As a kid, my only exposure to caffeine would have been primarily from soft drinks. I was never a big soda drinker, so my consumption was minimal for most of my childhood. At that age, I didn't even realize that many sodas had caffeine. Who knew Sunkist was caffeinated?!
Introducing elementary school kids to the two most addictive substances in the world* isn't the brightest idea, but what do I know. Think about how many of those kids turn into adults who can't function without refined sugar and caffeine to get them through the day. The only difference is that as adults, the caffeine-to-sugar ratio is higher, coming from energy drinks and Starbucks milkshakes they try to pass off as coffee. And artificially sweetened beverages don’t get a pass. They still create a spike in insulin and reinforce sugar cravings.
But let me not get off track!
Ranting on refined sugar can continue another day. This article is about my experience with caffeine, how I know when to take break, tips on preventing caffeine withdrawal symptoms, and a few thoughts on its use as a performance enhancement aid.
I'm not anti-caffeine in the slightest. I just think that all of my fellow caffeine users should put a bit more thought into how we choose to dose our favorite stimulant.
The Morning Coffee Ritual and Pre-workout Boosts
By my senior year of college that I started to become a bona fide coffee drinker. I started off "light and sweet" but gradually shifted to only drinking black coffee. I was beginning my evolution as a true coffee snob, but I was also following Dr. Mauro DiPasquale’s Anabolic Diet at the time, which is a low-sugar diet for the most part. One to two cups per day was typical at this point.
In addition to a morning coffee, during my competitive weightlifting days, I would use also use caffeine capsules as a pre-workout supplement 1-2x/week. Around 100-200mg of caffeine seemed optimal for me. This was likely a lower dose than I got from drip coffee, but having it on an empty stomach, and absorbing all of the caffeine at once (as opposed to sipping a coffee) resulted in a more potent effect.
It was helpful for strength workouts, giving maybe a 2-3% boost on my heaviest sets. Too high of a dose, though, would cause nausea and disrupt my coordination—one reason why I limited caffeine intake during and prior to weightlifing competitions**.
While it does have a mild strength-enhancing benefit in the short-term, I can’t definitively say that it resulted in more long-term strength gains. My training intensity was never an issue. It was my ability to recover from training was the limiting factor, so I never put much value in pre-workout stimulants.
So that's where the panic attacks were coming from
Eventually my coffee habit started getting out of hand. I was regularly having three to four strong cups per day. When I learned I could get 25¢ ice coffee refills from Starbucks, it was a wrap! I would save the plastic cup so I could top up in between training sessions with clients, and being iced coffee, I would naturally chug it much faster.
It seemed like everyone ran on iced coffee during the summer in NYC, so drinking iced coffee like water didn’t feel unreasonable. And why not save a few bucks while I’m at it!
At this point, the caffeine intake still wasn’t causing any apparent negative effects, outside of the occasional sour stomach—a price coffee addicts are willing to pay!
Then seemingly out of nowhere, I started having what I assume were delayed-onset panic attacks. I would get light headed, feel like I was going to black out, have a racing heartbeat, and get butterflies in my stomach. It was tricky to identify the cause at first, because the onset of the panic attacks usually came several hours after ingesting caffeine. After a year or so of experiencing these seemingly random panic attacks, I finally thought “hmm, maybe I’m having too much caffeine” (duh!).
While there could have been additional factors at play, when I reduced my caffeine intake, my symptoms quickly resolved themselves.
Breaking caffeine dependency
Once I better understood my caffeine tolerance and negative side effects, I got into the habit of periodically abstaining from caffeine. Sometimes these breaks were done in conjunction with a short-term “detox” type of diet, but that was not typically the case. Whenever I feel like I can’t wake up easily in the morning without coffee, I know I’m overdue for a break. Ideally, I would back off caffeine before this happens.
Time away from caffeine allows my adrenal glands to recover, improves my ability to focus throughout the day, and helps me to better manage stress. It also makes building and maintaining muscle mass easier, because my appetite is no longer suppressed and I'm not maintaining elevated cortisol, which has a catabolic (muscle wasting) effects.
In the past when I would go cold turkey, I might get caffeine headaches from the withdrawal and would feel groggy in the morning for the first few days. On this most recent caffeine-free week, I surprisingly didn't get any of these symptoms.
Here’s what I did to make abstaining from caffeine as painless a process as possible:
- I had already reduced my usual coffee intake to a single cup per day, using a smaller amount of beans (12-15g).
- I always try to get early morning sun exposure which greatly helps with me to wake up without stimulants. It's almost as if we weren't meant to be inside all day.
- When I am having coffee, I wait until I’m fully awake to enjoy a coffee, instead of having it first thing in the morning. I feel like this approach is less disruptive to my circadian rhythm, and it allows me to get an honest assessment of my energy levels in the morning. (Credit to Dr. Carl Hart for this tip!)
- I've also been drinking a lot of Holy Basil (aka Tulsi) tea regularly, which may be helping to mitigate any symptoms of withdrawal. Holy Basil is known as an adaptogen that benefits the adrenals and balances cortisol production (Cortisol being one of the hormones responsible for alertness in the morning).
- Most importantly, I eat a nutritious, low-glycemic diet, centered around meat (including organ meats, fat, skin, connective tissue), eggs, veggies, fruit, and a moderate amount of legumes and grains that is proportional to my activity levels. This helps to maintain steady blood sugar throughout the day which is probably the most important factor in maintaining steady energy levels and not feeling the energy crash which can trigger caffeine cravings. Many people wouldn't even crave caffeine in the morning if they simply ate a real breakfast instead of bagels, donuts, and cereal!
How do I know when I can conclude a caffeine-free period? When I no longer have coffee cravings in the morning.
This might take a few days or a few weeks. For me, 5-7 days is usually enough. Keep in mind that if you are not doing the basics to take care of your health (i.e. eating well, sleeping well, exercising, sunlight), then your energy levels will always be depressed whether you are consuming caffeine or not.
My Key Takeaways
- I’m not advocating for or against caffeine. I just wanted to share my experiences, positive and negative, in case they are helpful to anyone. Some people are hypersensitive to caffeine and should probably stay away from it and stimulants in general (or have it in very small amounts). Others can handle much more without any noticeable ill effects. Listen to your body and you will know what is best for you.
- Unpleasant side effects from excess caffeine can have a delayed onset. If you regularly consume caffeine and are having issues with sleep, stress management, digestion, mood, anxiety or panic attacks, cut your intake by 50% for a week and see if you notice any improvement.
- I never want to feel dependent on coffee to get my day started, even though we have normalized this behavior. Whenever I feel like this is happening, I know it is time to take a break.
- When taking a break from morning caffeine consumption, getting early morning sun exposure is critical to helping me wake up naturally.
- I like to be fully rested and alert before having any coffee, so it doesn’t clash with my natural rhythms. Having coffee around midday provides a stronger effect from a smaller portion of coffee compared to having it first thing in the morning.
- If I’m focused on building muscle mass or recovering from an injury/surgery, I’ll keep my intake to a minimum and will avoid it after training sessions. This is because it suppresses my appetite, raises cortisol, and speeds up my metabolism, making it harder to consume enough calories and recover from training well.
Notes
(1) It’s well established that caffeine is the most widely used psychoactive drug. And with refined sugar, think about how many people you know who cannot control their sugar intake despite negative health consequences. If feel confident in saying that there are more people addicted to refined sugar than every other substance combined.
(2) I was eventually able to find a sweet spot for dosing caffeine during weightlifting competitions, so that it kept my energy up but didn't interfere with my coordination and lift execution. I would take one 100mg caffeine pill, 10-15g of BCAA, and water with a bit of greens powder after the first half of the competition. This would allow me to keep my energy up through the end of the competition and not experience a blood sugar crash. I moved away from having caffeine at the very start of competitions, because the pre-competition adrenaline combined with caffeine was not a good mix for me, and I found that my coordination would suffer.
