Re: Sweeteners
No no no no no no no no no no !
Sweeteners are terrible things, carcinogenic, stay very well clear. In years to come they will get banned.
You're doing the right thing otherwise.
Remove any bags of white refined sugar you have in the house, pure poison, throw it away.
Beware cereals. Even if you're not adding your own sugar to them, the vast majority of them are loaded with sugar anyway. Even those one would think healthy.
Kelloggs Bran Flakes - 14g sugar per 100g (14%)
Kelloggs All Bran - 18g sugar per 100g (18%)
Kelloggs Special K Original - 15g sugar per 100g (15%)
Pretty shocking really when these products would be deemed by most adverts and slimming clubs to be good for you.
An average serving size of cereal is said to be 30g though I suspect it will be more in reality for many people. Even at 30g though, those cereals are delivering the equivalent of 5-6g of sugar per serving which is between 1 teaspoonful of sugar and 1.5 teaspoonfuls.
Years ago I used to put sugar in tea and coffee and then like you thought sweeteners was the way to go to reduce sugar. Thankfully I didn't do it that long. I ultimately just stopped putting any sweeteners in tea and coffee.
If you find this hard, here's a way to achieve it.
Stop drinking your normal tea/coffee completely for about 1 week. In their place drink fruit teas and green teas or your choice. Japanese rice tea is a nice substitute but I found Clipper Green Tea the easiest.
After a week you will be craving your normal cup of tea/coffee quite badly.
At that point make your normal drink with NO sugar or sweeteners and drink it and you'll find it's actually fine. The caffeine kick you needed was the most important element and that familiar taste of your regular brew.
Aside from this, make sure you now examine the nutrition labels of absolutely everything you pick up in the store. You'll be surprised at the sugar content of most.
Remember that 4g sugar is 1 teaspoonful.
Avoid those products where you would be eating that amount in a serving.
Some are obvious. Ketchups, brown sauce, all fruit juices etc. Some are less obvious like tins/cartons of chopped tomatoes or passata, natural yoghurts and the like.
Check everything and continue giving sugar the heave ho.
You'll lose a stone pretty quickly once sugars are out of your diet.
GL