Caffeine Withdrawal

It does exist, believe it or not and I'm suffering big time from it right now. I've never been one to drink a lot of tea/coffee, but fizzy drinks have been a big part of my diet for years now.

As of this writing, the last time I consumed a serious amount of caffeine was last Sunday, which is about ten or eleven days ago now. I've had a few bars of chocolate since then, but apparently, there is very little traces of caffeine found in chocolate, so this has done nothing to alleviate the problem.

The primary aim is to cut large amounts of caffeine out of my life for good. Its only recently that I've found out how bad it can affect your lifestyle and if anyone wants further clarification on that, a simple Google search will bring up thousands of articles.

However, the side effects are unbelievable and although I've already been on websites where people have been sharing similar stories of their caffeine withdrawal experiences, its not really made me feel any better. Pounding headaches, muscle aching, nausea, hot and cold spells and not to mention the very feverish feeling.

Anyway, the point of me making this thread was to see if anyone has similar experiences regarding caffeine withdrawal. I read something interesting earlier that says caffeine affects the same part of your brain that heroin does, so that may go a long way in explaining why it can be hard to eliminate completely from your diet. Its obviously nowhere near addictive as heroin, but definitely more serious than I thought it was.

Share your stories (if you have them) here

 

I always knew it was addictive, but its only now that I'm suffering from lack of intake that I realize just how addictive it actually is

 

There's no chance I'm going back to it anyway. As I said, its been almost two weeks now and once I get the side effects out of the way, I'll hopefully start drinking more and more water and forgetting about the stuff.

I'm normally good when it comes to drinking water anyway, but before now, I was always more focused on Irn Bru, Lucozade, Fanta, you get the idea. Not good for you at all

 

Used to enjoy a can of Monster or a bottle of Lucozade until I read about how much caffeine and sugar was in both. 21 teaspoons of sugar in a 500ml bottle of Lucozade. That's not healthy and it's encouraging type 2 diabetes.

 

I used to drink crazy amounts of Lucozade and started getting heart palpitations all the time despite always being in good shape, I actually started getting quite worried then I read up about them and saw just how bad the caffeine was and was most likely the cause, I stopped drinking it and haven't had any since.

 

I'll never understand why people would drink energy drinks like Boost etc as a replacement for water. People at my schoo l go and buy a bottle of boost at lunch, instead of coke or irn bru, it seems so stupid... You don't need an energy drink unless you're doing sport or need to stay up for a night shift etc. My mate also doesn't like water (the "taste" of it) and just drinks lucozade all the time instead.

 

I don't actually know why I started drinking Lucozade I have always drank water and enjoy it but when I started drinking Lucozade it was just the odd bottle then I started drinking loads of it, it was like I was addicted to it the amount I drank

 

Is your mate that Hun that was on Countdown yesterday?

 

Nope! He's a tim , no a very bright guy though.

 

Doesn't seem like it anyway :icon_mrgreen:

 

i drink a can of redbull every morning before i start my shift im not addictive to caffine but i feel i need it out of habit

 

What drinks have the most caffine in them? do lucozade and coke etc have more than coffee or tea?

 

I think coffee is the main one. I'm thankful that I didn't drink that stuff in the first place. Tea also contains quite a bit of caffeine, but from what I've read when I've been doing my research over the last few days, it does not contain as much as coffee.

Fizzy drinks such as Lucozade, Irn Bru, Coke, Fanta, all contain serious amounts of caffeine, but not as much as coffee. It was Minty that said that one 500ml bottle of Lucozade contains 21 teaspoons of sugar. I'll never touch the stuff again.

 

http://www.energyfiend.com/caffeine-content-uk-europe-drinks

 

I drink at least a 1 litre bottle of Lucozade pretty much everyday and have done for years now. I am not really a big fan of water as it's tasteless so I don't drink much water at all.

My diet is pretty poor aswell, I never eat a breakfast and that's been the case since my early high school days, in fact, I usually only have one meal a day which is my dinner. I eat quite a lot of junk food aswell so I am quite unhealthy although I am also quite fit as my compulsion for exercise is just as strong as my compulsion for sugar.

I don't drink alcohol, smoke or do any sort of drugs so my diet is the only thing that I have that's bad for my body and it's not really a concern for me either tbf.

 

Do you never want to improve your diet?

 

I used to be addicted to Diet Coke and I think some days I would drink close to 2 litres. I stopped drinking it, but I still drink coffee and tea. I am slowly cutting down on the coffee- I usually have 2 or 3 cups a day and I try not to drink any after 3pm so that it doesn't affect my sleep. Sometimes I think I should give up the coffee completely, but I love coffee. I have never been a morning person and coffee has always helped.

Since I have cut down on my caffeine intake I do get less headaches and have been able to sleep better.