staying healthy in the fast laneviduals should be caffeine free for a few days so you can remember
how you feel being off caffeine. The goal is for you to be in control
of the drug. If you don’t know how you feel off it, it’s hard to make
conscious choices.
I often share this visualization with my patients. It is one thing
to have a large breakfast and coffee and then go out and do manual
labor for a day, let’s say in an agrarian society. It is totally another
to be racing out of the house, stressed, going through the drive-
thru to get a whipped cream-topped, chocolate, and sugar-filled
coffee drink, maybe eating a muffin on the way to dropping off the
kids at school and then going to work. The former example will do
no harm. The latter example is a prescription for exhaustion, head-
aches, anxiety, mood changes, and a variety of other symptoms.
What people don’t understand is that regular coffee (or caf-
feine) consumption leads to a withdrawal phase every twenty-four
hours.^2 By withdrawal phase, I don’t mean the sometimes vicious
headaches you can get when you stop caffeine cold turkey. I mean
you are just sitting there in your office or at home and you feel a bit
down, and you just want that coffee or caffeine drink at the same
time the next day; it almost seems as if for no reason.
A counter-intuitive reality is that if you chronically ingest a lot
of caffeine, especially with sugar, you can create depression and
fatigue.^3 This becomes evident after four to seven days of being
caffeine and sugar free and your energy and mood begin to return.
Caffeine and Calorie Content of Coffee Drinks
When you are in your local coffee establishment, ask or look
for their nutrition fact sheet or brochure. You will be amazed how
many calories (four to five hundred) are in one of the fancy coffee
drinks; and in a tall or large cup of plain coffee, the caffeine content
can be three to four hundred milligrams! The goal is to be aware
and in control of your intake.