Mines a Decaf…

Ok, so let me just start with complete honesty – I really didn’t want to write this, because I really really don’t want to do this, this being giving up caffeine for Lent, but in the spirit of following through on what I say I’m going to – so be it. 

Last week in my ‘pancakes anyone?’ post I mentioned giving things up for lent and that if I were to do it mine should probably be caffeine – here we are of course a week later and that has now become a reality, do I wish I hadn’t opened my big fat mouth and said it, maybe? – as soon as I said it and my husband read my post he was delighted, why? Because he’s been nagging me for months about my caffeine obsession, on a normal day Id say I probably drink four very large, very strong cups of coffee.

Lets dive into the symptoms I’m dealing with, I sometimes struggle to sleep and I know its the caffeine as on days where I don’t drink as much I sleep better, notice I say ‘as much’ because there really isn’t a single day that goes by where I don’t drink any coffee at all. Also confession time my toxic trait is probably having that fourth cup of coffee when I’m already hurdling over the edge with anxiety. This is something I struggle with and coffee defiantly worsens it but I continue to do it anyway. Why? Because I’m already on the caffeine buzz rollercoaster and I can’t stop myself, so I continue on, hands over my eyes, with a see what happens worry about it later attitude.

Iv done this before once successfully – this was when I was pregnant with my son Milo, when going to one of my checkups the doctor detected ‘ectopic beats’ or an irregular heart beat with him while he was in my belly, I myself have an irregular heart beat so I was concerned that it may have been hereditary, I was told to cut out all caffeine no coffee, tea, chocolate or vanilla, he was born and his heart is absolutely fine, but I didn’t have any caffeine for more or less my whole pregnancy.

Cutting it out cold turkey was really difficult, I felt sick, had a raging headaches, I was lethargic, even my digestion seemed to be impacted, this lasted for around a week and then gradually got better and better. After all the withdrawal symptoms wore off I really started to reap the benefits, I don’t know about you, but first thing I the morning has really never been my favourite not at least until I have had my fix, once I have had that cup of liquid gold my brain wakes up and I can begin my day, around two weeks into giving up I woke up in the morning feeling wide awake and refreshed from a night of sleep, fully rested and ready to take on the day, I have honestly never felt so alert and fresh in the morning as I had whilst caffeine free – as I’m writing this I’m questioning why I ever began drinking it again in the first place and gave up those wondrous mornings I had, I think its because I was giving it up for a reason, because I was advised to for my pregnancy and as soon as I gave birth I ran back to coffee, alcohol and everything else I felt I had been deprived of for that amount of time, regardless of all these wonderful benefits I had been feeling, silly eh?

Doing something because you want to do it verses doing something because you have to is always going to produce different effects, wanting to give up and noticing the benefits of it is super empowering and encouraging, giving you a feeling of fulfilment and achievement, giving up something because you have to for medical reasons or pregnancy (at the time – in my case both) is not as fun, because instead of feeling empowered you just feel deprived. I feel like there’s a certain stubbornness in us all, where when we are told to do something compared to when we actually make the decision to do something, even if the advise is for our own good.

Doing a little research on what caffeine can cause in your body I have found that I actually suffer from a few of these side effects already, some of the side effects are –

• Restlessness and shakiness.
• Insomnia.
• Headaches.
• Dizziness.
• Fast heart rate.
• Dehydration.
• Anxiety.
• Dependency, so you need to take more of it to get the same results.

All pretty ugly, of course it wouldn’t be fair to completely demonise caffeine without at least trying to find some benefits. According Healthline – Due to its stimulating effects, caffeine has been linked to health benefits such as –  

• Enhanced alertness.
• Improved athletic performance.
• Elevated mood.
• Increased metabolism.

But then cutting it out completely also according to Healthline could give us benefits such as –

• Less anxiety.
• Better sleep.
• More efficient absorption of nutrients.
• Healthier.
• Balanced hormones for women.
• Lower blood pressure
• Balanced brain chemistry.
• Fewer headaches.

Confusing stuff, but I guess its that moderation thing again that keeps coming up in every area of our lives, I know that I’m not alone by saying that I find moderation super difficult, I’m an all or nothing person in most areas of my life, and I think if you struggle to moderate at anything that could be possibly unhealthy for you then you are better off not doing it at all, who knows maybe this 40 days will create a new me with better self control and after Iv finished I’ll manage to have the odd morning or afternoon coffee without feeling the need to go completely crazy with it. I guess ill have to check back in with you guys in 40 days or maybe in 6 weeks to see if I caved as soon as it was complete!

What are you giving up for lent? Does anyone want to do caffeine with me? We could make a caffeine support group underneath this in the comments section… we can do this sort of stuff! Ok so that’s it from me until next week! Have a fantastic weekend everyone!