Although I enjoyed both the taste and ritual aspect of coffee, around six weeks ago I decided I was too dependent and that it was having a negative effect on me. Specifically, I felt like it was sapping my energy and leaving me with a kind of brain fog around mid afternoon that nothing could fix. Drinking more coffee wouldn't help at all. I had also noticed that the acidity of coffee was contributing to indigestion. I guess I was drinking two large cups of strong drip coffee per day on average, sometimes more, sometimes less. I would also drink green tea in addition to this. Aside from the morning dependency (MUST have coffee before starting work), the mid-afternoon mental slowdown I'd experience sometimes, and the increased stomach acidity, I didn't have any greatly negative experiences - unlike other people who have trouble sleeping, get very anxious, and so on. I could drink many cups and not have any real problems. I never drank coffee immediately before a work out so I'm not sure if it was helping my performance much.
It seems that there is no clear cut story about the long term health effects of coffee or caffeine. There are plenty of studies on both sides of the issue - some report that caffeine contributes to high blood pressure, increases stress, leaches calcium from the body, and so on. Others point to increased athletic ability, protection against cancers and protection against Parkinson's disease. I found this post on the CrossFit Santa Cruz blog which seems to reach a similar conclusion.
I didn't find it hugely difficult to give up - I simply decreased initially to a single shot in the morning for a week, then I dropped it off completely substituting black or green tea, and then gave up completely. I suppose its been over a month now since I last had coffee. I don't have any particular urge to drink it, I'm happy enough with herbal teas and the occasional black or green tea when I feel like it. I don't notice a huge difference in how I feel apart from a reduction in what I call brain fog, and of course not craving coffee in the morning. I don't think coffee could have been helping my CrossFit performance that much - since quitting coffee my Fran time has dropped by a minute and a half. On the other hand, I'm not implying any causality in that - I'm sure my performance would have improved if I hadn't quit coffee.
Overall, I feel like being dependent on any substance for a long period of time is not good, that its healthy to break these mild addictions. Its rewarding just to know I can, and also not to have any pressing need to either brew a cup or pay someone else to brew one for me. I think I'll stay off coffee for the foreseeable future - I feel more free without it.
Niall O'Higgins is an author, event organizer and software consultant. He wrote the book MongoDB and Python, published by O'Reilly. Events he organizes include We Have Tablets, the #1 Bay Area Tablet Computing Meet-up and PyWebSF. He also offers consulting services for Mobile, Tablet and Cloud Computing.
