Diet Soda/Excedrin Habit

[Jayceef]

I have a terrible diet soda and Excedrin habit. I drink 4-5 diet sodas daily and take excedrin everyday to combat with headaches/migraines. My DH keeps bothering me about the bad habit, he thinks I am going to end up on dialysis someday. This scares me as well, I just hate having bad headaches. I put a pitcher of plain water with some lemon juice in the fridge to drink today. I have only had one diet soda so far and I did take some excedrin already. I ordered a product called migralief to see if that would help me to quite taking excedrin so much.

 

Any thoughts or ideas to help would be much appreciated.

[gofish]

The sweetener in diet drinks gives me very painfull headaches.I stoped drinking them when I was pregnant with my 1 child and 90% of my headaches went away.

[themartianchick]

What GoFish said... I used to get migraines and found that Excedrine helped them to go away. A little research helped me to learn about the connection between birth control pills, diet sweeteners and migraines. I got off of the bc pills and began to seriously limit the artificial sweeteners. I rarely get migraines any more and a small bottle of Excedrine Migraine will probably last me for two years if things continue along at this rate..

[Fullpantry]

Oh I have SOOOOO been where you are! I drank 4 - 5 regular Cokes per day (20 oz) and took Excedrin at least once per day. When I finally decided to stop drinking soda, it was really rough for about 2 weeks (bad headaches, feeling run-down, etc.) But I pushed through it and now I hardly ever have a headache. I take Excedrin for a headache maybe once or twice a month.

 

The thing that amazed me the most was that when I quit Cokes and started drinking water, it took me about 4 days before I was having to pee a lot. You know, you drink water all day, you usually have to pee all day. I didn't and it was because I was so dehydrated from the Coke. Those things really dehydrate you and that can cause headaches as well.

 

I know its tough, but if you can kick the soda habit and tough it out for the first couple of weeks you will feel so much better! Its amazing how sluggish you are and you don't realize it until you get all that crap out of your system. I can think better, I sleep better, and I have very few headaches.

[Jayceef]

Thanks for the responses. I know that I just need to kick the bad habits. I am going to try the hardest I have ever tried. This whole deal with Egypt has me thinking that prices on everything are going to go up. Which means that soda is more of a want than ever before. Plus I don't need any unnecessary doctor visits for something as trivial as my migraines.

[mommato3boys]

Ditto on the horrible headaches with diet sodas. Can't drink them so I stick to lemon water and if I must have a soda I drink Sprite or Sierra Mist Natural. Don't have the horrible headaches anymore.

[Amishway Homesteaders]

Good luck with the DTs...........

But in the end things will be so much better.

Ask Hubby to bear with you as you go through this stage and he may have a new woman when you are done.

 

***also most headaches are from lack of water. So drink water, just water and most headaches go away in 15 minutes!

People think by taking aspirin they are helping seeing it went away but it may have been the water that did it NOT the pill.

The headaches are your body telling you it is starting to dehydrate.

 

And besides look at all the money you will be saving.

 

 

[michelle]

What Michael said. I am bad about drinking water although I've been doing a lot better for a while. I 'know' that but every time I would get a headache dh would remind me again "Did you drink water?". I could drink a large glass of water and lay down for a few minutes and no headache. I do take Aleve (normally) on occasion if I get a bad headache but that's rare. Usually water takes care of it.

[Vic303]

A number of things can be causing your headaches. 1. I expect you are consuming a TON of caffeine. Excedrin is full of it, as are many sodas, diet or otherwise. Withdrawl or reduction of caffeine intake results in headache.

2. Caffeine is a diuretic, and if you are dehydrated you will often get a headache. 3. You could be having a reaction to something in the soda you drink. Try subbing coffee instead, and use a small amount of real sugar if you take it sweet. If the headaches stop by subbing coffee for soda, then you can be pretty sure it was the soda. BUT remember that coffee has more caffeine in it than soda. Here is a chart for comparison.

http://www.wilstar.com/caffeine.htm

[Katz25]

I was drinking 2 Diet Dr. Pepper daily for about 25 yrs, and then the headaches which I would dull down with 2 tylenol and 3 ibuprophen. I finally had enough and quit cold turkey. You know the sweetner is really bad fo you, the fizzy stuff eats away at your bones and lots of other things. Anyway so I wouldn't get headache in a.m. I know just put 1 tsp. instant non sweetened tea in a glass of water with ice and that way I don't get headache from no caffiene. I don't like tea or coffee, so one glass does the trick and the rest of the time its water. It was hard for couple weeks, but now don't even think about it and I'm not taking all that extra OTC meds. You can do it, just get thru these first days. You'll feel so much better and your health will be better for stopping the vicious cycle of drinks and excedrin. Good luck!

'

[CoM]

Of course you should try to get off the diet drinks. I hear feverfew herb is good for migraines.

 

From Herbalpedia:

 

For prevention of migraines take a 100 mg capsule per day. At the start of a migraine

take 5-10 drops of the tincture every 30 minutes at onset. Best for “cold” type

migraines, involving tightening of the cerebral blood vessels and eased by applying a hot

towel to the head.