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Habitual coffee intake shapes the microbiome, modifies physiology and cognition
- nchmy 5mo agoIt's always amusing to read the self-narratives of a bunch of unacknowledged drug addicts when links like this get posted.
- schnitzelstoat 5mo agoIt has some genuine benefits though like for liver health, for example [1]. Alcohol does the opposite. [1] https://britishlivertrust.org.uk/information-and-support/living-with-a-liver-condition/coffee/ https://britishlivertrust.org.uk/information-and-support/liv...
- nchmy 5mo agoThere's a study that'll say pretty much anything. That's not my point though. Just that most people talking that get enthused about any of this are drug addicts who refuse to recognize it.
- GuinansEyebrows 5mo agounfortunately, it's never amusing to read the thinly-veiled self-narratives of the condescending when comments like this get posted.
- culi 5mo agoRead the very first paragraph of this paper: > Moderate coffee consumption is associated with various health benefits, including reduced risks of type 2 diabetes, liver disease, cardiovascular diseases, and cancer3. In a large cross-sectional study of 468,629 individuals without clinical cardiovascular disease, light-to-moderate coffee consumption was linked to lower rates of all-cause mortality, cardiovascular mortality, and stroke incidence4. Furthermore, coffee intake is consistently associated with a reduced risk of Parkinson’s disease in a dose-dependent manner, across multiple human cohorts5,6,7. Meta-analyses have also found that coffee consumers face a lower risk of depression8,9, and one meta-analysis of cohort studies examining cognitive decline, showed that coffee consumption accounted for a 27% reduction in the incidence of Alzheimer’s disease10.
- nchmy 5mo agoI don't see what relevance your comment has to mine...
- culi 5mo agoYou are under the impression that this paper is negative on the health effects of coffee when in fact it is glowing about its health benefits from the onset
- nchmy 5mo agoYou're under the impression that I was commenting on the paper. I was commenting on the drug addicts commenting in this thread
- sph 5mo ago"To prove I wasn't addicted I stopped for a week. I felt depressed and tired. I'm back to my 3 cups of coffee a day as it cures my depression." — every HN thread about coffee
- mamunmia 5mo ago[dead]
- subjectsigma 5mo agoWe get it, you think you’re better than everyone else
- nchmy 5mo agoNope. I'm also an addict, but aware of it rather than trying to "optimize my dosing"
- neya 5mo agoThe only good thing that keeps me from collapsing into a state of limbo is coffee and now, even that's bad (seems more like a mixed bag, but still)? Sigh.
- bee_rider 5mo agoThere have been positive and negative reports for a long long time. If coffee was going to kill us, I’d certainly have died in school!
- kulahan 5mo agoCoffee in general is unreasonably healthy as a beverage. The overwhelming majority of science agrees it’s a quality health drink.
- modo_mario 5mo agoNon-industry funded science?
- kulahan 5mo agoCorrect
- anon84873628 5mo agoDon't fret. You're allowed to enjoy things that aren't part of the scientific reductionist longevity influencer lifestyle fad :)
- antonvs 5mo agoNitpick: What you’re referring to is not scientific.
- cyberpunk 5mo agoMaybe I have some neurological issue or something but whenever I quit coffee I find it extremely difficult to maintain any kind of motivation to sit in an open plan office and code. Coffee makes me a worker bee, I can understand why employers give it away for free. So, the coffee stays for now.
- getnormality 5mo agoCoffee modifies physiology and cognition? You're telling me this for the first time.
- ButlerianJihad 5mo agoI was so surprised at this headline that I nearly leapt out of my chair!
- jonplackett 5mo agoBut it says it’s the same for decaf. That is more interesting
- aitchnyu 5mo agoBeen treating coffee as caffeine with aroma. Any important points about coffee itself?
- triage8004 5mo agoHumans known since 45 minutes after first drink
- alecco 5mo agoThe paper is about previously unknown ways coffee affects the body.
- reedf1 5mo agoAt least subjectively, coffee seems to help my memory. But maybe that's why I started drinking coffee? I would probably drop coffee it was proven to have negative effects on memory.
- 6LLvveMx2koXfwn 5mo ago"These findings reveal previously unrecognised effects of coffee on the microbiota–gut–brain axis, suggesting that microbiome profiles could potentially predict coffee consumption patterns", or, perhaps, just ask the patient?
- raincole 5mo agoCould you elaborate on how to interpret your comment without it leading to anti-intellectualism?
- 6LLvveMx2koXfwn 5mo agoIt was a joke
- colechristensen 5mo agoYou are missing the point. If you can predict someone's coffee intake based on testing of their microbiome then you've proven that coffee intake has predictable effects on the microbiome. The important part isn't predicting coffee use, it's just the proof that there's you can predict and perhaps control in the opposite direction leading to more research.
- wjnc 5mo agoI have not much followed the science of gut microbiome and psychology. Is this really going where this article is pointing? That we can tease out causation in foods and habits via gut microbiome towards behavior and psychology? Pretty rad.
- colechristensen 5mo agoYeah there's nontrivial evidence that among other things, the complex community living inside you manipulates your brain.
- ButlerianJihad 5mo agoMy psychiatrists agree that “hallucination” (in lay terms: “hearing voices” or “seeing things”) only refers to things that aren’t real.
- chneu 5mo agoThere's a decent amount of research going into the hormones that our GI biome produce and how it affects us. Our body has a few different biomes and they all seem to play somewhat important roles.
- poly2it 5mo ago> ... reintroduction triggered acute microbiome changes independent of caffeine. This sounds interesting. I've never really considered the constituents of coffee other than caffeine and what unique effects they may bring. I wonder if I would experience behavioral effects if I replaced my coffee intake with caffeinated non-coffee drinks or pills?
- kulahan 5mo agoStudies seem to indicate that coffee is at least as healthy, if not healthier than tea, and I have not heard this about caffeine specifically (aka the same effects coming from pills or energy drinks). One fun fact: we still haven’t figured out why coffee makes us poop. We’ve studied every chemical in there and can’t seem to find a link, but the association is uh… well-known.
- hermitcrab 5mo ago>why coffee makes us poop. That seems to vary wildly between individuals. It doesn't have that effect on me.
- pinkmuffinere 5mo agoI’m super interested in this sort of study! However, it looks like n=62 here, which I think weakens the results —they’re probably just useful as suggestions of possible effects. Also, any food is expected to have similar effects on the microbiome. They didn’t test caffeine in isolation. In some ways that’s better (I don’t consume caffeine in isolation), but in some ways that’s less useful (it’s possible you get similar results from many random vegetables)
- sixtyj 5mo agoIn 1995, NASA did spiders experiment. Caffeine is a siginificant impulsivity trigger. :) https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/nasa-spiders-drugs-experiment/ https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/nasa-spiders-drugs-experime...
- jayd16 5mo agoNice web, Mr. Crack spider.
- ivell 5mo agoLSD has unconnected strands in the air. I guess this is expected.
- dotancohen 5mo agoThe LSD and sleeping pills were not in the original study I believe. That might be an artists representation of the image at the bottom of the original study, which I remember showed the results in a single row.
- ButlerianJihad 5mo agoWarning: those photos in the dot-com website are negative images, not the original black-on-white. Lousy with animated ad banners, too. https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20100033433/downloads/20100033433.pdf https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/20100033433/downloads/20... Don't ask me why some blogger posted the PDF in 2013, and also don't ask me how English Wikipedia editors determined that a Wordpress blog is a "Reliable Secondary Source". I did locate the original on NASA's own website. Public Domain (USGov).
- satvikpendem 5mo agoWhat's cool is this effect exists even in decaf coffee, as someone who primarily drinks decaf black, for flavor and for a good night's rest as I'm sensitive to caffeine.
- Kelteseth 5mo agoWhat kind of decaf coffee do you drink? There are differences between the cheap chemical Methylene way to create decaf coffee and the expensive co2 way to get rid of the caffeine. https://cleanlabelproject.org/wp-content/uploads/CLP-Decaf-Coffee-White-Paper_3_2.pdf https://cleanlabelproject.org/wp-content/uploads/CLP-Decaf-C...
- satvikpendem 5mo agoI don't buy the methylene processed ones, generally it's Swiss water processed or like you said the CO2 processed ones.
- Schlagbohrer 5mo agoIs that methylene way even legal? It basically uses petroleum fuel in the process right? I assume it was outlawed a long time ago but that might be extreme naievete for US regulatory capability...
- eichin 5mo agohttps://www.thedecafproject.com/ https://www.thedecafproject.com/ (Dec 2024) let you order matching swiss water, CO₂, and Ethyl Acetate (sugar cane byproduct) decaffeinated coffee from the same batches of beans. The EPA banned methylene chloride earlier in that year, but because of toxicity to workers, not because of risk from the resulting coffee itself (and it looks like the FDA didn't ban it.) So I guess you couldn't make decaf with it in the US but you could probably still import and sell it?
- IAmBroom 5mo agoI'm pretty sure I'm allergic to methylene-decaffeinated coffee. I discovered in the early 1990s that I'd get sneezy almost every time I drink decaf office coffee, but my home decaf didn't do that to me. Hasn't happened in a long time, probably due to (1) avoiding cheap decaf and (2) the banning of meth-coffee (heh) in the US.
- testemailfordg2 5mo agoFunded by the Institute for Scientific Information on Coffee (ISIC) — an industry body — which is a notable conflict of interest the authors disclose but don't extensively discuss
- rapidaneurism 5mo agoIt does not sound like an outcome that big coffee paid for it to be so: Behaviourally, coffee drinkers exhibited greater impulsivity and emotional reactivity, whereas non-coffee drinkers demonstrated better memory performance.
- selcuka 5mo ago> It does not sound like an outcome that big coffee paid for it to be so: Who said anything about big coffee? These guys might be a secret, anti-coffee organisation. /s
- iammjm 5mo agoDo they though? Any data on that? Also, the highly caffeinated people might also be sleep deprived, which impacts memory and emotional regulation
- Antibabelic 5mo agoThe data is in the linked paper. It's a direct quote from the abstract.
- TazeTSchnitzel 5mo agoAfter habitually consuming caffeine (not in coffee form) daily, usually multiple times a day, for more than a decade, a horrible mental health incident happened to me that forced me to stop it for a while. Afterwards I didn't resume the habit, and so I no longer have a tolerance. This has let me evaluate what caffeine does with fresh eyes, so to say, because I can now consume it occasionally while having many non-caffeinated days to compare to. It's a profoundly psychoactive substance and does a lot of things to cognition. I guess I have decided I don't enjoy how it feels, having previously been dependent on it.
- readthenotes1 5mo agoNotably, the article is looking at coffee, both caffeinated and decaffeinated. There is a lot more to coffee than just caffeine...
- mixedCase 5mo agoThe overwhelming majority of the enjoyable coffee experiences are caffeinated. While there is good decaf out there it's not the norm, specially in smaller markets.
- tsimionescu 5mo agoI think they meant that coffee contains a lot of other compounds than just caffeine, which something like energy drinks or teas will not include. So you can't necessarily extend conclusions from a study on consumption of coffee to effects that other drinks that happen to include caffeine might have. Edit: this is especially relevant here, as the study found similar effects in decaffeinated coffee drinkers. So the effects they observed, if real, are not related to caffeine.
- rimliu 5mo agoHow do you know that caffeine was the cause?
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- ANarrativeApe 5mo agoIt would have been interesting to see if there was any difference relating to CYP1A2 (Cytochrome P450 1A2), the fast metabolizers and the slow metabolizers.
- sdevonoes 5mo agoI must be weird, but coffee (or caffeine) doesn’t really “wake me up” in the mornings and I could drink it in the night and still sleep well. Because of that I don’t drink coffee; I prefer tea
- fedeb95 5mo agotea also has caffeine, although in smaller quantities. Maybe you mean that you don't care so you go by taste, just specifying because there's a common misconception about tea not having caffeine.
- Lionga 5mo agoSome tea has caffeine, most has don't.
- pasquinelli 5mo agoall tea has caffeine unless it's decaf. some things that aren't tea are called tea casually, but they aren't tea, for instance peppermint "tea" is not tea. by the same logic that one would call peppermint a tea, one would have to call coffee a tea. and beef broth.
- majkinetor 5mo agoThat depends on culture. All camelia s. teas have it (green etc) but almost none of common herbal teas in Europe have it (chamomile, menta, sage etc.) They are not called casually teas.
- pasquinelli 5mo ago> They are not called casually teas. are you saying chamomile isn't called tea but it's one of the teas without caffeine? if so that's very confused. camelia sinensis is tea. when i said that other things are casually called tea, i mean that what chamomile tea, for example, ought to be called is a tisane or an herbal infusion. casually, people might call it a tea; some people are so casual about it that they think it actually is tea. but it isn't.
- fedeb95 5mo agothirty-one participants were moderate coffee-drinkers (CD, i.e., people that usually consume between 3 to 5 cups of coffee per day). 3-5 is moderate? To me, 3 is already high. Also, sample size is pretty low and they're all Irish.
- alexey-salmin 5mo agoI do 6-10 espresso cups per day, so 3-5 does sound very moderate.
- MagicMoonlight 5mo agoThat’s not normal. It’s like saying “I drink 6-10 beers a day so 3-5 is very moderate”
- andor 5mo agoIt depends on how much caffeine is in your cup. Rather than measuring the size of a cup, I would go by the amount of coffee, as in the weight of the beans, used to brew it. The actual amount of caffeine is not as easy to measure, and even for the same kind of beans, there is natural variation. For a traditional Italian espresso, about 7g of coffee beans are extracted. For a third-wave double espresso, it's usually 18g or more. In my opinion, 10x7g is a lot. 2x12g is more than enough for me.
- askvictor 5mo agocaffeine extraction is largely a function of time in contact with water. Espresso is quite quick brew, so has less caffeine than other brewing methods (yes, there are plenty of other factors)
- Edd314159 5mo agoThere is no realistic scenario where, no matter your extractions or bean selections, 6-10 shots of espresso a day is not an enormous amount of caffeine
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- shinryuu 5mo agoWould be real interesting to see a similar study on tea.
- therealdeal2020 5mo agogood thing I have claude to summarize this and quickly realized that sample size was small and nothing much new unless you are a microbiome researcher
- reliablereason 5mo agoIf the effect size is big small sample sizes does not matter as much as otherwise. You really have to look at the power analysis and the sample size together. Saying this as a general truth. I am not sure about the power of the method in this papper, i only read the abstract.
- xingyi_dev 5mo ago[flagged]
- arnejenssen 5mo agoI am not a coffee drinker, but I met with a friend at a cafe who said he was going to get a cup of insect poison, referring to coffee :)
- tootie 5mo agoCaffeine evolved to deter insects. Coffee, tea, chocolate and some other plants all evolved caffeine independently due to similar evolutionary pressure.
- throwatdem12311 5mo agoCaffeine is an extremely potent drug. It’s actually kind of crazy to think that a large portion of a country’s population could be “high” on it basically all of the time. And there is a huge industry in place for delivering said drug to as many people as possible by having it available on almost every street corner. And that most people take a fairly non-chalant attitude to giving this drug to kids through sweet drinks that are primarily marketed to them as well. The scale of it is kinda mind boggling to me. Mind the nonsensical rant, I haven’t had my coffee yet this morning…
- adammarples 5mo agoThis week as I tried to lower my coffee usage or stop altogether, I had dropped from 3 cups a day to 1. That one suddenly started to make me feel noticeably high, like a bump of cocaine in the morning. I realised that I craved it in the same way and it clicked for me - coffee is literally just a drug I like to take by myself and read the newspaper. It's no different. It's the first thing I think of in the morning because I'm addicted. Currently trying to go cold turkey.
- throwatdem12311 5mo agoI went from 60oz per day to 36oz. I went from perpetually stimulated to basically on stimulated during work hours. Even with a minor cutback, I’ve noticed the change in potency of an individual dose as well. My next goal is to cut back to one fully caffeinated drink in the moring and then doing decaf the rest of the day. The ritualistic habit is the hardest thing to break for me. Also the social aspect of “let’s go for coffee” with friends, family, spouse etc…
- adammarples 5mo agoAs it is with a lot of addictions
- FireFjord 5mo agoHow’s the cold turkey going so far?
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 5mo ago> The coffee provided was consumed with a quantity of hot water, milk, sugar chosen by the participant. Could it be the sugar?
- rubslopes 5mo agoWas this thread invaded by AI? Casually reading the first comments, 3 different users mentioned they had a recent "mental health incident" related to caffeine?? Search this page for "mental health incident"
- fc417fc802 5mo agoThat doesn't seem even remotely surprising to me. Much of the readership here likely consumes inadvisable quantities of caffeine nearly every day and one of the most common side effects is anxiety followed closely by a number of other emotional perturbations.
- proggy 5mo agoPossibly AI, possibly younger folks (18-24). “Mental health incident” is only one step removed from algospeak like “unalived”, “seggs”, and “neurospicy”. A detached, memetic phrase that has been implanted into the lexicon by a toxic brew of algorithmic social media moderation and heavy exposure to LLM conversational patterns.
- IAmBroom 5mo agoOr maybe just because language patterns change over time. You need to be hep to the new jive, daddy-o.
- deleted 5mo ago[deleted]
- neuroelectron 5mo agoI only use caffeine or caffeinated beverages such as coffee at the most three times a week. And that's a heavy week for me.
- homeonthemtn 5mo agoYes, well, nevertheless. Sip
- dgllghr 5mo agoI switched from caffeine (coffee) to theacrine (pills) and I like it so much more. I feel alert and focused without added anxiety. It doesn’t seem to affect my sleep at all. I really didn’t like how hard it was to quit coffee. I don’t like that it’s a pill. I tried making my own theacrine drinks, but theacrine is so bitter that I never found one that I liked. I am still haunted by the chicory + theacrine drink I made…
- Projectiboga 5mo agoHere is a fun citation with a brief summary. They suggest regular caffine use lowers your baseline and it just returns you to where you'd be if you weren't dependent. University of Bristol. "Coffee consumption unrelated to alertness: Stimulating effects may be illusion, study finds." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 3 June 2010. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/06/100602211940.htm>.
- hpeinar 5mo agoA very interesting article, I have personal experience with: > Coffee also affects the gastrointestinal tract. It increases stomach acidity and stimulates the release of hormones that aid digestion. Both caffeinated and decaffeinated coffee promote the contractility of ileal and colonic smooth muscle, helping prevent constipation As the two times in my adult life I've tried to make an intended break from coffee, it has ended up with almost unbearable stomach pain caused by constipation. It's good to know that this is not linked to caffeine as I thought, so I will try un-caffinated coffee instead now because I tend to think that my general "tiredness" comes from actual caffeine.
- irthomasthomas 5mo agoCan you actually get caffeine free coffee? I thought most decaf brands where only about 50% less.
- hrldcpr 5mo agoYou're right that the caffeine isn't entirely removed, but it's supposedly more than 90% removed. (I'm even seeing the number 97% mentioned a lot online.)
- jeffbee 5mo agoThat fraction is going to depend a lot on the definition and the reference. I believe the 97% is the US standard for how much of the natural caffeine in green beans must be removed. You will note how this can be manipulated by using a more caffeine-abundant variety. EU standards are more sensible, stated in terms of caffeine content in the final product. Either way, commercial decaf processes and normal brewing methods will yield something like 5-10mg of caffeine in a "decaf" dose of coffee, which is an order of magnitude less than usual.
- winrid 5mo agoThe bean is already only like 2% caffeine lol so cheap decaf can definitely really be "half caf" even if they say that.
- LogicFailsMe 5mo agoI once quit caffeine cold for 6 months: 2 weeks of pure hell then it was like I never craved it until life got real and stressful and I fell off the wagon. Today, I drink my espresso with a dot of lowfat milk now and life is currently too real and stressful to consider trying to drop it again. I do suspect some of us likely have undiagnosed low-level mood disorders leaving us highly functional but discontent and caffeine is the spackling compound used to plug the hole in our souls.
- CoffeeOnWrite 5mo agoWhen work was chill I went to decaf for the morning espresso on weekdays, and enjoyed real coffee on weekends. I took glee in withholding energy from work that I redirected to my personal time. Then when work picked up, I went back to regular coffee everyday. I don’t think there’s a hole in my soul though. And caffeine degrades my personality a little bit (to my own judgment).
- smt88 5mo agoCaffeine (like all stimulants) can alleviate symptoms of various dopamine-related disorders, like ADHD. I'm sure many people are self-medicating.
- z3c0 5mo agoThis study considers caffeine concumption outside of coffee, so an alternative caffeine source might be worth looking into. That was my takeaway, at least. I also drink espresso, for the caffeine and the noticable ease on my gut compared to drip or pressed coffee.
- BoneShard 5mo agoI stopped drinking coffee for a month and didn't notice any difference in my anxiety/mood/etc, so I returned to my regular schedule (3-4 large cups in the mornings).
- inerte 5mo agoSame here, and it made me wonder, why did I go back to drinking coffee? My best explanation is that there are effects, I just suck at self-awareness :)
- dghughes 5mo agoI never used to drink any caffeine. In fact the few times I had tried it when I was a teen or my 20s it made my chest pound my heart raced so much. It was Lebanese strong cardamom coffee so maybe not the best example. Then at age 34 I started a new job my first shift work job, late evenings, some overnight jobs. I started off with fancy coffee like french vanilla. A year or so later the first Starbucks opened. I was drinking venti quad shot lattes. Then energy drinks were permitted for sale here (we had a can ban for years). I recall after drinking a Rockstar 750ml for breakfast and the following muscle spasms made me consider I should tone it down. So I've settled a bit a small coffee in the evening. Sometimes I don't even finish it.
- mskogly 5mo agoWe know, that’s why we do it.
- username135 5mo agoIf coffee was a god, I would pray to it.
- codazoda 5mo agoThis paper is not saying coffee is bad. If anything, it leans slightly toward beneficial or neutral effects. What broader science says (not just this paper). Across many large studies, Coffee is associated with: * ↓ Lowerisk of Type 2 Diabetes * ↓ risk of Parkinson’s Disease * ↓ overall mortality (yes, really) Downsides (for some people): * Anxiety / jitters * Poor sleep * Increased heart rate
- maininformer 5mo agoHabitual anything intake shapes the microbiome, modifies physiology and cognition
- beej71 5mo agoI drank a lot of coffee until I forgot to pack instant on a 3 day backpacking trip. Headache the whole time that I cured in 5 minutes by drinking a mt dew the minute we got back to civilization. Figured it wasn't worth it and weaned off. Then it turned out my rate of getting migraines dropped off considerably. But I love coffee, so I tried decaf. Migraines returned to being more frequent. So that was that. If I could get it without the side effects, I surely would. Right now I'm drinking a hot cup of delicious roasted barley tea. But it's not the same.
- Nifty3929 5mo agoPSA: decaffeinated coffee contains about 1/3 as much caffeine as regular - so far from caffeine free.
- mbil 5mo agoIt depends of course but typically it’s more like 3% the caffeine of regular coffee
- Nifty3929 5mo agoDecaffeinated is often marked as "97% caffeine free" or something like that, but regular coffee is 91% caffeine free, by weight.
- culi 5mo agoThat's not accurate. In an 8oz cup of decaf there's 2–15 mg of caffeine. Regular coffee is about 91 mg for an 8oz cup
- silver911r 5mo agoEvery study like this should clearly state who paid for it. Institute for Scientific Information on Coffee
- WesleyJohnson 5mo agoThis discussion has been particularly insightful. I'm 47 and have been drinking 2 to 3 Mtn Dew Kickstarts a day for probably 10 years. I don't feel high, or jittery, or like I'm bouncing off walls. I have no trouble falling asleep, even drinking caffeine right up until bed time. But, I also have trouble focusing, am working with a psychologist on a possible ADHD (primarily inattentive) diagnosis, never dream, and am very forgetful. Based on everything I'm reading below, and a "discussion" with Gemini, it's highly probable all of this is related. I know AI isn't a doctor, and confirmation bias and all of that, but even if it's all nonsense - backing off on caffeine or quitting entirely can only help. So I'm going to star to day, by trying to not have any after 2pm. My regular bedtime is around midnight, so that's 10 hours. We'll see how it goes. Thanks HN!
- jcalvinowens 5mo agoI used to drink a small amount of blisteringly strong coffee in the morning and after lunch, but nowadays I drink a massive amount of relatively weak coffee throughout the entire day. Weaker than you'd ever get from a shop or in an office. That's been a big win for me: I feel like I get to enjoy the coffee more, and it eliminated the negative effects for me. I no longer feel like I suffer when I don't have it. I miss it, the way I miss the sunlight in my office on a cloudy morning, but it's strictly a positive for me when it's around. I only get headaches if I go from 100 to 0, even one day of reduced intake is enough to avoid it for me. When I'm exhausted and going to bed, I'll go fill the coffee machine, and catch myself thinking "oh boy, it's going to feel so great to wake up at 6am and drink this". Then I shake my head at myself and laugh and how absurd that sounds :D Coffee is above running hot water in my hierarchy of needs. Seriously. If I were forced to choose between coffee and alcohol for the rest of my life, I'd choose coffee in a heartbeat.
- SummSolutions 5mo agoCongrats to this team, providing exceptional research on how coffee affects us physically and mentally. I think moderation is key.
- deepsun 5mo agoWhat surprises me is how many people drink coffee first thing in the morning. The organism is literally in wake-up mode, with cortisol spiking ~30min after wake up. So you get a caffeine AND a spike in cortisol at the same time. Better to wait at least couple of hours after waking up.
- BrandoElFollito 5mo agoI am reading the comments and wonde about the spread of individual sensitivity. I drink 3 to 6 Nespresso coffees daily, at various times, including shortly before going to bed. Sometimes I don't drink at all for a few days. I don't feel any effects related to the number, or whether I drink it or not. Sure, this is subjective but when I compare myself to the stories of the commenters I start to wonder if there is any caffeine at all in what I drink.
- haffi112 5mo agoI stopped drinking coffee for four or five years. I drank a lot before. You do realise that it has a strong psychoactive effect, at least it did for me. I still don't drink coffee, but I started experimenting with paraxanthine and I absolutely love it (paraxanthine is the primary metabolite of caffeine and is also a stimulant). I feel like it gives me most of the benefit of caffeine with very few downsides (no jitters, no crash, exits your system faster).