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Caffeine blues

Well, I know this article will not be popular. Most of us are so addicted to caffeine that we don’t want to know. I’m writing this because when Stephen Cherniske MS’s “Caffeine Blues” came out, I knew I had to read it. Several years ago I began to realize that the coffee was much worse than what we had been told, because I noticed that I had arthritic pain in my wrist within ten to twenty minutes of having a cappuccino!

This book not only told me how bad coffee was, it told me how GOOD I would feel once I was totally caffeine free for two months. Somehow this book convinced me to give it a try. And it was good! For example, I no longer have the feeling of exhaustion that I used to have in the morning.

This is one of the best health books I have ever read. It is written by Stephen Cherniske, Clinical Nutritionist. “Caffeine Blues” is incredibly easy to read and compelling. After reading it I realized that caffeine does NOT give us energy. In fact, it is one of the main CAUSES of LACK of power. However, he explains that this drug is so powerful that one needs to go three weeks to two months without caffeine before noticing a difference. And how many of us have ever done that? Almost nobody.

As Cherniske reviewed tons of information about caffeine, he began to see that, consciously or unconsciously, almost all researchers start with the assumption that caffeine is okay. Why? Probably because they themselves depended on caffeine.

Caffeine is found in coffee, tea, chocolate, colas, lollipops, many sodas, some drugs, most “energy” drinks, and guarana.

A 6 oz cup of:

Filtered coffee has approximately 120 mg of caffeine.

Black tea has around 70 mg of caffeine.

Green tea approximately 35 mg of caffeine

Leading Colas 45mg Caffeine

Mountain Dew 54mg Caffeine

Decaffeinated coffee has 5 mg of caffeine.

Milk chocolate has 6 mg per ounce.

Baking chocolate has 35 mg per ounce.

Caffeine is produced by more than eighty species of plants. The reason may well be survival. It turns out that caffeine is a biological poison used by plants as a pesticide.

Caffeine is considered harmless simply because it is used a lot.

There is a brochure available in hospitals and other related medical areas: “What You Should Know About Caffeine” published by the International Food Information Council (IFIC) in Washington DC. After many phone calls, Cherniske finally obtained a list of “supporters” from the IFIC. The list included Pepsi, Coca-Cola, M&M, Nutrasweet, Nestle and Hershey, all of which contain caffeine in their beverages and food. IFIC’s ‘partners’ included groups such as the National Association of Pediatric Nurses and the Children’s Advertising Review Unit of the Council of the Better Business Bureau Inc. This brochure states that “caffeine is normally excreted several hours after consumption.” In fact, only 1% is excreted. The remaining 99% has to be detoxified by the liver.

It can take up to 12 hours to detox a single cup of coffee.

Many studies on coffee and hypertension were flawed, because the test studies left coffee for only a week or two. It takes many more weeks for stress hormone levels in the body to return to normal.

The ‘half-life’ of a drug is the time it takes for the body to eliminate half the dose. Caffeine is a drug. The half-life of a single dose of caffeine ranges from three to TWELVE hours.

Caffeine puts your body under stress. A single dose of 250 milligrams of caffeine (the equivalent of about 2.5 six-ounce cups of coffee) has been shown to increase levels of the stress hormone epinephrine (adrenaline) by more than 200%.

Caffeine triggers a classic fight or flight reaction. The fight or flight response was designed for events that occurred only occasionally (like a lion chasing you). Now, we put our bodies on fight or flight every day with caffeine! Since we are in society, we do not respond in a fight or flight way. Instead, other things can happen. For example, sugar and fat are not used in the bloodstream. Sugar creates more stress. Fat clogs arteries. The digestive system slows down or shuts down.

Not only is caffeine addictive, it also encourages other addictions to substances like nicotine.

Caffeine doesn’t give you energy. Stimulates your nervous system and adrenal glands. That is not energy, that is stress. Imagine going to a bank for a loan. The loan officer accepts your loan. But as he leaves the bank, he notices the fine print: the loan must be repaid at 75% interest! The “energy” you think you get from caffeine is actually a loan from your adrenal glands and liver, and the interest you have to pay is very high.

Stress is a major factor in disorders such as anxiety, insomnia, depression, ulcers, rheumatoid arthritis, headache, hypoglycemia, asthma, herpes, hypertension, and heart disease. And yet, hospitals offer coffee and tea, which put stress on your body.

DHEA is our vital hormone. The decrease in DHEA levels is a cause of aging. Caffeine consumption leads to DHEA deficiency.

Caffeine lowers the stress threshold in virtually everyone. That is, if you have had caffeine, it will be easier for you to suffer emotional stress. (Therefore, when conducting research designed to show how safe caffeine is, any test subject under significant stress is removed from the study.)

Caffeine is implicated in ulcers and irritable bowel syndrome – GABA is produced in the intestinal tract, where it calms anxiety and stress. Caffeine disrupts the normal metabolism of GABA.

Caffeine disrupts sleep. Deep sleep is CRITICAL for good health. When there is caffeine in your bloodstream, you are unlikely to experience deep sleep!

Caffeine AT ANY TIME of the day can cause problems sleeping, especially if you are under stress.

Malnutrition is one of the best-defined effects of regular caffeine intake.

A single cup of coffee can reduce iron absorption from a meal by up to 75%.

People do not develop tolerance to the anxiety-producing effects of caffeine. Rather, people simply get used to the feelings of stress, irritability, and aggressiveness that the drug produces.

Caffeine contributes to depression in well-defined ways. This is particularly due to the withdrawal effect, which can cause headaches, depression and fatigue, even in light users (p. 111). Cherniske reported that 90% of the people who came to him who suffered from depression and stopped caffeine completely for 2 months reported that their depression was gone.

If you are a coffee (or tea or cola) drinker, you may be thinking, “Well, I drink coffee and I’m not depressed.” It goes without saying that we are all different and also that depression can be subtle. Throughout the book, Cherniske suggests that you will never know the full effect the drug is having on you until you experience what life is like without caffeine (which takes two months). Over the years, Cherniske has heard similar responses from hundreds of customers: “Wow, I never realized that caffeine made me feel this way (select one: anxious, depressed, irritable).”

Students around the world use caffeine not only to stay awake, but also believe that the drug will improve their performance on tests. However, solid research illustrates that as little as 100 milligrams of caffeine (one cup of coffee, two cups of cola) can cause a significant DECREASE in memory and reasoning.

When people are relaxed and given caffeine, caffeine does not raise blood pressure significantly. But how many people are relaxed? When people are stressed and caffeine is given, blood pressure rises significantly.

Women who consume more than 24 ounces of coffee (6 moderate cups) per day have almost twice the risk of heart attack compared to those who do not drink coffee. Moderate coffee drinkers with high cholesterol had more than seven times the risk of heart attack, while heavy coffee drinkers had eighteen times the risk than non-coffee drinkers.

Caffeine depletes your supplies of thiamine and other B vitamins, calcium, magnesium, potassium, iron, and zinc.

Caffeine increases calcium loss and the risk of osteoporosis.

In a large study, the risk of hip fracture for those women who consumed the most caffeine was 300% higher than for the group who consumed little or no caffeine.

Take the challenge! Most people have no idea what life would be like without the background of caffeine and stress hormones running through their veins. Even if you’re only drinking a few cups of coffee, your personality is likely to be affected in ways that may be too subtle to associate with caffeine. I want to encourage you to take a trial period without caffeine. You owe it to yourself.

Don’t ‘go’ suddenly ‘. To avoid headaches, etc. When stopping caffeine, Cherniske recommends taking up to six weeks to quit. Drink the same NUMBER of cups, but each week reduce the strength or amount in each cup.

There is much more information in this very interesting and easy-to-read book. 440 pages. Read this book and you won’t have to spend so much on supplements!

Copyright ©: Stephanie Relfe – 2001

Permission to use this article in whole or in part is granted if you acknowledge the author and quote and link to www.relfe.com.

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