My experience with Aspartame is this: in the early 80’s (which is when I think it began being used heavily) on a very, very hot L.A. summer morning, I was chugging Crystal Light Lemonade. I went to church at noon and passed out halfway through the service (very dangerous, considering those pews are spaced pretty closely together). My mother, certain I was pregnant (I was actually a virgin) rushed me to the hospital. They did a bazillion tests and whatnot, including a dizzying array of EKG *and* EEG tests, blood sugar levels, etc. etc. What they concluded was that I had passed out due to the large amount of Aspartame in my system. They told me it is really, REALLY tough to metabolize, and they had been having a number of fainting victims related to ingesting the stuff. I don’t remember exactly why it made people faint, maybe a lot of blood goes to your stomach, trying to digest it, and there’s not enough going to your brain and boom – you’re horizontal.
A friend of mine who was a chemistry major at USC at the time told me they’d run some tests in one of his labs and determined that Aspartame turns into methyl alcohol in your stomach, but I think he was joking.
At any rate, I avoid it like the plague, now. (Aspartame, not methyl alcohol. Well, I don’t eat *that* either. 🙂