Originally Posted by Cornish_Celt

Overall, when someone injests diet soda, it tricks the orosensory system into thinking it's had sweets with calories, when there are none. This tells the body it needs more calories to make up for the sweet sensation, and you crave food. That is why if you eat a full-sugar item, you generally get your fill of it, it seems rich, so your body says stop. That is usually negated with sugar free items.

Also, I do believe there are some residual calories in diet coke, So you might want to check that out. It's not anything that will crash your diet, but just for your reference.

One other thing, the cola component leeches calcium from your bones, so if you drink alot make sure you take a supplement. The problem with diet soda, and more importantly ANY carbonated beverage (especially for women) is the phosporus, and phosphoric acid. Every carbonated beverage, diet or regular, contains phosphoric acid which is known to deplete the bones of calcium. For women, this is a major risk factor for osteoporosis.
An interesting experiment is to take a chicken bone, put it in a dish of cola, and leave it for a couple of weeks. It should be soft enough to tie into a knot.

Whatever you do, DON'T ever brush your teeth imediately after drinking dirt soda(or normal soda or fruit juice), It's much better to drink water, let the enamel weakened by the acid reharden, and then brush half an hour or so later.

Then there is also the fact that the sweetners do degrade to chemicals that are not so good for you (including formaldehyde). Therefore if you are going to drink it, ONLY drink the newest diet coke you find, and NEVER drink it when out of date, or if been sitting in the sun a long time (heat speeds up the degradation of the sweetner) To check this keep a bottle of diet coke with about an inch left closed for a couple of months and then open and smell - you won't want to drink it so much anymore!

Caffiene dehydrates you which means if you don't drink alot of water then your body is in water storage mode where it thinks there's a drought and it stores extra water in your body since it doesn't know when it's going to get enough fresh water.

The sodium in it also helps you store more water in your body.

The caffiene restricts your blood vessels while upping your heart rate so if you appear to be a little high in blood pressure this can be the cause. Also this can be the cause of many headaches when you go too long without it. Getting off of caffiene takes a little time but your blood vessels will get better... your water (if you go to drinking just water, 2.5 litres at least per day) weight will drop and overall you'll feel a lot better as well.

This isn't just diet coke... it's all softdrinks. Even caffiene free drinks have enough other negatives to affect em. Diet drinks have the fake sweeteners... some in the past have been linked to cancer so it's best just to try and stay away from over indulging in them.

Personally, If I drink any form of soda then it will be normal soda NOT diet soda!