I have for some time now been suffering strong burning feelings and numbness of the toes. (And yes, I *KNOW* I should have seen my doctor. I just hadn’t got that far yet.) The burning feelings have been mostly felt in the late afternoon and evenings. This largely coincides with the times spent at my computer desk (a necessity as I earn my living at the computer), and had not been experienced while away from the desk, as for example, out for the evening with my wife, Along with the burning, I have also had some numbness of my toes. I had come to the conclusion that the condition as such was something to be expected as a not-as-controlled-as-I-should-be type 2 diabetic, and that possibly my chair at the desk was aggravating it by interfering with circulation. I was getting to the stage where I was going to buy a new chair to see what happened.
Then I spotted John’s posting, and I couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if I stopped drinking Tab, and its Aspartame content. The way I saw it, it couldn’t harm me, and if there was anything in the postings, it might even help.
The results were, to me, amazing. Up to Thursday, the burning feelings were strong, long lasting to being almost continuous, and bordering on downright painful.
I stopped drinking Tab on Friday afternoon. This was the only change I have made in the past 3 days. Friday evening, the burning feelings were drastically reduced. Saturday they were practically non-existent, and what few there were, were very mild, and went away very quickly.
As I write this, Sunday morning, the numbness has definitely eased, although it is, I admit, difficult to quantify. The feet just feel somehow “better” this morning.
I realize that 3 days is hardly a definitive test, and it seems impossible, but all I can say is that my feet are feeling MUCH better in that period, and the only change I’ve made is to stop drinking Tab. If that’s what giving up Tab can do, I can live without the Tab, thank you very much.
After a month I tried it again and within a day I was getting uncomfortable feelings in my legs again which again vanished on ceasing ingestion of this drink.
Obviously I haven’t got this far yet, but assuming that I have no recurrences within a week, I fully intend to try this test as well.
The bottom line, as far as I’m concerned, is that one should at least TRY before de-crying, and getting hot under the collar about the qualifications or otherwise of those opposing Aspartame.
Certainly most, if not all, of the problems Aspartame is being blamed for are very likely things that will be experienced anyway, but as far as I can see, they can be aggravated or advanced by Aspartame, and that’s an unacceptable price to pay. It’s bad enough that these “nasties” are in the future without advancing them.
From what I’ve seen in various postings, and from information I have received yesterday, one of the problems with Aspartame is that it breaks down into methanol/wood-alcohol (which nobody seems to be disputing).
I think we all know what consuming methanol does to humans.