Many enjoy the pleasures of a diet soda, but the diet soda you swear by is not doing what you think it is. In fact it is doing the opposite of its alleged qualities. There is no nutritional value in drinking diet soda, you’re actually better off drinking water or freshly squeezed fruit juice.

Diet sodas are loaded with artificial sweeteners, and your brain cannot differentiate between real sugar and fake sugar. Diet soda tends to increase your craving for sweet calorie rich foods. An acupuncturist knows that this craving and consumption deeply affects your spleen. Your spleen and stomach are responsible for all postnatal qi which your body depends on for survival. The disruption of the digestive system as a result of a poor diet, incites disease. 

Heart and Obesity Problems

The first example of disease from your favorite sugary drink is Heart failure. Drinking diet soda increases your risk of cardiovascular disease by up to 49%. To an acupuncturist, a weak spleen can lead to an inadequate amount of qi and blood in circulation which in turn can lead to a heart attack.  

Another reason is obesity. Artificial sweeteners tend to increase your cravings for fatty foods, which leads to weight gain. An acupuncturist is aware as to how a rich, greasy and sweet diet can injure the spleen and stomach leading to the generation of damp-heat and phlegm.  

More Diseases caused by Diet Soda

A third example of diseases is dementia. Just drinking as little as one diet soda a day increases your risk of developing dementia 3 fold. A stroke is another disease that could be caused by the consumption of diet soda. Studies have shown that the artificial sweeteners in diet sodas play a large role in increasing a person’s risk of having a stroke if you consume more than one per day. Artificial sweeteners can potentially impair the spleen’s ability to transform and transport, thus leading to the generation of phlegm that obstructs the flow of qi and blood in the channels.  

Another is high blood pressure potentially due to its high sodium content since a can of diet soda can contain up to 41 mg of sodium.  

How Can Acupuncture Help?

An acupuncturist understands how daily consumption of diet soda can lead to the generation of damp-turbidity. This tends to transform into heat, and when heat rises, it serves as a mechanism for high blood pressure. An acupuncturist would look to treat this heat, but could be prevented on your end through the controlled consumption of sugary drinks. Other issues that can develop as a result of a daily consumption of diet sodas can be: diabetes, various stomach issues, liver problems as well as osteoporosis which can all be treated with acupuncture.  It pays to see your acupuncturist for regular wellness visits, but if you continue to drink diet soda regularly you’ll be seeing an acupuncturist for much more than a wellness visit.  So let’s look to increase our water intake, and remove sugary drinks from our lives completely. Until next time, acupuncture is my life, what’s yours?