I drank different sodas, cokes, pop’s for my entire life. With brief periods when I gave them up. The past eight years my drink of choice has been Diet Mtn. Dew. I drank way too many of them. I cut back a few years ago and stopped buying two liters for home and would only drink water, tea and coffee at home. Work and driving was my real issue and it was having a ton of ill effects. Besides health issues it was becoming a costly “addiction”. While I can’t say for sure If I have quit them for good this time I am sure trying. I’ll share with you a few tricks I’m doing to help kick the soda.
Don’t Be Thirsty
This is a big one for me. In the past when was thirsty I would automatically go for a soda and not even think about it until after I was drinking it. To make sure I don’t do that I make sure I’m getting enough to drink. Heck maybe even too much to drink but I’m not thirsty and I’m not going for a soda. My main choice here is water of course. Best of all water is free.
Have A Variety
Just water alone gets boring. To help me kick the soda craving I’m using a lot of different drinks. I have a few different tea’s both hot and cold all unsweetened. Coffee helps me with my morning caffeine fix to get through the day. In fact coffee has become my new favorite drink. I’ll occasionally drink some yerba matte since I have a bag left to drink. To help with the plainness of water I keep lemon and lime juices to add a little flavor. Lastly I’m drinking some carbonated water to replace the fizzyiess lacking without sodas.
Make Your Own
In preparation to get off sodas I bought a SodaStream a few weeks back. I have made some sodas with it which are pretty good but my real intention was to carbonate my own water for cheap. I can make up some fizzy water and take it with me when I’m driving so I don’t have to stop for a drink. This has worked out really well for me.
I still have a long way to go but feel I have a strong start. When I think about all the money wasted buying drinks I get pissed. Money that could have gone to much better things that instead went down the toilette. In addition to the wasted money Sodas diet or otherwise are not good for you. I know in me they slowed or outright halted weight loss, promoted sugar cravings. I feel much better now and the desire to even get one are almost gone.
What do you drink? Trying to quit sodas as well? Let me know in the comments!
Today’s article brought to you by the great folks over at Survivalgearbags.com home to all your Bug out bag and tactical needs. Help support Survivalpunk by supporting the great folks at Survival Gear bags.
Coffee and water ftw!
I quit drinking soda back when I went Paleo, but before then I didn’t drink it very often.
I drink a lot of water with some herbal tea and coffee from time to time…
And yes, a Sodastream for fizzy water is a great thing, we’ve had one for years.
db
Good for you! I quit buying sodas for the house in college because I couldn’t afford it and would rather buy a 30-case of beer for (almost) the same cost 😉 We get free soda at my office, but I abstain except for maybe two days a week I’ll sneak one as an afternoon treat. When I was growing up, soda was a once-or-twice a month treat when we were good or at a BBQ or whatever, but nowadays everyone guzzles soda like it’s water when all it does is dehydrate you and make you thirstier! I always have a cruiser cup of water within reach and it keeps me going quite well.
I quit soda pop on the 18th, just 12 days ago… day 3 or 4 was the worst for cravings but they went away quick. I’m strictly water, coffee, homemade sweet tea and seltzer now and I figure I’m saving $2-4 a day…now if I could just quit smoking…
Soda is my weakness. I have tried quitting many times, with varying lengths of abstinence before falling off the wagon. I’ll have an energy drink first thing in the morning (red bull, full throttle, or rock star). Then I stop by a drive through for a giant size cup of coke that I take to work and nurse throughout the day. Then I have another couple cans at home during the evening. I also have 1 to 2 cups of coffee at work. And since they have free bottled water at work, I always have one open on my desk to sip on. I cant stand the taste of diet soda chemicals. So I know the soda calories from sugars is a big reason for my weight. I have started trying to phase out the soda and replace it by adding more water and coffee and unsweetened tea. But I would say for the last 20 years I have had a 2 liter a day soda habit. Ugh.
I have had my Soda Stream since last summer, and really enjoy making my own flavored soda’s. I have not had a coke, pepsi, or any other soda for years, and I dont miss them at all.
I have a Coke addiction. As a nurse, I know that are probably the reason so many people are over weight, becoming diabetic, filling our systems with artificial sweeteners and the high caffeine drinks are giving us heart problems. And as you said, we are just hooked on sugar and live from one sugar high to another. Perhaps if we realized that what we are putting in our bodies can be as dangerous as some drugs or if we had to get in the car and drive to the bad part of town to make a purchase in some alley we would see that we do have a serious problem. I have a vision of some dope dealer asking, “What will it be today, weed, Mountain Dew, a two liter Coke?”
So I will join you and try and stop with the sodas……..lets all of us soda addicts join hands and repeat after me….”To make my butt smaller, to stop my hands from shaking, for clearer skin, to prevent sugar diabetes and to save money…I will break my addiction to the dreaded soft drink!!”
I write this as I sit here craving a big cold Coke…………..
I had been drinking pepsi for 35 years with only one previous attempt to quit. I was up to at least a 6-pack a day. The physical results of this is my sugar hovers around 100 barely pre-diabetic and damage to my teeth from the acids and sugars. One is quit before, I actually lost weight because I lost almost 1000 calories a day and didn’t know how to eat real food to make up the difference. I lost the battle and went back to drinking them and the first couple really burned my throat, but I got used to it again.
I have quit again and so far have managed 51 days. I have so far replaced the sugar and caffeine with coffee and sweet tea, but at least it’s real sugar and I control the amount. Eventually, I hope to quit all caffeine except chocolate and drink mostly water.
I have already reaped the benefits of the costs of the soda, and like a smoker, my appetite is returning but this time I am prepared with lots of veggie snacks.
Russ has a worse case of addiction than I do. Had to laugh…..like any addict he keeps count of the number of days without the pepsi. Don’t you think they should have hospital for this. Our families have an invervention, drive us to the clinic and they lock us up until we get over our problem. In my case, I have gone three hours and 15 minutes without my coke. Drinking water like a crazy lady. Can’t wait til the caffeine headache kicks in later today.
Soda is some of the worst cr*p you can consume,between the high fructose corn syrup or poisonous artificial sweeteners.
Additionally, colas contain phosphoric acid, which acidifies your body, and needs to be buffered by your body pulling calcium from your bones; it’s all bad…but it makes gads of money for the corporations selling it.
When I started to come off sodas, I started with Pierre water, then other grocery store carbonated water {Publix is best}. When I drink non carbonated water it is from my Clear2-O carbon block water picture,tastes better than than bottled water. I do sometimes drink Coke with fast food, but try to keep some carbonated water in my car.
Hello, my name is Kelly and I am a Dr. Pepper addict. 🙁
I’ve been trying to limit my consumption for years with no luck. I drink about 3gallons a day. I am never without my “jug”.
🙁
I didn’t make it 24 hours…….today have part of a 2 liter coke in the refrig. Will try not to replace it and go cold turkey. But first I have to drink up the rest of that coke…………
It’s Like I’ve been saying to the guys that I work with, we want to buy things, to be prepping to help our families. Will spend 30 40 dollars on a meal to eat out, we buy expensive carbonated drinks, we buy all kind of things that we don’t need. If we were to figure out how much money that we frivolously spend and instead use that on prepping. How much closer would we be to what we want. I’m as guilty as any and more guilty than some but I gotta change.
I know our attention has moved on, but I had to say I’ve been more than 10 days without coke. A couple of nights I have sipped no more than 2 oz…..and only that much. I am trying to learn to like Coke Zero to get me off that burn in the back of the throat…found out that is what I liked about coke. Mostly lots of water and iced tea. Also, off white bread and trying to learn to like whole wheat…..makes horrible toast.