I am currently trying (somewhat unsuccessfully)
to give up caffeine for the past 18 years.
Growing up, I never thought twice about caffeine. It, followed by a close second with nicotine, is the drug of choice for my family. Never in my life was coffee absent from the breakfast table... come to think of it, lunch and dinner and after dinner too.
I was never a coffee drinker (I think it smells like tuna. People have argued this point with me for I don't know how many years, and it doesn't matter. It smells like that to me!) and so I have consumed many hundreds of thousands of cups of Pepsi.
At first, I was a diet Pepsi drinker. It had all the caffeine, all the taste, with none of the calories. I have been quoted in saying that DP is the elixir of life. I drank it in the morning first in cans and later in 20 ounce plastic bottles. Yum, sweet elixir, do your magic.
It wasn't until November 1992 when I moved to Maine and decided I was going to remove as much shit from life (and body) that I decided to go off caffeine. It wasn't that I felt particularly dependent on it, I just figured it wasn't natural (especially in the form I was ingesting it) and that I needed to go off. How difficult could it be, I thought? I would just simply stop drinking soda. Easy, right?
Wrong.
I had such horrific headaches that I literally did not get out of bed for a week. I was in college and (thankfully) in a single. I blackened the room, opened the window (I needed the icy November New England air), and slept. For days and days I slept, trying to rid my body of this all-encompassing cloud that was keeping me from my life.
I think I was caffeine-free for about six months. I don't really know what prompted me to go back on, but eventually I did. Like a smoker with a two-pack-a-day habit, caffeine subtle charms lured me back again and again.
I don't remember the particulars of quitting again over the next 17 years, but there were times when I absolutely did, sometimes for a day, sometimes for weeks or more. It wasn't until I was in the hospital with what turned out to be multiple sclerosis did I painlessly withdraw (I was on a lot of different drugs, and I'm sure I had symptoms, but they were masked by MS stuff). I was off for a good three months and I was proud of it. MS docs encouraged me to stop drinking DP... I could have Pepsi, but not the aspertame in diet sodas. So instead of being caffeine-full and calorie-free, I got the added "bonus" of 250 extra calories with each 20 ounce bottle. Uh oh.
A million bottles and 18 pounds gained later, I decided that maybe it was time to go off again. Okay, there was also the gentle nudging of my new caffeine-free love interest that made me think that perhaps now was a good time. I set a date and jumped, blindly, into the world of living without my junk...
That was Friday. It's been four days, and you know what? I feel like death. I'm jittery, cranky, headachey, miserable. Tired. Did I mention I'm tired too? I am.
Do they make caffeine patches to help with the weaning process?
to give up caffeine for the past 18 years.
Growing up, I never thought twice about caffeine. It, followed by a close second with nicotine, is the drug of choice for my family. Never in my life was coffee absent from the breakfast table... come to think of it, lunch and dinner and after dinner too.
I was never a coffee drinker (I think it smells like tuna. People have argued this point with me for I don't know how many years, and it doesn't matter. It smells like that to me!) and so I have consumed many hundreds of thousands of cups of Pepsi.
At first, I was a diet Pepsi drinker. It had all the caffeine, all the taste, with none of the calories. I have been quoted in saying that DP is the elixir of life. I drank it in the morning first in cans and later in 20 ounce plastic bottles. Yum, sweet elixir, do your magic.
It wasn't until November 1992 when I moved to Maine and decided I was going to remove as much shit from life (and body) that I decided to go off caffeine. It wasn't that I felt particularly dependent on it, I just figured it wasn't natural (especially in the form I was ingesting it) and that I needed to go off. How difficult could it be, I thought? I would just simply stop drinking soda. Easy, right?
Wrong.
I had such horrific headaches that I literally did not get out of bed for a week. I was in college and (thankfully) in a single. I blackened the room, opened the window (I needed the icy November New England air), and slept. For days and days I slept, trying to rid my body of this all-encompassing cloud that was keeping me from my life.
I think I was caffeine-free for about six months. I don't really know what prompted me to go back on, but eventually I did. Like a smoker with a two-pack-a-day habit, caffeine subtle charms lured me back again and again.
I don't remember the particulars of quitting again over the next 17 years, but there were times when I absolutely did, sometimes for a day, sometimes for weeks or more. It wasn't until I was in the hospital with what turned out to be multiple sclerosis did I painlessly withdraw (I was on a lot of different drugs, and I'm sure I had symptoms, but they were masked by MS stuff). I was off for a good three months and I was proud of it. MS docs encouraged me to stop drinking DP... I could have Pepsi, but not the aspertame in diet sodas. So instead of being caffeine-full and calorie-free, I got the added "bonus" of 250 extra calories with each 20 ounce bottle. Uh oh.
A million bottles and 18 pounds gained later, I decided that maybe it was time to go off again. Okay, there was also the gentle nudging of my new caffeine-free love interest that made me think that perhaps now was a good time. I set a date and jumped, blindly, into the world of living without my junk...
That was Friday. It's been four days, and you know what? I feel like death. I'm jittery, cranky, headachey, miserable. Tired. Did I mention I'm tired too? I am.
Do they make caffeine patches to help with the weaning process?
1 comment:
Keep at it Rebecca!
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