Weight Gain

Even though you're not drinking all that sugar, there are some risks associated with artificial sweeteners. They have a more intense sugar flavor than actual sugar, so they can actually start to turn our bodies off foods with natural sugars, like fruit. According to Brooke Alpert, RD, artificial sweeteners have now been shown to have the same effect on your body as sugar."Artificial sweeteners trigger insulin, which sends your body into fat storage mode and leads to weight gain," Alpert says.Other studies have shown that people who drink diet soda on a daily basis had a 500% increase in waist circumference vs those who did not.