1) Wean Yourself Off. Cold turkey is not only mentally hard, but can be very painful, if you’ve become addicted. Caffeine and sugar addictions are very real things!
If you have more than 1 soda (12 oz can) a day, first cut down until you’re at only 1. That might mean 4 today, 3 tomorrow, 2 and then 1.
You can then go to every other day, and so on. The key is to have a plan for your goal, the abstract rarely works.
2) Mix your Soda with Sparkling Water. This is sort of like quitting coffee by mixing half decaf and half regular.
The sweetness is what most people crave in the taste of soda, and this can cut that down. Of course the sugar and caffeine are the rest, and this cuts that down too.
Your taste buds DO change with time, which is why people who swear they don’t like a certain veggie, can learn to like them eventually.
Your body actually changes.
3) Start Replacing Soda with Tea that has Caffeine. I like to put sparkling water and ice tea together for sure. I’m a fan of the bubbles!
You can also just go green or black tea, and go for full possible caffeine dose.
If you do this one in the morning, you can keep soda off until much later in the day, as you start to cut back.
4) Switch to Natural Soda. There are lot of sodas that have no artificial ingredients, a ton less sugar, and skip out on things like high fructose corn syrup.
You can then switch to flavored water, if the bubbles and flavor are really important to you. You’ll skip out on the sugar and the chemicals, and actually be hydrating your body, instead of dehydrating it with soda!
5) TELL EVERYONE. The thing I see most people do, is not tell the people around them, when they have a goal.They say it’s because they don’t want people to see them fail.
If you dig deep enough, it’s usually because they don’t want to ACTUALLY have to stick to it. .
If everyone at work knows you are only allowed 1 per day, and you stand up an say to the office, this is my 1, don’t let me have another, even if they never call you out, you’ll do better at not wanting to go back on your word.
I hope you find this helpful and I am here if you need anything at all for your health, fitness, or nutrition!