Fail is in the title of the thread.
I had a coffee yesterday morning which was my last caffeinated capsule I had here. I didn’t want the muscle aches.
I slept I bit better tonight but might have been the lack of sleep from the previous night.
Having this overall muscle pain or whatever this is. Made some stretching yoga and felt like I aged 20 years in the last 3 days. Idk. I feel like a caffeinated fake if that makes sense. Also I never drank coffee after 1pm for quite some time.
In the office I feel I can concentrate better, my mind is clearer. Idk. I am confused.
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A little update. I am now stable with one coffee per day. Rest is decaf. It’s the habit and the taste I haven’t quite found a way around yet. But I think switching to decaf and not seeing this as failing is already a big step I think.
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Any tips on dealing with caffeine withdrawal? I had cut back to half decaf, drinking two cups in the morning. But I’m on a new medication that pretty much requires an abrupt end to any caffeine. Midway through day 1 no caffeine and have a bad headache. That’s really the only symptom I’m concerned about for now. I’m drinking a ton of water. Any ideas?
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For me ibuprofen were enough. I wrote about my symptoms just above. And during the last times of withdrawal they were pretty consistent. The worst was the backpain I got after some days - subsided after some more days. Well and against the odds my major symptom is not being able to sleep 
I think the best is to listen to your body. Sleep when you need it and as long as you need. It will balance out. I find that I am less tired and way more concentrated without caffeine.
Best of success to you and that your symptoms are minor. 
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Thanks Franzi! The ibuprofen is helping a little, but not quite enough. I’m hoping its only for a few days. I’m glad I’d already cut way back.
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How are you feeling now that it’s been almost a month?
As I’m making an effort to not be a reclusive hermit, and coming back to the forum, I figured I’d slip back into this thread.
Overall, I’ve kept my caffeine intake stable except for the last week where it has gone a little off the rails. I’ve been looking for a good time to make another reduction, so this is a bit of a setback.
I’ve kind of come to the understanding that complete caffeine “sobriety” will be very hard while my cat is still alive, as I get up every morning at 4 to feed her and then tey to get back to sleep, which doesn’t always happen. Its a big disruption to my sleep cycle and often I’m dragging through the day.
I’m still going to keep aiming for it though.
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This morning is my first day completely without caffeine. I reduced down to one tablet a morning to ease what tend to be pretty difficult symptoms for me. While my cat still needs middle of the night care, I now don’t need to take on this responsibility alone and have an eight hour window in which I can be in bed without needing to get up.
In comparison with all the other addictions I have given up, caffeine has proven to be one of the more insidiously detrimental ones. More ubiquitous in society than alcohol, caffeine isn’t a “problem” for many people, but it is still a drug that affects the body and mind, and most notably sleep cycles can be affected, even if it is in a subtle way.
There have been positives with this drug as, for me, it acts as a useful “anti-depressant” in a way that SSRI type medications can’t (since they have the opposite affect on me), but I think caffeine has done more harm than good, and even acted as a “gate way” for taking stronger and more deleterious stimulants, which made their mark on my health in such a way that can never be undone even though they have long since been given up.
Overall, I’m pleased about taking this step, and hopefully this time I will be able to make it stick permanently. 
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Wow that’s really impressive that you’re down to none at all. I’m still pretty good about keeping it under 400mg a day but if I have less than 400mg, I tend to get a really bad headache.
I totally agree with what you said about it being one of the harder things to quit. I didn’t realize how physically addictive caffeine is until I quit alcohol and then caffeine was the only “drug” I still ingested. I couldn’t blame my headaches on alcohol anymore so it kind of uncovered the symptoms that caffeine withdrawal can cause. If that makes sense.
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I also get headaches (I can feel one coming on right now, that I know will ramp up in intensity as the acute withdrawal gets worse), so I greatly sympathize!
Yes what you said makes complete sense to me. Caffeine withdrawal can be a small annoyance for some people, an inconvenience for others, and still for others it can completely put them out. It definitely makes sense that you wouldn’t have thought caffeine was the issue when it came to some symptoms you had when your intake might have been slightly less than your body expected.
I’m lucky to have been able to set aside today and the rest of the weekend to be tired, cranky, achy, and over-all out of commission. I can already feel myself falling asleep at my desk as I type 
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well I’m glad you made time for it!
I’m sure once you make it through the first day or two, it will be much better.
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Thread necromancy! 
My GP this year started writing a monthly health email to all of her patients. Trying to establish general good baseline for us all. She’s awesome, very back to basics.
This month is sleep hygiene, and this made me think of this thread:
Most people need 7-9 hours of sleep per night. For those who feel they need less, I challenge you to consider if you may actually need more—UNLESS you do not drink ANY caffeine (even earlier in the day, as this molecule stays around in the body for long periods of time) and feel that you wake up refreshed with energy for the full day— then you may be one of the <5% who truly need less.
Emphasis added, that caught my eye. Since quitting drinking, I found myself super sensitive to caffeine. (Holy shit was I mess while drinking and not know it.)
Now I have a single cup of caff in the morning, and that’s it. And since those changes, I sleep soundly on time every night, and wake sometimes very early in the morning without an alarm like, wtf I still wanna sleep!
But I’m ready to go.
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Thread bump.
I’ve had insomnia for 3 days, which is why I’m typing this at midnight after 48 hours of 3 1/2 hours of sleep, in a hotel room, when I was very much hoping to wake up rested.
My insomnia the last few days is worse than it has ever been. I might have had a spate or two every once in a while throughout my life but this is 2-3 hours here and there throughout the night with many wake ups. My sleep totals are 3-6 hours nightly (down from my usual 8-10) and a few nights ago I woke up from an anxiety dream sweating with a racing heart.
Coffee drinker from 14 or 15 on. I very much love coffee. Black drip coffee.
After sobriety 2 1/2 years ago coffee became one of my remaining “healthy vices” and I leaned hard.
Just a while ago I bought a beautiful fancy coffee maker so I could brew at home my daily pots of black coffee. Kicking Horse has long been my brand of choice but I upgraded my brewing system from a 20 oz Mr. Coffee to a Moccamaster in the hopes that I would drink less but better brewed coffee.
I’m lazy with my nice things though and the insomnia can be pinpointed back to when I started using a cool vintage pitcher I bought off Etsy to fill my water reservoir as opposed to filling up the Moccamaster carafe with water (and sometimes the sheen of yesterday’s pot) to refill the reservoir.
Purer coffee or the conspiratorial rantings of a 3ish day insomniac?
I make a 10 cup pot every morning with 4 Tbsp of Kicking Horse so that less coffee thing was probably just my addict voice being a dickhead.
I have cut back, and once accidentally given up coffee in the past often with some bleak moods and headaches following.
Since I’m on vacation and expected to function kindly around a child and my sweet brother and his wife for the next two days I will continue to drink drip coffee the next few days and when I get home I will swap back to my old Mr. Coffee (must I always have a contingency plan) to be able to function at work while I re-evaluate.
Coffee consumption from this morning to present: 1 10 cup pot of Kicking Horse at 4 am, 1 small cup of airline coffee on the plane at 7 am, 1 (12 oz.?) Nespresso made by my brother for me at 11 am. No wonder I can’t sleep. Why is addiction always the answer and I am always looking away from that answer. Sheesh. Sorry for the rant. My tired brain isn’t sleeping so this felt good to get out. It might be time to re-evaluate my relationship with this beautiful dark demon. Sigh. I always take things too far. 
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I am coffee drinker as well and some time ago I decided to cut it off a bit cause I had this huge energy crashes during day. Now I drink one (sometimes two) in the morning and yerba mate and matcha later during day. I’m still abusing cofeine like crazy but I feel different, more stable energy-wise. I used to drink 5-6 coffees a day when I stopped with alco. I dont have advice about insomnia cause my superpower is falling asleep almost immediately when my head hit the pillow but I’m sure I feel better now when I changed coffee for other healthy energy drinks.
Hope you get some good rest soon. Sleep is life 
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There’s no way around it: caffeine messes with sleep cycle. It’s elimination half-life is about 3-7 hours, depending on the drinker’s genetics. I’ve given up coffee almost completely bc of sleep issues and heart burn. I might have 1-2 cups a week.
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Day 36 caffeine free… very noticeable improvement in sleep and anxiety…
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Current moderation attempt. Since I’ve been back in town my insomnia is better but I am laying in bed longer and sleeping less.
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Its my day off this week so I am allowing myself a full pot with 3 scoops just days after posting that sign.
I live so much in my head that my science brain says “lets see how this affects your sleep” while my addict brain says “didn’t we already do this, read the sign”. Or maybe, I have those personas flipped in my head. 
Yargggggghhhh.
Either way, documenting here to see with my own eyes how this day off “treat” affects my sleep.
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For some reason caffeine doesn’t affect my sleeping. I usually drink one or two cups per day, one in the morning and sometimes one in the evening. My mom is the same.
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I used to be this way and I long for it back. This insomnia is recent, and maybe I’ll find out that its unrelated to coffee and that I can go back to drinking it by the gallon.
For now, my sleep/caffeine balance feels precarious. Maybe its just my brain fucking with me but I live in here and the brain runs the show. 
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