★★★★★
I also experienced "Splenda withdrawals" which felt similar to hypoglycemia. I was so sick I thought I might have Type I diabetes even though I am in my 30's. The symptoms were really severe for at least 2 days and it took about a week before I felt somewhat normal. I was scared to eat because every time I did I felt groggy and flushed and shortly afterwards I would feel light-headed and anxious just as if my blood sugar had crashed. I had severe lower back pain, anxiety and photophobia and would wake up in the middle of the night in a sweat and severe anxiety. It was very scary and I'm posting so that maybe I can provide peace of mind for someone else going through this.
I was eating the packaged Splenda every day which includes sucralose and maltodextrim. I believe the sucralose gave me SIBO (I had little burps constantly immediately after eating and steatorrhea and my vitamin D was low even though I supplement with cod liver oil every day) and the maltodextrim was probably masking the signs that I had absorption problems by providing a constant source of sugar to my brain (I noticed the flushed feeling with the packaged Stevia as well which also contains maltodextrim as a filler).
While on the Splenda, I gradually developed severe brain fog. The whole process was very insidious because I didn't notice any effects immediately after eating Splenda so I believe my side effects were a result of SIBO since sucralose has been shown to kill off 50% of the good bacteria in your intestine (which would make sense if bad bacteria are using the undigested sucralose as a food source and then killing the good bacteria).
I drank lots of water, acidophilus and some apple cider vinegar to try to restore my gut flora. One good thing to come of this, is that I discovered I have mild Asperger's syndrome which the Splenda probably exacerbated. I was definitely a different version of myself on Splenda.
