I was never a big coffee drinker, but coffee and I, we definitely had a love relationship. I loved to have a cup of caffe latte first thing in the morning, and I enjoyed finishing my lunch with a second cup of coffee with a nice white foam on top.
Last year, after some infectious disease, I discovered that dairy started to cause me discomfort, like tummy cramps and bloating. Then I stopped consuming dairy. But as my love for coffee was strongly connected with a white soft milk foam on top of the cup, and without it, it was just a coffee without any feelings, I decided to quit, and I broke up with coffee. It was hard for some time. But I was strong and resisted the need for caffeine. Entire summer I was caffeine free. I sound like a former drug addict, right?
At the end of summer, we went to Japan. I was not prepared for the difference in time zones and was so sleepy. And then my husband seduced me with a cup of soy latte from Starbucks. And I got hooked again. Sometimes I enjoyed my soy latte, sometimes it tasted indescribably bad. It was never as good as caffe latte with real cow’s milk. The reason is soy milk. If you take 10 different brands of soy milk, without being a tasting specialist, you could tell that they are all different. So drinking soy latte was always a surprise in taste – sometimes lovely, sometimes not.
I was drinking soy latte for almost half a year once or twice per day. During this time, I felt like a teenager continually fighting with pimples on my chin. After some time, I made a guess that it was soy’s fault. Apparently, I was right, as soy is highly estrogenic with an ability to modify your hormone levels. So it was the time when I said no to coffee again.
Quitting the coffee drinking club twice, I had the same experience with both tries. The withdrawal was precisely the same. It took me three awful days, two better days, five days in total and lots of headaches during these days. Who could have thought that caffeine is such a strong addictive substance? Psychologically it was not hard for me. I knew that I cannot have coffee with regular milk because of dairy intolerance. I could not have coffee with soy milk either, because of hormonal imbalances and adverse effect on the skin. And coffee with other types of milk or without any milk is no go for me because of the taste. During my quitting process, I realized that I was not craving for a nice cup of coffee with a big fluffy foam, rather than I was in physical need for just one chemical part of it – caffeine.
My body was showing its dissatisfaction with headaches. I did not feel sleepy or sluggish, I just experienced headaches of different intensity during the abstinence period. For the first three days, it was pretty much the same: the first body’s signal that it lacks its daily dose of caffeine was at around 9am (I wake up at 6am), then again around 12pm, then from 4pm to 6pm was the worst phase and evenings were ok. During the fourth and fifth days it was the same schedule for the pain in my head to come, but with lower intensity. The sixth day was a bright day again without mood swings caused by the addiction.
This is how I said bye to my cup of coffee. I replaced it with fresh orange juice and camomile tea, and I do not feel sacrificing anything at all. The only thing that is still bothering me is the smell of freshly grounded roasted coffee beans. I know I do not want to drink coffee, because I know I do not like the taste of coffee that I can drink, but that smell still triggers my brain, and it smells divine.
Sending love with a cup of camomile tea on my desk,
Ausra
