Thread: Caffeine withdrawal. How bad to you have it?

Caffeine has been a part of my life for decades off and on, mostly on. Coffee for me. I co- owned a coffeehouse in the early nineties and it was then that my caffeine mistress really became my wife in the form of a continuous supply of espresso, etc.

My problem is that I can never catch up to properly regulate my caffeine intake to avoid caffeine withdrawal which for me usually manifests itself in the form of the signature headache coupled with mild to moderate nausea. At its worst, it will at times result in a full fledged migraine that will shut me down for a day.

So...too little caffeine and withdrawal starts. Once withdrawal symptoms are set in motion a 5 gallon bucket of caffeine will not stave off the side effects.

I've quit in the past for this very reason the longest being about 1 1/2 years without any caffeine. Normally I drink anywhere from 1/2 to a complete quart sized french press pot of fresh ground coffee.

Does anyone else get bad caffeine withdrawal? I'm juuuuuuust about to call it quits again.

Chris L

Oh yeah... I get the headaches bad.
But my poison of choice is Dr. Pepper... go through quite a few of those in a week

With how much coffee i drink, I am surprised don't get the withdrawal symptoms when i don't drink it.


/drinking a red bull right now.

I've gone off it a few times and have experienced the headaches. I've been able to completely avoid them by gradually reducing the amount over the span of a week or two.

2 big cups of coffee in the morning, 1 in the afternoon. That's a schedule I am comfortable with.
If I don't get coffee I don't have withdrawal symptoms, though I might have a slight yearning for hot coffee.

I can drink more without losing sleep, but I get a bit antsy then, so I don't.

Coffee is something I grew up with. My parents drink a lot of coffee, and so does everybody else in our family. I once heard that in the US, coffee is considered for grown-ups, but I think that is a bit of a tall tale. I started drinking the occasional coffee when I was 5 or so.

I drink coffee constantly, it doesn't really affect me one way or another.
I once stopped drinking coffee and even tea for 3 weeks to see if it affected my wellbeing at all. It didn't.

People tend to overestimate how much caffeine they are drinking, but I guess some people are more sensitive to it than others.

I genuinely wish espresso came in big mugs instead of teeny tiny cups, that might give me the kick I'm after.

Originally Posted by Auto Express article

Motorway coffee too weak for tired drivers

---

New research shows motorway service station coffee is so weak that a drowsy driver would have to drink 11 pints to ward off fatigue.

Of 25 service stations tested, not one served coffee strong enough to keep a driver awake for the recommended two hours, the motoring magazine Auto Express found. The weakest had so little caffeine you would need nearly a gallon and a half to wake yourself up, while even the strongest, a double espresso, would take half a pint to deliver the necessary kick-start.

David Johns, the editor of Auto Express, said the research showed that government advice was "highly misleading". He explained: "There are more than 100 sizes, varieties and makes of coffee sold to hundreds of thousands of motorists every single day. The bottom line is there’s absolutely no way of telling how much caffeine you’re getting in what you buy."

Dr Louise Reyner of Loughborough Sleep Research Centre, said her experiments on a driving simulator showed that 160 milligrammes of caffeine could revitalise a dozy motorist for up to two hours. But not one of the cups of coffee bought by Auto Express at motorway service stations came anywhere near that. The strongest, from Costa Coffee at Sandbach services on the M6 in Cheshire, had less than half the necessary dose, while the same double espresso from Strensham services on the M5 had only half the caffeine of its Sandbach counterpart. Dr Reyner said: "The problem is that consumers cannot tell how much caffeine they are getting. There’s nothing written on the cup or anywhere at the point of sale, so they can’t possibly know if the coffee will have the desired effect."

Furthermore, price is not a reliable guide to caffeine levels, although the two cheapest cups, from McDonald’s and Burger King outlets, were in the bottom three for strength. An espresso from a self-service Coffee Nation machine at the Membury Welcome Break site on the M4 cost only £1.30, but it had a caffeine level 15 times higher than a £1.89 Costa Coffee latté from RoadChef’s Woodall services on the M1.

This year, the Department for Transport launched a campaign advising motorists to drink two cups of coffee every two hours on long journeys to combat fatigue, as a quarter of serious crashes are "sleep-related". Yesterday, a spokesman for the department insisted: "We are not saying coffee is a panacea. It should be seen as part of the whole package of measures, including taking a rest."

Mark Kitson, of Costa Coffee, said: "Caffeine levels can vary between coffee beans by up to 100 per cent. But we are not aiming for consistent caffeine levels - we are trying to make the best-tasting coffee each time."

yes, i am also well and truly addicted. there was a very interesting article about it on /. the other day:
Slashdot | Beware the Perils of Caffeine Withdrawal

I've been drinking black tea more regularly and have found that without at least a cup in the morning I'm quite lethargic. Not good when you're chasing around a 1 yr old.

When I was in school in Montréal I was coffee junkie and we would put on the first pot of coffee before even taking a morning whiz. Then I would get headaches without caffeine.

X

I get it pretty bad when I stop, even for a day. At my worst (which is right now), I drink 4 or so cans of coke a day. What's funny is the caffeine really doesn't do anything for me when I'm not addicted to it. I just really enjoy the taste I suppose.

My withdrawals are pretty bad. It takes about 8 hours, then starts to set in with a small, but increasingly painful headache. For me, it's a different kind of headache than migraines, but the result is usually the same. My head feels like it's in a Jorgensen clamp, and after about 15 hours, if I don't get a coke in me, I turn irritable, can't think well, and can't even sleep (which is where it's different from migraines). I usually don't realize it's a withdrawal headache until it hurts pretty bad, but by day two, I know exactly what's going on.

Day 2 is simply painful. It feels like a pan being banged on my head continuously. It takes a lot of diversion and willpower to only drink water. Assuming I get good sleep, Day 3 is much better, and by Day 4 I'm not feeling pain- but I still want the coke. It takes about a week for me to quit craving coke.

My issue with quitting is that nothing else quite satisfies me flavor wise. We drink tea around here, which is also a source of caffeine. That leaves me with water I like water, but after drinking water for months and months, coke or tea just sounds too damn good. Everyone says to use crystal light, but that gets old quick. The only flavor that doesn't taste like crap is pink lemonade.

What does everyone use as a method to quit? I always go cold turkey, but only when I've got a good 3 days where nothing is expected of me in any way.

Two doubles by 10am.
One single at 11
Caffeinated soda with lunch
Single at 2 ish (late today....)
Single at 4 (sometimes skipped)

Occassional sugar free energy drink at 5:30 or so, expecially if I want a "supercharged" workout.


If I don't get enough caffeine in the morning, by noon I have a headache. By then, like you, it's too late...I might not get worse, but I'm not getting better any time soon. I can beat it with tons of sugar and caffeine and food, and by that night, I might feel OK. If I wait until 2 or 3....migraine accompanied by the painful pukies is possible.

Since I became a caffeine junky, I have not attempted to quit (going on 20 years). In that time, Ii have given up some really bad, really difficult to quit habits, not the least of which was cigarettes that I smoked (up to 2 packs a day at times). The thought of quitting coffee scares the hell out of me.

That said, I thought about it this very morning (NO KIDDING!) for what was probably just the third or so time. I'm sick of "needing" a chemical to function.

I wonder...I tried EVERY type of smoking quitting, cutting back, the patches, the gum, and nothing worked except going cold turkey and gritting my teeth through it.
I wonder if gradually cutting back on coffee would work for me.....

I'm going to go get a cup of coffee and think about it.