By Brody Walsh

Over 9 in ten Americans report consumption of caffeine. 75% of caffeine consumers report consuming it at least once per day, and 25% of those consumers report consuming it three or more times a day. Caffeine is everywhere and a tremendous amount of people use it daily. How much do you know about your caffeine consumption and how it affects your body? Well, March is caffeine awareness month so there’s no better time to learn about caffeine and how to maintain a healthy relationship with it.           

So how does caffeine actually work? Most people know at some level that caffeine helps wake you up or give you energy. At the same time, many of those people don’t know how caffeine works. Caffeine is an adenosine antagonist. Adenosine is the chemical produced in your brain that makes you sleepy, and caffeine basically makes it so your brain can’t receive that chemical. Now that we understand caffeine you can use this knowledge to better consume caffeine. Have you ever had your morning coffee, and found yourself crashing halfway through the day? This is because of how adenosine works, when you drink caffeine, adenosine will still build up in your brain. This means that when the caffeine wears off all that adenosine floods the system, and you experience that crash. One way you can solve this problem is to wait about 90 minutes every morning between waking up and consuming caffeine. This will let your brain process the adenosine and then you can still receive the benefits of caffeine in the morning all without having to go through that crash.

Knowing how to consume caffeine while avoiding things like crashing or dependency is important because caffeine has a number of really beneficial effects on our health. Caffeine is known to boost mood and focus by increasing the signaling from adrenaline and dopamine. Too much caffeine, however, can downregulate these signals, which means you could become dependent on caffeine just to perform at a normal level. How can we avoid this? Moderation. Paying attention to the daily intake of caffeine is crucial to maintaining a healthy relationship with it. Generally speaking, anything above 600mg of caffeine a day will likely end up being too much. To avoid this, be sure to pay attention to the sources of caffeine day-to-day and keep it under that 600mg limit. Keep in mind that an 8 ounce cup of coffee has 95mg of caffeine. For example, a large Tim Hortons coffee has 24 ounces!

If you’re already thinking you might be dependent, there are ways to improve your relationship with caffeine. Often times quitting caffeine cold turkey will be an unpleasant and difficult experience, so the best way to fix things is to gradually wean yourself off of caffeine. Some ways you might find helpful to reduce caffeine consumption is to gradually move to decaf coffee, or other, lower dosage options. For example, you could still have your morning coffee, but then maybe what would have been a second cup can be replaced with decaf or herbal tea. Many teas still have some caffeine but with much smaller dosages per serving. This can help reduce your overall consumption while avoiding the unpleasant withdrawal symptoms you might have if you just quit cold turkey.

Caffeine is everywhere, and the vast majority of people consume it one way or another. It’s very important with all things that we understand what impact it has on us, and practice moderation to maintain a healthy relationship with what we put in our bodies. Ultimately, caffeine can be a great tool to boost mood and focus, but overusing can ultimately lead to dependency on the chemical that can make life harder. Staying educated and tracking our interactions with caffeine can only help us to live happier and healthier.