About a month ago my wife made the accusation that I was addicted to caffeine. I disagreed with her, and had to prove that I was not, in fact, addicted to caffeine. To that end I decided to go five days without consuming the drug.
A BRIEF HISTORY
I have taken some sort of energy drink/caffeine supplement almost daily since early in my high school career. While the forms have shifted, from Pepsi to “Spark”, then to various energy drinks and coffee/tea, one thing has remained; they all have some sort of caffeine. Over the years I have learned that your body builds up a sort of tolerance to the drug, the more you take over time the less it affects you.( I.e. the first time I had one dose of “Spark” I was a bit jittery, then, as time went on I slowly upped the dosage until I was having a double dose of “Spark” several times a day and feeling little or no effects.) There were short times when I would stop taking caffeine, but never longer than a week or two. Every time after I had stopped and got back on, my body had re-set and caffeine suddenly had a greater effect; which was great, I could spend less money to get the desired result (more energy).
THE EXPERIMENT/INITIAL RESULTS
My five day journey began on a Monday. The day was great until about 2pm which was when my first hard core caffeine headache hit, I took some ibuprofen which helped. Day two sucked the most I think, the headache hit hard, and I felt slightly physically ill. Day’s Three was more manageable and I only took ibuprofen once. Day Four I didn’t take ibuprofen at all and had only a slight headache, and Friday I just felt great!
APPLICATION
After I achieved my goal of my five days I decided I could only have caffeine on days I did NOT work. This has worked out great so far; however, I have had to re-learn my caffeine digestion. I had one bad experience on a Saturday when I had an energy drink at 6pm and one at 10pm, big BIG mistake. When I used to consume energy drinks 2X’s per day I could take one at 10pm and be in bed by 1am, but since my body wasn’t accustomed to that high amount of caffeine anymore I was up in bed until around 4am, and it made for a horrible morning. Through trail and error, I have figured out that the energy drinks now last about six hours instead of two, so I can plan my consumption accordingly.
As for the days when I don’t consume caffeine I simply go to bed earlier. During the day I still get tired around 2pm (like I did when I drank energy drinks). I don’t get headaches anymore when I don’t have my “fix”, and I am saving a TON of money by only having them on the weekends.
All in all I would say that caffeine is a good thing and a tool, you just need to know how to use it. Caffeine like any other drug/medication can be awesome when used appropriately. If not you are simply throwing money away.
Lata Folks
Ryan
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