Are artificial sweeteners making you fat?

What if I told you that artificial sweeteners like sucralose, Splenda, aspartame, sweet n low, NutraSweet were actually increasing your risk of fat accumulation.  Crazy right? 

I mean we are told by the American Diabetic Association that zero-calorie sweeteners don’t count and if you are macro counting for weight loss, there are no carbs in synthetic sweeteners, so they don’t work against your macro goals for the day.

Unfortunately, if you want to maintain your waistline or decrease your belly fat, these synthetic sweeteners are adding up and compounding but not in your favor. 

Public health guidelines actually recommend low sugar/low-calorie products for weight loss. Sure it could be cardboard but as long as it’s sweet and sugar-free, it is great for you. 

Research out of George Washington University has actually shown us the opposite effect. 

Basically, the more synthetic/artificial sweeteners we consume, the more fat our bodies accumulate.

How is this you might ask?

Well, fat cells have a protein on their surface that transports glucose into the cell (muscles have this protein as well).  It is called GLUT4. When we increase our sugar intake this transporter works more, causing us to accumulate more fat.  Researchers found that when we consume artificial sweeteners like those found in diet products, the GLUT4 receptor gene expression on fat cells increases, essentially turning us into a fat producing and sugar storing factory.

I cannot recommend highly enough eliminating nonfood substances like synthetic sweeteners from your life.

Stick to raw honey, maple syrup, fruit, molasses, fruit extracts when sweetening your food. 

And yes erythritol which is usually present when people are using monkfruit is also associated with increased belly fat.

If you are having a hard time losing belly fat, then yes you will likely want to decrease your intake of natural sweeteners as well, but please do not be coerced into the artificial sweetener, no-calorie no consequence marketing agenda.

So many of you have created new habits and new food routines.  Let us know about them. 

Let’s keep feeding those routines and identifying as fit, healthy, vital, and belly fat melting humans.

Have you made the transition from artificial sweeteners to real sugar? I’d love to hear about it in the commnts below.

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