How many 12 ounce servings do you drink each day?

For me it was straight up coke, none of this watered down diet stuff. Anyways, I was drinking about 4-6 cans per day. For the first couple of weeks I limited myself to 3 cans and then planned to drop to 2, then 1, then nothing slowly over time. After those 2 weeks I said screw it and went cold turkey. The first three days were the toughest but after that it was a breeze. That was 10 years ago and now I probably have 4-6 sodas per year - usually a Sprite when I'm not feeling good. I can't drink a coke anymore but will take a sip or two of the kids when we're out to eat for a quick taste.

I used to drink 6-10 Mountains dews per day...I just stopped drinking them. It sucked for the first 3-5 days and I had some nasty headaches, but now I can't even drink the crap as it's way too sweet. I have probably 5 soft drinks a year now, generally after a race or on a really hot summer day.

As your family implies, there are much worse addictions. But having something that you can't seem to control isn't good. My drug of choice was Pepsi. I finally stopped just by going cold. The first three days are the worst of it. It's good to have something available for the potential headaches that are part of the withdrawal. I don't think there is a magic formula to quit. As others have said, weaning off sofa by dropping the amount can work. For me that was too easy to to justify another sofa if the day was stressful or whatever reason I could dream up. Cold turkey with no soda in the house at all worked for me. Again, those first few days sucks. Let it be a reminder how much of a hold the stuff can have and use that as leverage to not go back down that road. And have some activities, hobbies, or something to keep yourself busy to help keep your mind off from it.

My way will not suit many - however, you did ask.


You aren't addicted. You are following a pattern that you have created. The addiction mindset tends to be used to portray oneself as a victim. You're not a victim. You are doing something that you don't want to do. Putting the blame on external factors is be beginnign of failure.

It doesn't increase - you increase it. Perhaps stop buying it? Then you'll reduce consumption by not having it in your home.

You are the only one who can. Own that.

As vices go, it's not so bad. Stop beating yourself up about it and don't create a big deal about it. Making a big deal about it is part of why you are finding it so hard to stop.

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My Blog

Hey - I'm 'addicted' to coke zero and have failed to quit on several occasions. You've inspired me. I'm going to switch one of my two coke zeros to seltzer water today, and try to do same for the second in February. Try it with me.

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Dimond Bikes Superfan

I drink tons of the stuff. Wouldn't say I'm an addict, but I prefer calorie free soda over water any second of the day.

Don't be so type A about it and let it slide. It's not really that big of a deal. I don't think it's going to affect performance that much (if any), and like others have said, there are MUCH worse things.

Try some crystal light, a soda stream for carbonation, or other water flavorings if you are that worried. Water is just boring. But really, it's not a big deal.

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New Training/Racing Log - http://www.earthdaykid.com/blog --- Old Training/Racing Log - http://colinlaughery.blogspot.com

I just gave up all diet sodas at the start of January. Still crave it after lunch, but am forcing myself to drink water instead. An hour or so later, I've forgotten about it. Will go to end of January to prove to myself that I can do it. But the question is whether to start again? I like the taste and honestly have noticed zero difference in my health, ability to sleep etc. since I've stopped drinking it... and the literature seems less than overwhelming that aspartame is that bad for you. Honestly not sure what I'll do on Feb 1st...

A few years ago I drank soda from the time i woke till the time i went to bed, i was probably having between close to 6 - 8 cans a day. What helped me was switching to Seltzer. I started with some of the flavored ones and now i just drink plane seltzer. If you are looking at the flavored ones make sure they do not have any of those artificial sweeteners, that the same garbage that is in diet soda.

Weird concept. Do you demand that everything in life should entertain you?

For me there's nothing like the pleasure of a nice cool drink of water when you're thirsty.
Sometimes a good beer or some juices gives it a run for it's money, but water is always satisfying.
Anything very sweet, in contrast, is deeply unsatisfying, and drinks with just the sweetness but no calories are the least satisfying of all.
I don't get it!

Entertain me? No. Be interesting? Sure, I guess... No dude. You are way overthinking this. I just like my liquid sweet. Don't read too far into this.

I understand where you are coming from. My wife is the same way with no kcal sweetened water/soda.

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New Training/Racing Log - http://www.earthdaykid.com/blog --- Old Training/Racing Log - http://colinlaughery.blogspot.com

I used to probably drink 2-3 diet cokes/day, now I probably drink that many in a month. Here is what worked for me:
1. Water bottle, get used to carrying it around. This way I wasn't "thirsty" to justify the soda thats on hand, I always had something to sip on through the day.
2. La Croix (or similar) flavored and carbonated waters. I downed a ton of these for awhile, pretty much anytime I had the feeling I wanted a soda I would just crack one and enjoy.
3. Stop buying it at home. Simple as that, you can't drink what you don't have. This limited my chances to workday and then out and abouts.
4. Coffee. If it is a "bump" you are looking for, I replaced it with more coffee. We can debate how smart that is, but nonetheless it helped with the tired times of reaching for a soda.
Good luck. As others said this is not the worst vice, but one that you certainly can eliminate or reduce.

It's not uncommon to get headaches or just feel kinda lousy if you suddenly stop caffeine intake. That might be your issue. Get some caffeine free diet dr. Pepper and swap out one can/day every 3-4 days until you are just on the no caffeine stuff. From there it's a lot easier to replace the no caffeine diet drs with sparkling waters or something else.

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ECMGN Therapy Silicon Valley:
Depression, Neurocognitive problems, Dementias (Testing and Evaluation), Trauma and PTSD, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

You have a couple options:

If you drink the 20 oz bottles, switch to cans, then switch to those mini-cans. I prefer the 8 oz ones because it gives me just enough taste to satisfy my craving
If seltzer water works, then it is an easy substitute.
If you just want to drink better quality soda (in terms of ingredients), switch to zevia. Alternate one caffeinated and one non-caffeinated

I personally use a combination of caffeinated nuun and occasionally a water enhancer like Mio, or Stur if you want fewer junk ingredients. I don't do much caffeine as it is so half a tab of nuun energy gives me plenty of pick up

Actually quitting will be the accumulation of a bunch of tiny good decisions. Make a conscious decision each time you choose to to get something to drink not to drink soda. Focus on that one decision at that time. Don't get bogged down with previous decisions (good or bad), or what happened earlier in the day, yesterday, or last week. Just make the right decision now. Do that over and over again for a week. Let the satisfaction of making a good decision be your reward, not the soda.

If that doesn't help, substitute cocaine for soda and you'll kick it quick.

As others have said above, I used to drink 3-5 cokes a day. A zip of coke would most certainly take the edge off on a stressful day. But I slowly weaned myself off. It took a good year to do.

I would use coffee, pepsi + coke zero as substitutes. If I were you I would probably drink Mr Pibb as a substitute.

You can most certainly be addicted to sodas. I think you need to treat it like any other addiction.

I used to keep a couple 2 liters of Pepsi under my desk and just filled a cup... probably drank one 2 liter a day at work. Then probably another can at home or a couple glasses of sweet tea. I smoked too.

I quit smoking and drinking Pepsi/tea were associated with smoking so I cut those out too. When I think of soda I think back to when I worked at Subway in high school and the container of slick syrup sludge we put in the drink machines. It makes me cringe a little, having a negative thought associated with soda. Being more health conscious and aware of sugar, I'm not a fan of added sugars in food especially.

Not sure if I can lend anything useful but I used to smoke and drink a ton of soda/sugary stuff. Just take a day at a time, it gets easier. I found the behavioral addictions to be the biggest hurdles... breaks at work were two cigarettes and a cup of Pepsi. I had to make new patterns and behaviors. Totally worth it!

you need to start believing that it is bad for you before you begin to dislike it. if you don't believe this is bad for you then psychologically you have no other reason to stop this habit. instead attempt to substitute your sugar cravings with something such as fruits, trailmix (this worst best for me) or sugar free gum as this will keep you occupied and while you're are it continue to believe and accept that sodas of all types are bad for your health (which they are) and you'll slowly but surely will overcome this habit.

have a reward program for when you complete 3 good days, perfect week, and perfect month... things that you wont go do/have otherwise except if you did complete the 3 days or week or month. have something that will reward you for good "behavior". also if you end up in a weak moment and drink a soda don't beat yourself about it and know what you did was wrong and believe that you can improve! this is how i beat my smoking addiction and while i do smoke cigars from time to time and the occasional cigarette i am not a smoker nor a social one. i continue to have cravings and simply reroute my trains of thoughts into something else to over come the cravings! also i had a small scare since i had a ct scan which showed a black spot in my lungs 3mil big and that has completely turn me off from smoking.

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Speed kills unless you have speed skills!!!

From 2000-2007 I worked for a company that provided free soda, so I would drink it almost constantly..probably 5-7 cans of Diet Pepsi or Mountain Dew throughout the day. Quit a few times just by tapering off on consumption over the course of a couple of weeks then going cold turkey over a weekend so that the headaches wouldn't affect my daily work, but would inevitably ease back into it after a few weeks to a couple of months (usually when stressed).

In the intervening years at another job I got it down to 1 or 2 sodas per day, and don't drink anywhere near as much now (and make a conscious effort to drink more water).

Coincidentally, I re-joined the same company a few weeks ago and the free soda is still a thing here, but I'm ignoring the diet sodas and drinking either seltzer or just regular old water instead. Having a big stainless tumbler of water handy throughout the day helps with that.

Imagine someone pissed in the can. That should help.

I used to drink 44oz prob 4 times a week at work, and went through a 2-liter at home through the week. I just know all that artificial sweetener wasn't good for me so I just decided I had to stop. I cut back to 1-2 a week at work, then to once a week. This was over about 2 weeks. Then I just stopped. It's been over a year now.

If I really feel the need for a coke, I'll get a regular one maybe once a month.

The amount I drink varies widely but what I'm doing on any given day. It's definitely worse if I'm driving (road trip sodas!) or hanging around the house studying (which unfortunately happens a lot these days). If I'm busy at class or on a rotation, then I can avoid it.
However, on my worse days I can easily polish off a 2 liter bottle.
I really appreciate everyone's thoughts and perspectives. Keep them coming.

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http://www.tri-ingtokeepwarm.com

One other thing that helps: consistently protect your sleep. After sleeping well for a week, you won't long for the caffeine as much.

I ask myself if my cat would drink it.