How to Quit Coffee

I loved coffee. For as long as I could remember, coffee had been a favorite part of my morning routine. Unfortunately, coffee hadn't been doing my gastritis any favors. This one-sided love had turned into a bit of an abusive relationship, and I was the one getting punched in the gut. I'd tried many times to walk away, but always ended up being lured back by the smell in a café doorway or weakened by a pounding headache. I knew I had to be iron-willed if I was ever going to do it. Here's how I bit the bullet and finally quit coffee.

I made absolutely sure I knew why I needed to quit coffee.

Caffeine addiction is a physical problem to be sure. But there is also a psychological component that has to be addressed when breaking any habit. It wasn't just the caffeine that I craved, but coffee and everything it stood for. When I was a kid, I used to love the smell of my first grade teacher's morning coffee mixed with the chalk dust in the air. I still love lazy afternoons in coffee shops, and I love sitting at my desk on a winter morning and using my mug to warm my hands.

If I wanted to quit coffee, I knew I had to break the mental addiction to the habit as well as the caffeine addiction. I paid attention to the physical discomfort coffee caused me, and I made a list of all the reasons that I knew I had to stop. Gastritis is a seriously painful ailment, and I was setting myself up for pain at the beginning of every day. Not only that, but I could see the stains on my teeth and I could feel the extra water I was retaining. Gross, right?

To successfully quit coffee, you're going to need a reason. You might need six or seven reasons. No matter what, you need to keep these reasons at the forefront of your mind to get through the hardest part of this process, which comes next.

How I used replacement therapy to quit coffee.

As a daily coffee drinker for 15 years, I knew what even a little caffeine deprivation would do to my body. I decided to wean myself in steps to avoid taking myself completely out of commission. For the first week of my new, no-coffee routine, I substituted black tea. According to the label on the box, a cup of this tea had about a third of the caffeine of a cup of coffee. Okay, whatever. I won't lie and say that the first few days of this didn't hurt a lot.

The next week, I switched from black tea to green tea. Hooray for antioxidants and all that feel-good stuff. Honestly, I still felt like I was dragging through my days and found myself sneaking off to nap at odd hours. Regardless, the next week I was ready for caffeine-free tea.

Because I love the feeling of sitting with a warm beverage in the morning, using tea to quit coffee was essential. It gave me the comfort of my routine and something to do with my hands and mouth while I was craving the real stuff. I imagine that tea will always be something I crave in the mornings now. That's okay, because tea won't kill me.

How I dealt with the caffeine withdrawal symptoms.

Oh, brother. My head hurt for days. Every time I took my caffeine consumption down a notch, I got a four-day, soul-crushing pain behind my forehead. I took some Ibuprofen during these times, but I purposely stayed away from migraine pills because of their high caffeine content.

My jaw also ached like crazy, probably from the headaches and all the clenching I was doing. I kept myself well-stocked in gum, so I could chew through the pain. This gave me the added benefit of having something to do with my mouth that wasn't drinking coffee.

Besides the physical pain, I felt completely wiped out. I've never been so tired in my life. For the first week, I couldn't stay up past 10:00 pm, and that was after one or two afternoon naps. Because I timed my decision to quit coffee with the beginning of the weekend followed by a slow work week, I let myself sleep as much as I needed to. Sure enough, I got my usual energy back eventually, and now I have more energy than I know what to do with. I've even started jogging again to burn some of it off.

It's okay to baby yourself when you're quitting coffee. Sleeping too much, eating constantly, smacking gum, guzzling water, and popping Ibuprofen might make you appear temporarily off your rocker. But these things will go away on their own. Your caffeine addiction, on the other hand, requires resolve and a commitment to a plan. Go ahead and indulge, because in a few weeks, you'll may also be pulling that old pair of roller skates out from the back of the closet for a quick spin around the block.