For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved diet sodas. There was never regular soda in my house growing up, so I truly enjoyed the flavor of diet soda.
At some point in college, my body stopped liking caffeine. Pretty much, my body will have symptoms of caffeine withdrawal pretty soon after drinking it. So I stopped drinking Diet Coke and started drinking caffeine-free Diet Coke.
I also have a love for Diet 7-Up and those no calorie flavored carbonated waters you can get at the grocery store (I’m partial to Albertson’s peach flavor).
In 2006 and 2007, I was on a no food diet. Literally, no food. I would only consume 600-800 calories in shakes each day. It was done at a hospital and I was being monitored each week, so it was safe. But during this time, I craved any flavor other than the chocolate shakes that I survived on. I would drink between 2-4 of the peach flavored no calorie carbonated waters a day. And each of those drinks was 1 liter. That’s a lot of soda. I also drank a lot of caffeine free sodas (I was on a weird orange soda kick for a while).
I’ve cut out most sodas in my life. I’ll occasionally get a caffeine-free Diet Coke at or a Diet 7-Up when I’m at the store. But I never was able to stop drinking my flavored carbonated waters (which I lovingly referred to as yummy water).
But now, Albertson’s doesn’t carry yummy water anymore. Or if they do, it’s in one of the weird flavors like blueberry acai berry. So I’m taking this opportunity to make a serious attempt to limit my fluid intake to water (and the occasional alcoholic drink).
This isn’t just a health thing. Sodas are expensive. Those yummy waters are $1 each. It adds up. I’d rather spend my money on paying off my debt or enjoying outings with friends.
I’m not going to try to cut out sodas and yummy waters completely. I feel like that is setting myself up for failure. Instead, I’m going to say only 2 sodas or yummy waters a week. And once that seems easy, I’ll cut it down to 1 a week.
So I had a caffeine-free Diet Coke today to say goodbye. I’ll see you again soon.
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