Diet Dilemma

I’ve heard many people talk about losing weight by giving up pop. I think it’s a wonderful idea and have seen people benefit from it. My own friends have suggested I give up my pop, but because I only drink diet pop, I thought I was okay.

It’s weird because both of my sisters refuse to drink diet sodas. They don’t understand why people would settle for diet when they could have the real thing. I always roll my eyes and think, “Like I could really have those extra calories.” Why drink regular soda when you can drink all the diet soda you want without the guilt of calories?

Turns out that might my thinking might not have been entirely right. I found this article when I was trying to figure out if my Diet Coke addiction was doing more harm than I thought. As the article points out, “For each can of diet soft drink consumed each day, a person's risk of obesity went up 41 percent.” I'm in trouble.

I’ll admit this: I’m a Diet Coke addict. I wouldn’t be surprised if I drank 2-4 cans a day, everyday. And what’s really bad is that one of the gas stations in town has a thing called Fountain Pop Friday. All fountain pop drinks are a penny an ounce, so I can get a 42 ounce drink for $0.42. Not bad. Well last Friday I went a little overboard…and I ended up drinking 150 ounces of Diet Coke. That ridiculous. It's completely ridiculous. No one should drink that much diet soda.

I didn’t realize how much my diet soda habits affected my ability to lose weight. From here on out, you can bet I’m going to be watching my pop intake much more closely. Water, anyone?