Bodybuilding Forums

Why do the recipes use splenda? This stuff is total garbage. There isn't long term evidence yet, but I would suggest staying away from the shit.

What are your guys's thoughts on this?

The manufacturer’s own short-term studies showed that very high doses of sucralose (far beyond what would be expected in an ordinary diet) caused shrunken thymus glands, enlarged livers, and kidney disorders in rodents

If this sounds familiar, it should: we went down the same path with aspartame, the main ingredient in Equal and NutraSweet. Almost all of the independent research into aspartame found dangerous side effects in rodents. The FDA chose not to take these findings into account when it approved aspartame for public use. Over the course of 15 years, those same side effects increasingly appeared in humans. Not in everyone, of course — but in those who were vulnerable to the chemical structure of aspartame.

Basically, artificial sweeteners confuse your brain. The enzymes in your mouth begin a cascade that primes your cell receptors for an insulin surge, and when it doesn’t arrive your brain feels cheated. That’s why most diet sodas are loaded with caffeine — so you’ll still feel a jolt.

But even if your brain is distracted momentarily, soon enough it wants the energy boost you promised it — and you find yourself craving carbohydrates. In one study, people who used artificial sweeteners ate up to three times the amount of calories as the control group. But again, this is individual. It all comes down to the brain’s perception of calories, which can get thrown off whenever artificial ingredients are substituted for whole food.

I know exactly which article you are referencing, and just realize that is one article with no cited research sources written by one person who is not a nutritionist, chemical biologist, or any other profession applicable to the topic, she is an OB/GYN. Not that I am a professional involved in anything related to the field either, but maybe think about taking it with a grain of salt like you would take this post or any other random thing posted on the internet.

When it comes to eating, anything consumed in excess, will be bad for you. Carbs, protein, fat, vitamins, minerals, even water, all natural and essential things we need, all can kill you if you eat too much of any of them. So negative side effects can be found with sucralose when dosages that are hundreds of times larger than what the average person would consume are given in lab tests, is that supposed to be a surprise? How about you have someone drink hundreds of times the average person's water intake and watch them die of water intoxication in a matter of hours. Is water bad too?

If you aren't comfortable with artificial sweeteners then by all means don't use them. But jumping to conclusions based on one person's opinion is just being gullible. Until you see a clear result showing that sucralose is harmful in the daily doses we might normally get out of supplements and diet food coming out of research published in a peer-reviewed medical journal, all you are doing is spreading misinformation through scare tactics.

Personally, I am a fan of natural things. But I recognize that sometimes, artificial sweeteners can get the job done in a reasonably safe manner. I don't think sucralose is evil but if I have the choice to avoid any artifical sweeteners I will, such as in taking Optimum Nutrition's natural whey protein sweetened with stevia instead of going for the more flavorful sucralose varieties. Does that mean I think you should avoid it too? No, that's just my own choice based on no evidence whatsoever and a personal feeling of avoiding what is easily avoidable.

Other times, there may not be a viable second option to a sucralose-sweetened product that doesn't involve fructose corn syrup, which is also a chemically processed sweetener by the way, and I will take my chances with sucralose over that garbage any day.