Fighting a Very Wicked Caffeine Addiction

My caffeine addiction slowly began during my sophomore year of college. I had a full load of classes while pledging a service sorority. The pledging activities kept me up late at night. As a result, I'd find myself sleeping in class the following day. I had always heard about coffee, and thought I should give it a try. I started drinking one cup of coffee dispensed from a vending machine. At first, I didn't care for the deep, dark liquid, so I added large amounts of cream and sugar to improve the taste. Although I had the option of eating a full breakfast using my cafeteria meal plan, I would forfeit breakfast in lieu of getting extra sleep. I reasoned, why get up extra early just to eat breakfast, when there was a perfectly good vending machine that dispensed the sustaining jolt of java which lasted all morning long? It made perfect and obvious good sense that I was gaining more with less. I was the type who completely grasped and embraced the concept that "less is more". I even lost weight and gained concentration! My mind seemed to be reeling with activity, supplying loads of creativity. As an English major, this additional boost helped tremendously with my writing assignments.

Gold Rush
The jolt of java strategy worked just fine for an entire semester. I soon began to realize that with just one more cup of coffee, consumed midmorning, I could prolong the sustaining effects. The immediate observation was that I could extend my energy level, while lessening the crashing effects of the caffeine. It never occurred to me that I was adding to my growing addiction by consuming, what seemed to be, a simple candy bar and a 12ounce can of coke by lunchtime. It seemed the more caffeine I consumed, the more caffeine I needed to consume. Without realizing it, my body was gradually building up a tolerance to this insidious chemical.

Too High To Come Down
There were no immediate problems following my usual amount of caffeine consumption. I only felt a heightened sense of alertness, with a high energy level. In the evenings while participating in pledging activities, I was able to keep right on going, while others were showing obvious signs of fatigue. It wasn't until I had completely finished pledging the sorority that I began to notice problems. The effects soon became apparent, because I no longer had the need to stay up late. Before the caffeine allowed me to stay up late, now I could not get to sleep. I would stay up drinking coffee and cola and used to wakeful and restless state to get in more study time. When I was finally ready to lie down and get some sleep, it seemed I just couldn't. I would fall asleep, but then I couldn't stay asleep for very long. I would end up getting up constantly to use the bathroom. Little did I know that the caffeine had a diuretic effect on my body. I was losing a lot of fluids. My stomach constantly had a slight jittery feeling, but I interpreted it as energy. It gave me the drive that fueled my energy high.

Grave Circumstances
After accumulative weeks of sleep deprivation and dehydration, I noticed negative changes in my appearance. My lips were constantly chapped and peeling despite the amount of lip balm that I applied. The dark circles under my eyes were deepening and becoming more noticeable. By now, I had graduated from drinking two cups of coffee, to drinking five cups of coffee each morning. Even worse, I found that the cafeteria served larger cups of coffee for about the same amount that I paid for vending machine coffee. Whenever I felt a slight drop in energy, it became natural for me to down a can of coke. In so many ways my body was screaming out that it was tired, but the caffeine would only silence it. Many of these initial signs of a caffeine addiction were quickly hidden by my consumption of even larger amounts of caffeine. When the symptoms appeared, I would only drown them in more caffeine. Never mind that I was beginning to suffer with frequent bouts of diarrhea. I was always anxious about things. I found it difficult to concentrate when people were speaking to me. I was pretty irritable and impatient with others. I soon desired to be alone most of the time, in order to ensure that I would not find myself in situations where I would not have access to my next cup of coffee. I was not in a peaceful state of mind most of the time. The real proof that indicated to me that I was actually addicted was that none of the physical symptoms really mattered to me. I was aware of them and I had some idea of where they were coming from, but to be perfectly honest, I did not care. As long as I followed along in my day to day routine, doing what I needed to keep going was all that I felt really mattered. During that time, ignorance was bliss! A lot that I now know about caffeine, I had no clue about then. As it turns out, knowledge really is power when it comes to one's health.

Wake Up!
When I finally received my wake up call I was stunned. It took me a while to finally realize that I didn't want to be reliant upon caffeine anymore in order to function "normally." I first had to admit that I was in fact abusing caffeine. Once I could admit to myself where I was with my caffeine addiction, and where I didn't want to end up with it, I felt I was at least on my way to learning more about caffeine and its effects on the body.

Just Say When
I learned that caffeine is the common name for a chemical known as the 1, 3, 7-trimethylxanthine. This chemical exists in its pure state as a bitter, white powder. The taste of the chemical is distinct and unmistakable in many soft drink beverages. Although caffeine is most commonly found in coffee, tea, cola, cocoa beans and energy drinks, it is also found naturally in over 60 different plants worldwide. Caffeine can also be synthetically produced and added to certain foods, beverages, medicines and supplements. A low to moderate daily intake of caffeine is considered to be somewhere in the neighborhood of between 130-300mg of caffeine. While a daily intake of at least 6000mg is considered to be a high level of caffeine consumption. The average amount of caffeine contained in a typical 8oz. cup of coffee, like the ones from the vending machine, is about 135mg. This figure represents plain, black coffee without milk or sugar being added. I also found that Diet Coke has 46.5mg of caffeine. This was even more caffeine than regular Coke's 34.5mg. Pepsi has 37.5mg and Mountain Dew has 55.5mg.
The energy drink known as Red Bull has 80mg in those tiny 8.5 oz cans. While SoBe's No Fear has a whopping 158mg. What amazed me the most was that the popular energy pill Vivarin has a staggering 200mg of caffeine!

Enough Is Enough
After learning how much of the caffeine chemical is found in some of the common beverages that I was consuming, and the daily intake amounts of what is considered high and low to moderate, I wondered what effects did the chemical have on the body. It surprised me to learn that caffeine could lead an individual to high blood pressure. It is because of caffeine's ability to make one's heart beat either unusually fast, unusually slow and irregularly that it can cause high blood pressure. Caffeine has the ability to penetrate deep within vital tissue. Some males have been affected by too much caffeine consumption by causing male infertility. Caffeine drinks consumed by pregnant women have been known to increase incidences of birth defects by being passed from the placenta on to the fetus. Caffeine has been linked to hypoglycemia, heart disease, pancreas and bladder cancers. The most obvious problem that I've found about caffeine is that it is a stimulant which works on the central nervous system. Any time one becomes involved with a stimulant, it is going to have a stimulating effect on the body. They are not so bad if used in low doses and perhaps very infrequently. But with all stimulants that are abused, they have the ability to race the body's heart rate way too fast, and for way too long. It is very likely that the body will simply shut down as a protective measure, in order to keep it from being over run. When the body's adrenals are constantly stimulated (artificially) by the use of caffeine, one can expect that breakdown is imminent.

Letting Go
I will readily admit that once I had the facts about caffeine and what havoc it was wreaking my body, I had to get the courage and will power to break the habit once and for all. It was a Saturday afternoon during the last days of the spring semester. Finals were coming up the following Monday. I had a heavy load of what I considered to be some pretty intense courses. There was an insane amount of reading which accompanied my English Literature class and intense writing assignments from my investigative journalism course. I was already a bundle of nerves from constantly fearing I would receive the dreaded C that could destroy an overall GPA in a single bound! I had worked so hard to keep up my 3.8GPA and was trying desperately to raise it to a 4.0! I was still living the "caffeine high" life, consuming well over eight cups of coffee, and drinking untold amounts of Cokes throughout the day and well into the evening. I was exhausted of my life, both mentally and physically. I knew that I was ready to take the first steps towards change. However, I just couldn't think of even attempting such a feat prior to final exam week. Yet a strange voice inside of me kept urging me to try. I don't know where I got the nerve, or how I had planned to see this all through, but I just knew that I had to do something. I couldn't keep on going the way that I was. It may sound funny, but vanity is really what I believe gave me my initial strength to try. I knew that I didn't look my best anymore. My eyes weren't very clear anymore. My skin was far from clear and radiant. I noticed a lot of fine wrinkles developing at the sides and beneath my lower eye lids. For the first time in my life, I had a lot of small pimples across my forehead.
I could disguise much of it with carefully applied make-up, but there was only so much that concealer could hide. Make-up could not hide an increasing amount of wrinkles, sallow skin, thinning hair, and a nasty disposition, no matter how carefully it was applied.

The Road from Perdition
I began the unpleasant ordeal of detox pretty much cold turkey. I chose to attempt it during final exam week, because I knew how stressful a period this was. I felt that if I could start it during this time, I probably could continue on during the less stressful period afterwards. I also knew that if at any point I felt I couldn't continue going through with it, I could always get back on the caffeine until I was better able to see it through.
I began at midnight on Monday morning. I promised I wouldn't dare touch the two stock- piled 12 packs of Coke that were kept beneath the foot of my bed in my small dorm room. To see them and have them completely accessible was, for me, part of the exercise in will power and control. I also kept them just in case the withdrawal symptoms became too great or even dangerous to my health. I expected headaches and I was certainly not disappointed. These headaches were of the migraine sort in intensity and duration. I don't believe I slept at all Sunday night. I had already written my paper and had it ready to turn in, so I didn't have much else to study except an algebra I exam. This was the type of exam that either you knew the material, from previous weeks of studying or you didn't. All I could manage to do was a few light reviews of my chapters. After that, I laid extremely still in my bed and fell into what seemed to be a sleep coma. Luckily my first exam was not until 1:00PM. It was all that I could do to get up and get going. I felt as though an elephant were standing on my head nearly crushing my skull completely. Once getting out of bed, I was so light headed that I nearly fell to the floor, while staggering over to the mini fridge in the corner to sip small sips from a carton of orange juice. While getting dressed, I got back into the bed to take a small rest break and to lessen the painful grip of the headache. Getting to class was a little better than I had expected. The campus trolley was approaching the stop right outside my dormitory as I stepped out side. I waved my arms wildly to make absolutely certain that the driver saw me. It was far worth the temporary, short span of discomfort, in order to not have to walk clear across campus that day. The trolley ride spared me the potentially excruciating experience of walking in full sun over to the humanities building. It had to be approaching 90 degrees by noon that day.

During the exam, the pain became so great that I had to be excused for health reasons by my professor. I was given one week to complete a make-up exam without any penalty in my grade. I did the same for the rest of my exams and just retired to my dorm room for days. I ordered in Chinese food, pizza and ate simple can ravioli and what ever else I could find from the confines of my room. I told only my closest sorority sister what was going on with me. I didn't tell her the entire truth. I only mentioned that I was suffering the ill effects of a reoccurring hypoglycemic condition that I had.

In the end, I suffered great and long to get my health back and restored to its former pre-caffeine addicted state. It was probably the hardest thing I have ever had to go through. During the time that I was going through all the unpleasant withdrawal symptoms, I realized that what took me down the long, dark road to caffeine addiction was the very thing I was chasing so hard after in the first place: Academic success. Ironically, it was caffeine that put me in the compromising position with all of my professors to have to make up my exams and further prove my academic success. I knew that this caffeine addiction could not be worth losing my mental and physical health over. I made a vow to myself that I would never again try to take foolish short cuts as I had done in the past. Nothing was worth what I went through to break the addiction cycle, and I can't imagine that anything ever will be.