One thing that might help is sparkling water. I grew up with an an unhealthy daily soda habit and eventually kicked it but would still crave a Coke after and couple of weeks. What helped me kick that is drinking lots of plain sparkling water (Pierrer/La Croix). I think what I was really looking for was that carbonated “kick” after all.
I'm currently a Coca Cola addict. It's not unbearable, but I really have strong cravings regularly. It's not thirst -- I don't want water, I specifically want Coca Cola.
This beverage has no redeeming qualities, and I want to kick off this habit.
When (mostly) quitting soda I discovered my craving was actually 80/20 carbonation/sweetness, so I could almost totally satisfy it with club soda (cheap) or sparkling mineral water (pricier but generally better). Seltzer didn't work—I think it had too little salt, tasted weird. Lemons and limes are pretty cheap if you want a little flavor and a touch of sweetness, and they provide some vitamins so they're not a total waste of calories. Much better than various flavored sparkling waters, IMO. Mostly I drank it plain, though.
Of course I have a lot more fat on me now than back when I averaged (guessing) 1.5L/day of soda and probably 4000+ total calories a day, almost all junk food. Lots of effort just to slow the progression away from a fit (looking) body toward a middle-aged one. And I feel way, way less healthy and get sick all the time, as opposed to never. Man, being a teenager was great. :-/
Even if you don't get something like that, just having a glass of water nearby is a great way to reduce consumption. I drink a lot of diet soda and it's mainly out of compulsion to constantly drink liquids. If I keep a nice cold cup of water near where I am, the soda consumption drops super fast. Once I start drinking water during that day, that's usually what sticks.
For me, it's almost all about the habit of constantly drinking. That said, even though I know how to kick the habit, I still tend to drink a lot of diet soda because it's a nice pick-me-up.
pro-tip for anyone trying to kick a soda (or alcohol) habit: get yourself a seltzer maker, and an assortment of bitters (Fee Bros Cranberry, Walnut, and standard Angostura are a good place to start).
This is just my personal experience, but I found that most of the unhealthy drinking I was doing was out of habit and boredom. I’m just as happy with a seltzer + a few dashes of bitters as I was with a beer or a coke.
I still need a small glass of Diet Coke every day in the afternoon. I need to cut the habit so I'm drinking right now Diet Coke without Caffeine.. It is like the last step before quitting for good. I like to drink sparkling water (San Pellegrino) when eating, I hope it will help me stop. Fresh sparkling water is good!
My bottle of 1 liter (33 oz I think in the US) lasts 4 or 5 days so I don't know if I'm at risk.
Similarly, I used to drink 4-6 cans of Coke a day, and quit about 2 years ago. I now make a half gallon of black unsweetened tea to take to work every day to have iced tea. I still find myself craving a Coke frequently, and often break down on the weekends and have one. I usually end up drinking the whole thing in just a few minutes, and really want to get another, it takes a great deal of willpower to have a glass of water instead.
I noticed the same thing. After consuming a soda a day for even just a few days I start to crave it. But if I stop drinking soda altogether, within a week the cravings go away, and I'm just as happy with water.
Try "flavored" seltzer water. I'm addicted to it now, and regular soda is largely undrinkable. You start to get used to the very, very subtle flavor in the seltzer water and after a while it just tastes like soda, but you're basically only drinking carbonated water.
Club soda got me off them (this is before fizzy water became a trendy drink). Turns out my craving was mostly for the carbonation bite, not the sugar.
Seltzer water didn't work. The missing minerals make it taste super weird to my palate. Had to be club soda (or sparkling mineral water, but that was too expensive for me to have often at the time).
I drank a couple Cokes a day for many, many years. I finally decided to quit. It took a full year before losing desire for Coke. I tried a few sips of it, and it actually tasted bad.
Switched to diet Coke, and drank that for a few more years. Then decided that was probably just as bad, and now drink sparkling water.
I no longer have any desire to drink sweetened beverages of any sort.
Being older, I decided to stop eating all ice cream, cookies, candy bars, pie, etc., about 2 months ago. This is difficult. I've tried that before, and failed.
I found switching to sparkling water (we bought a Soda Stream) helped me here. Now I get a real soda maybe once every week or two as a "treat" (basically the now rare occasion we order takeout) and can resist them when in an office (rarely these days) with a vending machine.
Have one every month. That way it is not a temptation and you do not make a big deal out of it.
I'm a diet coke addict and the way I deal with it is that I drink half a bottle and keep the rest for latter. The fact that I know that I still have a half-full soda makes me not want to buy another. And if I feel like drinking some soda I just take a sip. The soda is at room temperature so it tastes like shit. This crappy taste makes not want to drink anymore and I can go without buying a new bottle of diet coke for more than a week. Sometimes I can last a month. By using this method I don't feel guilty if every once in a while I have a soda and I've been able to reduce my daily intake of a bottle of soda to just one small bottle (20FL oz) every one or two weeks.
I quit soda this year, and it's been very difficult. Sometimes I just want to wash down a great meal with a tall, ice cold Coke. Hoping after being away from it long term I start to not want it anymore.
I cut out regular and diet soda entirely, switching to green tea and san pelligrino carbonated mineral water, in January 2011.
There's really no way to do it other than cold turkey, but similarly to kicking morphine for heroin after the civil war, it's easiest to do cold turkey by replacing with something better. :)
I second the idea of not drinking soda for 30 days. That stuff is unhealthy in various ways, and after a couple weeks, you won't miss it. It's a clear easy win. I did this in high school and have not regretted it.
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