteners.
Now, places you're going to want to look for these artificial sweeteners and the names
you're going to be looking for, the top two names to look for are Sucralose and aspartame.
Now, if you ever use protein powders, you've got to look in your protein powders for these.
Number one, if you're drinking a diet soda, 99% of the time it's going to have Sucralose
or Splenda in it.
Even things like Crystal Light and a lot of the different sweeteners out there, you're
going to find they have these artificial sweeteners in them.
You got to read your labels.
You do not want to bring in this stuff in.
Honestly, I'd rather someone drink regular sugar than do artificial sweeteners because
they're neurotoxins, they're toxic chemicals.
Here's what you want to do instead.
You want to switch over to an all-natural sweetener, something like stevia.
Now, this is personally what I use, but stevia is an all-natural sweetener that comes from
the herb of a flower and it's no calories, and so it's not going to cause the added weight
gain.
So add a little bit of stevia into things the like berry smoothies that I do.
If I want to sweeten something up a little bit, again, stevia is a great option, all
natural.
Some other things you can do, you got to be careful of the sugar content, but raw honey,
Grade B maple syrup and things like coconut nectar are other good options and fruit, but
that's where I'd go ahead and stick with when you're trying to sweeten things up.
Again, if you want to do no-sugar, though, stevia is the way to go, and there's a lot
of all-natural products coming out that you're going to find at natural health food stores
that actually contain stevia.
This is a way you want to go.
So remember, action steps for the week, get rid of all the artificial sweeteners.
Get rid of the aspartame, get rid of the Sucralose, switch over to stevia and the all-natural
sweeteners.
It may just save your life and a friend.
If you like this, think about the people you know who are at work or at your church or
the places you go to who are addicted to diet soda and tell them about this.
Spread this message.
You may just save a life.
I'll see you next week.