Aspartame

What is Aspartame?

An artificial sweetener containing phenylalanine. Found in most diet colas, fat-free sweetened yoghurts, sugar-free products and just about everything 'sweet' these days.

Phenylalanine excites neurons in the brain to the point of cellular death. And an ongoing intake of aspartame can lead to severe discomfort, illness and in some cases, death.

We got VERY sick. Make sure that YOU don't! I'm 27. And I used to live in such sweet bliss. If only I'd realised how dangerous it was to be so naive. If only I'd listened to the warnings about aspartame. I've been on a few diets in my life and always used artificial sweeteners in place of sugar. It worked pretty well. Every morning: my favourite cereal and two sachets of sweetener for breakfast. On top of which, I enjoyed a caffeine-free, sugar-free diet cola for years - on and off. If things hadn't gone terribly wrong earlier this year, I probably wouldn't have started this site. It started with me waking up with a headache one morning. Nothing unusual there - I took two tablets and expected things to ease up, as usual. But things got worse. By the time I hit the traffic, I had to sit with my head on the steering wheel. Weak, nauseous, pain all over. This wasn't just a headache.

Over the next few weeks, the headaches multiplied - and stuck. Eventually, my head was permanently aching, dizzy or half-numbed by painkillers. That wasn't half the problem. The nausea was excruciating. The weakness and fatigue were crippling. And the stomach cramps and diarrhea struck without warning - sometimes joined by panic attacks to push things completely over the edge.

I put it down to a stomach bug. Some virus or flu strain. It had to be something new and unexplainable - I hadn't been this ill since I could remember. Eventually, the symptoms faded away. Until that weekend, when I was right back where I started. The following week, same pattern. The next week, same thing. I was left weak, desperate and scared: was there something more serious going on? I had to face the facts. This kind of suffering wasn't normal, and the ongoing nature of the symptoms meant it wasn't just a quick flu bug. It was serious. So I scoured the web, searching for articles to try diagnose my particular set of symptoms. Almost immediately, one word popped up all over the place: aspartame.

First thing I thought: "Okay - that can't be me. Sure I use aspartame, but that can't be causing all this." And with the thought barely out of my mind, reality shifted completely in the next 2 minutes. I found a site that listed symptom after symptom of aspartame usage - and more than half of the early symptoms matched mine. Then - I started to panic. And THEN I started to think about it. How much aspartame was I eating and drinking? Turns out, much more than I realised.

Here's what I discovered, when I looked at my average day. Between sweetener with cereal, four cups of tea (with sweetener), a few glasses of diet cola, breath freshening minty paper strips and a fat-free yoghurt on the odd day - I was practically breathing aspartame, all day, every day.

Now here's the thing. As far as I was concerned, I was leading a healthy lifestyle! Sugar-free sweetener, fat-free yoghurt, sugar-free breath mints, caffeine/sugar-free cola and, as a treat now and then, a sugar-free low-fat milkshake. How could all of this be BAD for me? More concerningly, how could all of this ALREADY be affecting my health in such a drastically negative way? And why had the companies using aspartame (containing phenylalanine remember) never offered even the most insignificant of warnings? Why had our Department of Health never issued a general statement to the public? Why had it taken me being THIS ill to turn to the internet to diagnose myself, when this is clearly a worldwide problem of epidemic proportions? And how could such a devastating ingredient remain the manufacturers' best-kept secret for so long?

I've just come to grips with the fact that I've been poisoning myself. I haven't properly detoxed myself yet - but I'm already starting to feel better. Almost normal. I haven't felt this good in weeks - and all because I've made this little life-changing observation. This site is here to help you do the same. We'll be posting links, setting up a forum, lobbying the South African government and making sure that - if nothing else - the public is aware of the real dangers of aspartame. Consumers need to be free to make an informed choice. While we're busy constructing the rest of our site, please contact us with your stories, resources or advice. We're ready to take the system on. And win back our human and constitutional right to be healthy. Watch this space, stop using aspartame and tell your friends and family!