This blog post is about to be majorly overdramatic.
It all started when I was just a wee young lass. My grandma is a big coffee drinker and my grandpa loved his gas station cappuccinos. They live across town from the house I grew up in, and they’re totally the kind of grandparents who love to give their grandkids “treats.” I’m pretty sure we were all raised on caffeine. I’m serious, my brother was drinking black coffee at four years old. Recently I’ve started wondering how much taller he would be if that hadn’t happened. He would probably be in the NBA and/or a really good men’s volleyball player.
In junior high I started discovering the wonder of Starbucks Frappuccinos on youth group trips. In high school, the same brother introduced me to the campfire mocha from Caribou Coffee (I will love you forever, Caribou). I took a Keurig with me to college but only used it when I wanted coffee, not because I felt like I needed it to stay awake or function well (HOWEVER, Dr. Pepper was a different story – it is free with every meal in Phelps Dining Hall and I gave it up for Lent my freshman year, gave myself caffeine withdrawal migraines, and had to compensate with coffee).
Junior year is when things started to change. My friend Sarah and I discovered that the best time for us to do homework is early in the morning – And the best place to do it was at Lemonjello’s. Of course, we couldn’t just sit in LJ’s at 6:30 every morning and not buy anything (for more reasons than one) – I quickly realized that my morning cups of coffee were super beneficial in getting my homework done.
But really, the blame falls almost completely onto the shoulders of my friend Niall. He was my co-program director for day camp at Covenant Harbor this summer. The guy used to work at Starbucks. He orders everything with an extra shot of espresso and knows exactly how to make it taste really, really good. I brought a car to camp this summer and he did not, which means that any time he wanted coffee that wasn’t from camp (which was pretty much every day since coffee and camp are not exactly the best mix), I had to drive him to Starbucks, ergo I ended up ordering stuff there almost every day too. I quickly made the jump down from cold brew to iced coffee (so much cheaper) and then up from iced coffee to iced Americanos (almost as cheap and way more effective). I was drinking a cup of camp coffee in the morning, an Americano later in the morning (sometimes with a refill), and sometimes more coffee in the afternoon. Bad. Helpful in my tiring job, but bad.
This semester, I haven’t needed coffee to function like I did over the past year. There was one day that I didn’t drink it at all, and the next day I had a horrible migraine all day until I pumped myself up with enough caffeine to replace what I had skipped the day before. That’s when I realized the crazy coffee consumption was an actual problem. I don’t want to depend on coffee in order to be a functioning human. I went back to drinking a moderate amount of coffee every day in order to prevent myself from getting any more migraines, but the back of my head was like, “But should I actually…”
This week, I decided I don’t want coffee to rule my life anymore. Two days ago, I didn’t drink any coffee at all. Yesterday and today I’ve had a cup of decaf. I’ve heard it takes three days to stop the withdrawal headaches and I’m determined that I’m going to do it. I’m really not sure why I picked right now; I think I just figured I might as well. I’ll still drink coffee occasionally just because I like it, but I do not want to depend upon it anymore.
It’s a whole new world! I can be a functioning human without caffeine!
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“Praise the Eternal, all nations.
Raise your voices, all people.
For His unfailing love is great, and it is intended for us,
and His faithfulness to His promises knows no end.
Praise the Eternal!”—Psalm 117