According to Ridder’s 2024 report for Statista, 47% of coffee consumers in the USA are young people aged 18 to 24. That’s quite a share, isn’t it? It must be a typical case for you to see a mate struggling to wake up or concentrate without a cup of coffee, and maybe you are even one of them.
Meanwhile, think about older generations. Do you often meet 45-year-old (and older) people who drink coffee just to wake up and live painlessly for a few more hours? You will probably notice that there are mostly young people following that path – the ones who have a lot on their plate and have to keep up with their life at a mad pace.
Obviously, the nutritional value of coffee is high. According to the 2019 research by Samoggia and Riedel, it benefits us in many ways due to its antioxidant effect and ability to improve cognitive functions.
Still, at some point, drinking coffee may become just another bad habit or even an addiction and do more harm than good. So, let’s go through the definite criteria that can help you understand that you should cut on coffee consumption.
You Struggle to Formulate Your Thoughts Adequately
An agitated person is a person who says things first and ponders them only afterward (sometimes, they do not ponder them at all). Depending on your individual reaction to caffeine and coffee specifically, you might notice that you do not finish sentences, forget suitable words, overuse interjections, or lose your train of thought.
The same refers to written formulations. It may not be that evident in casual chats, which is different from business emails or written assignments students often have to deal with only after drinking some coffee. Indeed, if consumed moderately, the latter boosts concentration and improves thinking. Still, there are ‘but’s’:
- it doesn’t work for anyone;
- actually, the coffee effect differs even for one and the same person depending on the time of day and what they eat;
- excessive amounts may overstimulate one’s nervous system and inhibit concentration while leading to increased agitation.
That is why drinking more coffee just to finish your work or college paper may even worsen the situation. In such cases, it is better to ask for help from an essay writer EssayHub has hired to make students’ lives easier. Prioritize your health and don’t sacrifice it even for the sake of academic or career success.
Disrupted Sleep Pattern
Of course, there are many other reasons for it, ranging from anxiety to serious illnesses. Yet, it might be the case that there is a simpler answer – excessive caffeine consumption. Also, the latter may enhance the symptoms of some disorders like depression or anxiety and keep you awake even when you are exhausted and need some rest.
As a result, your energy supplies do not restore by the time you wake up, and your metabolism gets disrupted. However, your brain already knows that coffee may relieve you of those sufferings and asks for a cup full of energy.
In the end, it turns into a vicious cycle: by drinking more coffee, you strengthen the habit of waking up only after receiving the necessary substance – caffeine – and, at the same time, postpone the moment of falling asleep, which makes you consume coffee to wake up again.
In addition, you may notice a rapid energy decline during the day that seems unbearable and goes away right after having a cappuccino. When drinking decaf, one feels the drop of energy sometimes, too, but it is not that exhausting and hard to overcome in contrast to caffeine withdrawal.
Irritation, Jitters, and Anxiety
If you have ever studied at school or college, you probably know what it’s like to be worried because of low grades, homework, or a test you have not prepared for. When demotivated and worried, one may struggle to concentrate on doing their best when writing a paper or make wrong decisions.
For example, instead of going through a review by NoCramming and finding a professional who can help you, one may just use an essay bot and submit the final product of low quality.
Caffeine weakens one’s ability to keep cool when facing stress. Even minor irritants might be too much for one if they drank several espressos. So, they turn into a monster who wants nothing but to shout and roll their eyes at every misunderstanding or noise and even becomes aggressive.
What concerns anxiety, sure, caffeine drinks are not to blame in 100% of the cases – it can be a result of:
- hereditary issues;
- deficit of particular vitamins and minerals;
- poor lifestyle;
- psychosomatic reactions.
Yet, all the problems above have one thing in common: low resistance to and immunity from stress. Coffee inhibits those even more. So, although it is a secondary factor, it does play its role.
You Are Thirsty Most of the Time
Coffee is a diuretic – it enhances the water excretion from the body together with magnesium and calcium. So, typically, it is recommended that one drinks coffee and finishes it off with the same amount of water to neutralize the effect. In addition, coffee also reduces the absorption of calcium.
Iron Deficit
As mentioned above, coffee obstructs calcium from absorption, but that is not all. Research confirms that regular consumption of coffee (whether decaf or not) leads to poor iron absorption. The latter may lead to iron deficiency and anemia, so there is one more reason to cut on coffee.
Final Word
Conduct a trial: drink decaffeinated coffee for a week or so. If you are a scrupulous person, you may even find it interesting to keep a so-called journal to track your state of mind and body. Just evaluate the criteria described above on a scale from 1 to 5:
- never;
- sometimes;
- often;
- most of the time;
- always.
Of course, the only thing you won’t be able to observe is the absorption of iron. That would require several months of observations and not drinking coffee at all.
To make it easier, do not betray other habits of yours. Your main task is to fool your brain and make it think that you still drink coffee as usual, with a croissant, cake, fruit, or whatever you are used to. The time of day is also important.
Mind that drinking decaf means not consuming other products with caffeine, like green, black, white, yellow, and red tea, Cola, and energy drinks. It’s also recommended to reduce the amount of cocoa in the diet, but that’s for the strongest people out there and not obligatory. Still, it will definitely improve the effect.
After you observe your reaction to the absence of caffeine, have an espresso. The result will probably be the same as after keeping abstinence from cigarettes – accelerated heartbeat, dizziness, or agitation. There will be a distinctive effect of caffeine you were used to and didn’t notice only a week ago.
Once again, go through the signs of drinking too much coffee and make the same evaluation. If you really kept away from caffeine for the whole week, you should notice at least 3 of the signs. They won’t seem as minor as they used to, and you will feel more discomfort than usual.
After that, just ask yourself what mode you favor more: the coffee-induced machine or a living person who can keep their mind clear and calm?
