A YouTuber quit drinking diet soda for 109 days and found he craved less sugar than ever

• YouTuber Joel Wood went from drinking two liters of diet soda a day to giving it up completely.
• After 109 days, he said he gradually became more sensitive to sweetness and ate less sugar.
• Artificial sweeteners can distort our sense of taste, since they're up to 500 times sweeter than sugar.
• He also saved about $300 and said he would continue going without diet soda for all of 2021 since he "didn't miss it at all."

Diet sodas are laden with artificial sweeteners and other industrial chemicals, but expert opinion is mixed on whether they're that bad for you overall.

YouTuber Joel Wood decided to test whether cutting them out entirely can make a significant health difference. He went from drinking about two liters a day to completely swearing off diet soda for 109 days - more than three months.

While the first days and weeks without his beloved Coke Zero and Pepsi Max were challenging, Wood said he eventually found it much easier than he though to live without diet soda, and plans to keep doing it.

There were major benefits to kicking the habit, both for his wallet and his health. He saved a significant amount of money - about $3 a day, or nearly $300 in total. But he also ate fewer sugary treats overall.

These benefits are backed by scientific evidence, with multiple studies showing the health risks of drinking too much diet soda, and why we might benefit from cutting back.

It took about two weeks to kick the cravings

Wood said it wasn't easy at first to shake off his soda habit. The initial urge for a sweet drink hit about 1 pm on the first day of the challenge, he said. By day two, he felt tired and groggy (likely from the lack of caffeine, a main ingredient in many sodas).

Read more: There's even more evidence that artificial sweeteners like aspartame could be dangerous

"After one full day, I really struggled to get up when my alarm went off, which never happens," he said in the video.

From there, things got slightly easier. He posted on day seven that he was feeling a mental boost from the initial success toward his goal, which helped him stay motivated to continue.

By the two week mark, Wood felt it was "fairly easy" to stick to it, and said he was starting to have fewer cravings.

Dining out and exercising made it harder to resist temptation

Still, there were moments where abstaining from soda was difficult. In particular, Wood said he struggled after workouts.

"It's tough when I'm really thirsty and after a workout when I feel like my blood sugar is quite low, because my body seems to then crave the sweetest thing that I can think of, which is artificial sweeteners," he said.

Going out for food or drinks was also tricky. At home, he could avoid reaching for soda by not keeping it in the house. But seeing it on menus or in stores proved to be a source of temptation.

One thing that helped him get there was swapping out the diet soda he missed for healthier options like sparkling water and squash (a fruity mix added to water in the UK).

"It's little decisions like these that will hopefully build themselves into habits, long-term habits," he said.

Kicking the habit made it easier to cut back on real sugar, too

Initially, Wood had planned to go a month without diet soda, but on a whim, decided to extend the challenge to 109 days, ending on Christmas Day.

When he celebrated with a long-awaited Pepsi Max, he found it to be somewhat disappointing.

"It's not actually as good as I thought it would be," he said (Insider reporter Rachel Hosie had a similar experience, and said her first diet soda after a month's abstention was "underwhelming.")

Wood also noticed his craving for other sweet foods had decreased throughout the challenge, perhaps because his taste buds were becoming more sensitive. Previously, it wasn't unusual for him to eat an entire bag of chocolates in a day, or several bars in one sitting.

As result, Wood said cutting back on diet soda might help him shed some weight and body fat, even though artificial sweeteners don't contain calories.

Studies show sugar and artificial sweeteners have similar risks

The benefits Wood experiences from cutting back on diet soda are backed up by scientific evidence.

Studies show diet soda has many of the same side effects as regular soda, including weight gain, metabolic issues, and risk of chronic illnesses.

Read more: What happens if you drink too much diet soda

Evidence suggests that people who try to cut calories by switching to diet drinks may make up for it by eating more, particularly in the form of sugary snacks. That may be because artificial sweeteners stimulate our appetite, making us crave more, research has found.

And the more diet soda you consume, the harder those cravings can be to satisfy, as artificial sweeteners can be up to 500 times sweeter than regular sugar. Over time, this excessive sweetness can shift our taste preferences, prompting us to want even more sweets, according to evidence.

A 2019 study found a higher risk of stroke, heart attacks, and earlier death among older women who regularly drank diet beverages. Newer research on more than 100,000 people also found artificial sweeteners were linked to a higher risk of heart issues, comparable to the risk of eating too much refined sugar.

The FDA still considers artificial sweeteners to be generally safe for consumption and dietitians say they can be appropriate in moderation, or for people with diabetes or obesity who need to avoid real sugar.

The consensus from experts, though, is that diet drinks still aren't ideal for a healthy lifestyle.