One of my favorite weight jokes involves a woman ordering up a double cheeseburger, fries and a Diet Coke. Because, you know, that way it's a healthy meal! (Haha)
This is funny because it's so very true. It is, indeed, hard to think of a more satisfying crutch than diet soda. It has caffeine! It tastes sweet and sugary! But it's also diet and therefore totally OK! For these reasons, it's natural to ignore or downplay the many downsides nutritionists have long warned about, from kidney issues to rotting teeth to (talk about false advertising!) weight gain.
But with the recent news that diet drinks are linked to heart disease and, um, death, it may be time to accept, once and for all, that it's time to break up with diet soda. For good.
The new research, out of the American College of Cardiology, revealed that women who drank two or more diet sodas a day were a whopping 30 percent more likely to have a heart attack or cardiovascular "event" (whatever that means) than women who rarely drank such drinks. More frighteningly, they were 50 percent more likely to straight-up die.
Granted, as is often the case with such research, this doesn't necessarily mean that knocking back Diet Cokes (or Pepsis, if that's your jam) will bury you in an early grave. As the researchers pointed out, their findings suggest an association but not necessarily a causality. Women who drink such drinks, for instance, are also more likely to smoke and be overweight, which exacerbate heart risks to begin with.
Still, one must ask how much damning research it takes to accept that it's time to move on. As someone who's happily chugged a Diet Coke at 3 pm on many a low-energy day, I can tell you I understand the pain in making the painful decision to cut ties. But ladies: it's time.
So with that, I ask you to join me in saying:
Goodbye diet soda. It's been a good run, but we've found someone else, and his name is black tea. We'll never forget you.
With love,
Women everywhere
Image: Wikimedia Commons
