For the last month, I’ve managed to drink only water. Now I’m going to take that challenge to the next level and commit to the entire summer.
No sweetened drinks. No tea. No alcohol. No coffee (okay, I didn’t drink coffee anyway).
Not even club soda or Perrier.
Just still water only.
I’m doing this for a few reasons.
- No matter how many times I think it through, I can’t come to any conclusion that justifies a drink form for anything I should be getting from food. Water is simply the best thing I could drink at any given time, period.
- From my own data, I keep finding non-water drinks can “modify” eating habits in ways that aren’t immediately obvious, particularly sweetened drinks. I also have been observing a lot of interesting habit changes from coffee drinkers after they’ve quit that leads me to suspect this too is a heavy influencer that may be less apparent to the user.
- I drank soda my whole life and switched to diet after going keto, but I’d like to kick the habit entirely. While I have phases where I drink little (usually out of conscious effort), I likewise have had several times where I drink it very often and this is usually coupled with stressful periods or intensive deadlines. Thus, I’m using it as a means of “instant joy stimulus”, as I like to call it.
- There’s another reason I won’t reveal until after the experiment is over.
Through the course of this keto lifestyle, I have tried to cut out diet soda on three separate attempts, all of which failed. But I mean to at least exceed the record of abstinence this time around. If I can make it to the end of August, that will be an impressive four months total.
Consider this my battle cry.
I managed to go the first six months of keto soda-free. Then diet soda slowly snuck back in, and now I probably have at least one Zevia or a Diet Coke every day. I may need to tiptoe into it with flavored seltzer, but I think this is a great idea.
It’s a real challenge. I find it amusing that giving up carbs was a lot easier than giving up sweetened drinks.
I’ve wound up on this path too, broadly for the reasons you state. I occasionally have carbonated spring water, but even that has a tendency to make me want to drink it even if I’m not really thirsty.
Exactly! Moreover, I find I will drink more water when not drinking the alternatives to water.
I’d like to hear more about the changes you see when people drop coffee. I dropped it in favor of iced unsweetened mint green tea. My body just didn’t want coffee anymore. I loved it though.
That could be a post by itself. Weight loss, weight gain, new cravings, mood changes. One thing is for sure, coffee is certainly having a profound effect on a number of people who consume it that turns out to be surprising to them when they quit. That’s really eye-opening data for me.
Can you elaborate with some articles, Dave? Does it have an effect on ghrelin production?
By the way, the Paleomedicina guys tell me that coffee seems to have less negative impact than teas, in terms of the various markers they monitor in their patients. They’re not sure why. This is an aside that isn’t directly relevant, other than for those who read this and decide to ditch coffee in favour of tea. It would probably make more sense to follow this example of ditching anything and everything in favour of still water.
I’m not sure about that. Green tea has shown some benefits, though mostly in epidemiological studies, which we know are mostly useless. There are some RCTs though. I’m now having two cups of green tea per day, in addition to my 3/4 cup of cold-brewed coffee, diluted to 1-3/4 cup.
As for soda, I was very low fat, low sugar for a long time, so I never developed a liking for soda. I avoid it now (even the zero calorie versions) due to possible insulinogenic effect. (If it’s sweet, I assume this causes insulin to go up.)
Drinking soda was a good habit to never developed in the first place. Well done.
When you say “ less negative impact“ – could you expand on that?
Does the restriction include broths?
Good question. If doing a ful fast during this time and needing a crutch I would think broth is better than anything else.
Broth would technically count, yes. I know, I know— it’s a tough challenge.
I’m pretty fortunate on this one. I was never “addicted” to soda, diet or otherwise, although I certainly drank them throughout my life. But, I recall at probably age 10 or 11, on a family vacation, I mentioned to my father that the Coca Cola I’d just had still left me thirsty, and he said something to the effect that water was best to quench thirst. That has always stuck with me.
So, especially since going low carb about nine years ago, I drink almost exclusively water. I have an occasional green tea, and an occasional beer or wine. I never acquired a taste for coffee.
Best of luck with your “battle cry”.
That’s a very powerful habit you developed early, Bob. I suspect it will serve your health well in the long term. 🙂
‘ I also have been observing a lot of interesting habit changes from coffee drinkers after they’ve quit that leads me to suspect this too is a heavy influencer that may be less apparent to the user.’ Would you mind elaborating a little more please?
I have just a handful of anecdotes to work with. Two were athletes, one noticing it helped her performance after she quit and set some new PRs, the other noticed his “bathroom issues” cleared up (he never elaborated). One was a fellow engineer who got much better sleep after quitting and now insists he’s actually more alert and awake compared to his “java days”. And one had improvements in… we’ll say, the “bedroom department”. But FWIW, one had lower energy and insisted he had to go back to regain it. I worry about him the most because he also consumes energy drinks as well.
Interesting, thanks. I am a bit of a hard core coffee type. I constantly toy with trying a stint without it. I did do that a while ago but it was before I was low carb. I live in Barcelona where the coffee is great too, so doesn’t make it easy. I will let you know if I take the plunge.
Great, thx. 🙂
Thank you for the post, I couldn’t agree more about what you posted. I too have tried to kick my diet soda habit, and have failed largely due to the same reasons you posted. I’ve tried substituting with other zero carb drinks, including flavored sparkling water and have never been able to stick to it. My best success was one (prior to going Keto) where I followed a vegetarian way of eating for 6 weeks, which I suspect I was largely successful due to the increased vigilance. Good luck, interested to hear how it turns out.
There’s something very powerful about tackling something categorically. When you’re both completely serious about it and taking away any measure of indecision (no small “allowances” or “cheats” of any kind).
Go Dave! I was a diet soda junkie for years and have not had soda for about 15 years now. It was tough because of the ubiquitous availability of soda and something about that acidic carbonation was really addictive. I can tell you now that the taste of diet soda now is really awful since I haven’t had in so long. Hang in there!
Hi Dave,
I have been on a zero carb diet for the past 2 months and low carb for the previous 6 months. I have had great results with the diet. I had my cholesterol checked this past week and the numbers freaked my doctor out. He said that he has never seen numbers this high before. From what I have read on this site, I wasn’t too alarmed but can I get your opinion on them. I have been taking Lipitor 20mg for the past 10+ years and would love to stop taking it eventually. My Creatinine level came in pretty high this year also 1.51 mg/dL ( was 1.20 mg/dL last year).
–==== CholesterolCode.com/Report v0.9.2 ====–
…2 months on Carnivore/Zero Carb/Meat Only ::: 16 hours water fasted…
Total Cholesterol: 506 mg/dL 13.09 mmol/L
LDL Cholesterol: 422 mg/dL 10.91 mmol/L
HDL Cholesterol: 65 mg/dL 1.68 mmol/L
Triglycerides: 95 mg/dL 1.07 mmol/L
–CHOLESTEROL REMNANTS–
Remnant Cholesterol: 19 mg/dL 0.49 mmol/L >>> Medium-Low Risk Quintile
Remnant Chol to HDL: 0.29 >>> Medium-Low Risk Quintile
Go to https://tinyurl.com/y8hokam2 for more on Cholesterol Remnants
–ATHEROGENIC INDEX OF PLASMA (AIP)–
AIP: -0.196 >>> Lowest Risk Third
Go to https://tinyurl.com/ycccmmnx for more on Atherogenic Index of Plasma
–CONVENTIONAL MARKERS AND RATIOS–
Friedewald LDL-C: 422 | Iranian LDL-C: 378
Total/HDL Ratio: 7.78
TG/HDL Ratio in mg/dL: 1.46 | in mmol/L: 0.64
Also, my VLDL was 19 mg/dL.
Here are my results from last year:
–==== CholesterolCode.com/Report v0.9.2 ====–
…3 years on Standard American ::: 12 hours water fasted…
Total Cholesterol: 230 mg/dL 5.95 mmol/L
LDL Cholesterol: 143 mg/dL 3.7 mmol/L
HDL Cholesterol: 64 mg/dL 1.66 mmol/L
Triglycerides: 117 mg/dL 1.32 mmol/L
–CHOLESTEROL REMNANTS–
Remnant Cholesterol: 23 mg/dL 0.59 mmol/L >>> Medium-Low Risk Quintile
Remnant Chol to HDL: 0.36 >>> Medium Risk Quintile
Go to https://tinyurl.com/y8hokam2 for more on Cholesterol Remnants
–ATHEROGENIC INDEX OF PLASMA (AIP)–
AIP: -0.1 >>> Lowest Risk Third
Go to https://tinyurl.com/ycccmmnx for more on Atherogenic Index of Plasma
–CONVENTIONAL MARKERS AND RATIOS–
Friedewald LDL-C: 143 | Iranian LDL-C: 159
Total/HDL Ratio: 3.59
TG/HDL Ratio in mg/dL: 1.83 | in mmol/L: 0.8
Thanks very much.
Hi Aman–
I personally think this is a pretty good looking lab. Your HDL is a nice and high 65 and TG a nice and low 95. This isn’t medical advice and I’m not a doctor, etc, but to put it another way, if a family member of mine had this lab, it wouldn’t concern me.
You should catch my speech at KetoCon next week. I’ll be talking prominently about a study that has cutpoints very close to yours — but I can’t give away any spoilers, of course. 😉
Thanks Dave. I will definitely check it out when it becomes available online.
I’ve been water only for years and years, except for some herbal teas and a rare sip of my husband’s diet soft drink. When I do get a sip, I always wonder why I did it–the taste is not even sweet, just sharp and acidic.
That’s fantastic!
Sounds like a hard row to hoe
This time around it has been a lot easier. We’ll see how I am in another two and a half months.
Wish you good luck. Got to know you’re not alone for this 😉
This year, i stopped to drink alcohol, and drank only sparkling water, and glass of red wine few times maybe.. Since 1 week, i try to drink only still water, See you end of august 😉
Thanks, Restless. Thus far, it’s actually getting easier the further I go. 🙂
Is there a reason why you would be cutting sparkling water? Since I started keto (about 3 month ago) I only drink sparkling water and its been great! I learned to love it (especially topo chico)
I think that’s great for you — no problem with that at all.
I actually love club soda and mineral water. The reason I’m cutting *everything* but still water out is that I’m relieving myself of seeking them out. If I have any amount of headspace devoted to beverages as a source of enjoyment, I can’t make them neutral instead. I’m trying to make the act of drinking water like breathing — something you do a lot but don’t think about as means to an end.
Good luck, Dave. Sodas a hard one to kick, but you can.