Personal experience: why I gave up coffee and how it changed my life

2024 Author: Malcolm Clapton | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 03:44

The editor of Men’s Health magazine tells how he got rid of the addiction to an invigorating drink.

My first day quitting caffeine was like a scene from Danny Boyle's Trainspotting. Imagine a grown man lying on the couch soaked in sweat (even though it was November), his head splitting. I had mild headaches for a whole week.

But then I began to sleep more soundly and longer, and my general state of health improved, although in the morning I sometimes still felt the urge to drink a cup of coffee. I became less tired in the afternoon. Got less irritable when things don't go the way I wanted. I lost a few pounds.

Caffeine is great, but it can hurt you too.

How caffeine affects you depends on your biology and how much you actually pour into yourself. Before I decided to give it up forever, I drank over three cups a day. But conversations with people smarter than me - biochemists, nutritionists, sleep experts, and neurologists - led me to believe that I overdid it with coffee and now it is harmful to my health, sleep, mood and performance.

If you've been on caffeine your entire adult life, you probably don't notice how it affects you. Start by measuring how much you drink per day, and then pay attention to your physical and mental condition. If you, like me, decide it's time to do something about your caffeine addiction, here are some tips.

How much caffeine do you consume?

90% of American adults consume caffeine every day. Recommended How much caffeine do you consume? the daily allowable dose is 300 mg. A glass of Starbucks medium roasted coffee contains 310 mg of caffeine. A serving of lightly fried is already 475 mg. So if you drink several cups a day, swallow 1000 mg of caffeine by the evening.

According to Caffeine: How much is too much? At the Mayo Clinic, caffeine in excess of 400 mg per day can cause side effects such as headaches, insomnia, indigestion and anxiety. And at least 14% of US residents regularly take this dose. Trends in intake and sources of caffeine in the diets of US adults: 2001–2010.

"The exact amount of caffeine that will be unambiguously harmful to health is difficult to name," says Maggie Sweeney, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institute. It all depends on your lifestyle and your genes. In rare cases, large amounts of it can increase. Does an energy drink cause a transient ischemic attack? the likelihood of mini-strokes (called transient ischemic attacks), when the blood supply to the brain is temporarily cut off, says neurologist Chris Winter.

It's really weird to see a 21-year-old guy who already had several strokes at his age. As a rule, such people abuse energy drinks. So there is definitely a caffeine overdose.

Chris Winter

When I was doing math, I consumed nearly 1,200 milligrams of caffeine throughout the day - every day, from 2001 to the present. Its half-life Serum Caffeine Half-lives: Healthy Subjects vs. Patients Having Alcoholic Hepatic Disease is approximately six hours. So if you take 300 mg at noon, you will have 150 mg in your body by 6:00 pm, about 75 mg at midnight, and so on. So my body has obviously been under the influence for almost two decades.

What are the side effects?

I realized my caffeine abuse after talking to Trevor Kashi, a professional nutritionist with extensive practice and a Ph. D. in biochemistry. His patients at the beginning of treatment (and he accepts both completely ordinary people and Olympic athletes) completely refuse coffee for two weeks: in this way Kashi finds out the power of caffeine's effect on indigestion, sleep problems, bloating or lethargy. According to Kashi and Sweeney, coffee is a strong gastrointestinal irritant.

Caffeine blocks the action of adenosine, a chemical naturally produced in the brain that helps the body fall asleep. It also triggers the release of cortisol, a hormone that aggravates stress responses and disrupts normal wakefulness and sleep patterns. So quitting caffeine will improve them.

Maggie Sweeney

Numerous studies of EEG and ocular correlates of circadian melatonin phase and human performance decrements during sleep loss prove the benefits of sleep for both the mind and body. Trevor Kashi believes that these benefits outweigh all the benefits of coffee.

Chris Winter argues that improving sleep quality is not only beneficial in its own right, but also has a beneficial effect on eating habits. That is probably why I lost a few pounds in a week after giving up coffee. The Effects of Experimental Sleep Restriction on Caloric Intake and Activity Energy Expenditure, published in 2013 by the American College of Chest Physicians, found that people who do not sleep well consume nearly 600 more calories per day than those who gets enough sleep at night.

When you're fatigued from sleep deprivation, levels of the hormone ghrelin, which causes hunger, jump, while leptin, which signals satiety, drops. By cutting out coffee and other energy drinks, you will kill two birds with one stone: you will experience less hunger and reduce your sugar intake.

Chris Winter

Doctors Kashi and Sweeney often hear from patients that they have become more balanced by giving up coffee. According to Sweeney, the Caffeine abstention in the management of anxiety disorders was confirmed by researchers as early as the eighties that coffee causes anxiety. And the American Psychiatric Association has officially recognized the anxiety disorder associated with caffeine abuse.

How to quit once and for all

Trevor Kashi has a way to determine if a patient is ready to quit caffeine. “Just invite someone to part with coffee for good and look at their face,” the doctor says. You will see a flash of existential terror. And Maggie Sweeney points to the well-known signs of withdrawal - headaches, fatigue and irritability, to prove to patients that they have acquired an addiction and convince them to finally detox.

The good news is that rejection doesn't have to be downright hellish. Sweeney offers a way to gradually wean yourself off coffee. Just start stirring your regular drink with decaffeinated coffee. “If you're an avid coffee lover, it can take several weeks to get rid of this invigorating substance,” she says. Drinking plenty of water or herbal tea during the detox can also help.

Chris Winter found my method of just picking up and abruptly stopping coffee as "too painful." But it seemed to me more effective. Trevor Kashi, on the other hand, agreed with me: "You will spend one weekend with herbal tea and aspirin, but then you will be clean," he said. I'm glad I finally quit my coffee. And now I see how my life without him becomes much better.