Dear Nutrasweet injured group:

 My name is Merilee, from the Boston area, and I too have quite a story on how nutrasweet made me severely ill. I am so glad that I found your site and links. I am fairly new to the Internet so bear with me on some of the lingo that I may use.

 Below is my story if you would like to use it somewhere on your site please feel free to contact me at: merigypsy@aol.com

 3 years ago I began having a wide range of strange symptoms that were affecting my health. Once a bodybuilder, a very healthy eater and free of any serious illnesses I found myself wondering if I were going to die but with no diagnosis!

 I had been on a 12 step recovery based diet that eliminated all forms of sugar, flour and grains. This was a godsend diet for I have an eating disorder and am happy and healthy today following the plan and free of nutrasweet!

 Up until this time in my life I had always used artificial sweeteners and dieted. When nutrasweet came out I was happy and sought out many products containing it! Diet sodas, diet gum, yogurts, cookies etc. 6 years ago when I made the commitment to drop the sugars I reached out for Nutrasweet all the more!  Now I consumed about 6-8 diet sodas a day, put it in my several coffees, drank crystal light, dumped heaping tablespoons of nutra on my yogurt, in baking, on my fruit and virtually all that I ate... and this was daily, for 3 Years!

 The symptoms...I began having blurred vision (sometimes having to pull over while driving almost causing accidents), light spots before my eyes like someone just took a picture, severe hypoglycemic symptoms- I eat 3 meals a day, it got so bad that I couldn't last 3 hours between meals without blurred vision, slurring of words, I felt mentally retarded, and almost blacked out in public trying to get to some food.  I could no longer work out, I was so fatigued and the dizziness increased when I exercised along with a strange throbbing pressure in my head. I went to the Joscelyn Diabetes clinic in Boston got checked for Hypoglycemia and they ruled out everything and were puzzled by my symptoms!

 Hormonally, PMS seemed extra strong (I mostly thought it was "just me"). My periods were irregular (non existing for 1 year), something not new to me while I was heavily training, but I was no longer working out and I had plenty of body fat!

 I had been prone to anxiety attacks in the past, but they began acting up more and more. I thought I may need medication for it. If anyone knows about panic disorder, one can easily panic over panicking and with all these crazy symptoms with no validation, once again I thought it was "just me" again. Now I had been to see all sorts of doctors, first with my primary care doctors, the Diabetes center, then I tried a western approach .. Chinese herbal medicine. I drank all sorts of teas and after almost a year gave up (I still highly respect Chinese and other holistic approaches).

 I next tried a treatment of Homeopathic remedies and accupressure. The breakthrough finally came when I just happened to mention to my new doctor that I was using Nutrasweet. My very wise doctor Gasped with horror and gave me a stat sheet on the dangers of Nutrasweet & symptoms!!!  I was horrified and relieved to finally find the answer to my problems. I didn't realize there were so many different symptoms. I thought I just had so many unrelated freaky health problems! though my intuition told me some thing was very wrong and not to just give up.

 I also shared this information with my friend who is a chiropractor and very educated in both Western and Eastern medicines. He further validated the dangers of Nutrasweet. He recommended detoxing and cleaning myself of all products of nutrasweet and said I should be free of most all symptoms within a few days!

 I quit all the products, drank lots of water and amazingly felt 100 times better! the Hypoglycemic symptoms..gone, dizziness, blurred vision, flashes of lights, pressure in head were all gone. Anxiety/panic attacks..gone, PMS hardly noticeable, and my periods came back soon and have been regular ever since even with workouts!! The fatigue... history, as well. I felt more mentally alert, too. I finally felt like myself again!

 Now it has been 3 years since I cut it all out. I had been occasionally indulging in a soda or yogurt with minimal symptoms, but after rereading this site, I feel slapped back into reality and I'm grateful! a soda is not worth my health! Not with this type of damage!!!

 Anyway I hope I didn't bore you with this info, but I figure if you can use it to help others contact me!

 Thanks you all for the Site!!!