What Are The Side Effects of Caffeine? How Do I Drink Coffee Without The Side Effects?
Coffee has been a popular beverage for centuries, with millions of people worldwide starting their day with a cup of joe. It has also been noted that the first person to discover coffee was a goat herder who stumbled over the bean and noticed the effects after his goats would eat the berries and would not be able to fall asleep at night. Thomas Jefferson, the man who wrote the Declaration of Independence also had an opinion on coffee, "Coffee- the favourite drink of the civilized world" (National Coffee Association, 2023).
Everyone who drinks coffee knows how supremely satisfying it is to wake up early in the morning still sleepy, on a chilly frozen winter morning and be warmed by a hot cup of heaven. But with heaven there's hell, and the hell is running to the bathroom four and a half sips in and wish you never woke up that day... (Just kidding but ya that's the point of this blog post).
Anyway to get to the point, yes, coffee is delicious and gives you a burst of energy and happiness but it also comes with some side effects. In this article we will be discussing some of the most common side effects of caffeine as well as a solution to all your coffee side effect nuisances. Stay Tuned!
Side Effects
- The Jitters
The jitters are the worst its like that feeling after a cup of coffee where you kind of feeling anxious about the rest of your day and act nervously. An example of this could be waking up feeling sleepy and not really feeling any sort of feeling about the rest of your day, but when you drink your cup of coffee you feel awake but suddenly stressed and nervous about the rest of your day.
Jitters can also be classified as feeling jumpy and cannot concentrate. Like when drinking a cup of coffee immediately after you feel like you have too much energy and can't focus. For example, you have a cup of coffee before lecture or school and you go in and the only thing you can think about is how attractive the person is 17 rows down and 6 seats to the left... no but seriously it can make your hands shake and make your mind feel restless.
It disables you from having a calm energized mind to allow you to be productive for the activities you literally just drank coffee to help you with, but instead hinders you through making you feel nervous, anxious, shaky and not being able to think straight or sit still.
So, in my professional opinion of the copious amounts of coffee I have drank this is my definition of the jitters as well as some other definitions I have incorporated such as Vocabulary.com: "When you're really anxious and jumpy, you can say you have the jitters. Your jitters might make it hard to stand calmly in front of an audience and deliver a speech. Jitters is an informal but useful noun that captures the fidgety, nervous feeling that everyone gets sometimes"
- Insomnia
I think we have all experienced the feeling of damn I haven't started studying for this exam that I gotta do tomorrow at 8am... maybe I should start now at 8pm. So, as a normal college student normally does, you crack open your favourite energy drink, tims, or Starbucks coffee and slug that sucker down. Woohoo you finished studying 4 hours later at midnight, time to get a good 7 hours of sleep... WRONG! HAHAH you thought. Nah you only gonna get 30 mins max and barely make it in to write the exam. This, right here, what I have described to you is:
Or a terrible time management schedule, either way the second side effect of caffeine is insomnia, which basically means by consuming caffeine it can make it more difficult for you to fall asleep.
The effect that caffeine has on your brain is that it blocks off the nerves in your brain that make you feel sleepy. So even if you did manage your time effectively and started at 4 pm and cracked a coffee, the sleep enablers in your brain may still be blocked not allowing you to get a good night's sleep.
- Increased Heart Rate/Blood Pressure
"Oh ya let's have that third cup of coffee" - You and its not even 1pm yet. Now that it feels like your heart is beating out of your chest and that is the only thing you can focus on instead of all the work you have to get done today, was having a third really your best course of action? No probably not, believe me I am not just ripping on you, I have been there and its not fun and actually not healthy either consuming that much caffeine.
Your heart is a muscle and its important to keep it healthy and having an elevated heart rate induced from caffeine is not the best thing for it. Having high heart rate as well as blood pressure can spark anxiety because now your thinking, am I having a heart attack? Now look at you having a panic attack in the library and everyone is staring at you. No, but caffeine intake around 4-5 cups of coffee should not be detrimental to your heart health in the long term (Advent Health, 2021).
To sum up, excess caffeine from coffee can lead to having a high blood pressure and heart rate which is not immediately concerning but as long as you're not having like 10 cups a day you shouldn't be too worried (I hope to god one of you did not just read that and think "well I only have 9 so I should be fine... seek help".
- Headaches
You just woke up with a headache didn't you. Oh ya having a cup of coffee will help it go away, is what you are thinking right now. You have your cup(s) of coffee and now its just worse than before, great, now you've done it. Boom! caffeine induced headache, which is the most fun and pleasant thing ever and is exactly what I wanted from my daily cup of coffee.
Wrong headaches suck and sometimes an over consumption of coffee can lead to a caffeine induced headache. It is hard to pinpoint exactly what causes headaches but caffeine allows for more concentrated blood flow to the brain which in turn narrows your brain veins or blood vessels around the brain. The narrowed blood vessels can increase blood pressure into the brain which can result into the so called "dumb headache I just got from those 6 cups of coffee. No, I have no idea why????"
But at the same time coffee can sometimes reverse the effects of a headache. Which is weird because I just mentioned it causes headaches. Yes, but that is because without caffeien the blood vessels are oftentimes dilated pressing against tissue also causing pain. So, the consumption of caffeien can help relieve that pressure on the brain and reduce the pain of a headache. So, it is up to you to gamble if the 4 cups of coffee is going to relieve or increases your headache. Either win-win or lose-lose and I
- Addiction/Dependency
The last side effect of coffee is the fact that you can actually become addicted and have a dependency on it. The problem with this would be constantly overstimulated your brain and increasing your heart and blood pressure. This could lead to your brain becoming so influenced with caffeine that you succumb more to the anxiety and stress that over consumption leads to. It will increase your heart and blood pressure and over a long period of time it may have negative effects on your cardiovascular system.
Also, over consumption and the addiction of caffeine can lead to insomnia and sleepless nights which in itself can cause health problems from not allowing your body to properly recover at night. But for the most part coffee is only bad for you if you take it in excess and that is a result of possible addiction or dependcy and the negative side effects of caffeine are really only present with overconsumption.
The FDA recommends the average person to consume no more than 400mg per day which is about 4 cups of coffee a day. Going over that is fine too, but this is the threshold where you will really start to feel the negative side effects of caffeine. I know it sucks your a drug addict... to coffee but in reality you shouldn't have to be drinking four cups of day just to get you through the day. I am addicted to coffee but I do not drink that much. The reason being is the solution that I have come up with....
Solution
The Solution is here and it is huge! The solution to help with mitigate the side effects of caffeine is Boost Coffee. I have added four different scientifically proven supplements that have positive brain health, cognitive and mental benefits. The combination of these supplements (L-Theanine, L-Tyrosine, Rhodiola Rosea and Lions Mane Mushroom) will help mitigate each of these caffeine side effects and many more, including other school and studying side effects (like going to every single lecture and not retaining a single word).
The carefully chosen blend of these nootropics infuzed in coffee will completely cancel out the jitters, allow you to sleep better at the end of the day, reduce your stress and anxiety from coffee and life, extend the energy of caffeine (so you don't have to drink 7 cups a day), and fuel your brain with all the necessary tools it needs to be a happy, healthy and productive student.
If you want to learn a little bit more about how each supplement helps reduce the side effects of caffeine then be my guest and read more about them in my article about the solution to coffee's side effects... If not I hope you really enjoyed this article and if you did share it, tell your friend about it, tell your gramma, tell your dog, tell the little gremlin that hides in your closet when you can't sleep at night, tell everyone because Boost Coffee wants to help you Boost Your Brain and that of every other college student ever!
Oh your still here... uhm okay I don't usually get this far... well uh here is the link to the article describing exactly what the supplements do to help mitigate the side effects of caffeine: (Link to the next article of the in depth solution of each of the nootropics