When does one get over coffee? I am waiting and waiting but it keeps calling me back. It acts like an on switch for my brain. But it’s not good for me. Makes my ears ring and they can become so sensitive I can barely handle music or loud noises. Not good for a musician and father of 3. My life is loud.
My morning coffee used to shoot me out of the gate. Mornings were when I did my writing. And I can see that my writing has suffered badly in the months I’ve been quitting caffeine. This is the first post on my personal blog since August. It’s hard for me to get into a writing mindset without coffee. The words just don’t flow like they do with a good caffeine buzz pushing me forward. I have tried decaf but even that small amount of caffeine still messes with me. Also, it teases as much as it satisfies.
I’m not a morning person and don’t think I will ever be. My ideal would be to sleep until 8 or 9am and then spend an hour or 2 slowly coming to life. But that isn’t how my life works. I need to get the kids to school by 8am and then I’m almost to the office. Breakfast meetings, lunch meetings and more meetings fill my day. Most of these are interesting and engaging. Things I chose to do and want to do. But it is hard when my brain isn’t full engaged. I feel dumb.
One upside to breaking up with coffee is that my afternoons are better. I have less of a crash after lunch- which, pre-break up, usually necessitated some espresso. Once you get on that caffeine train it’s hard to get off.
Winter makes it worse. My energy waxes and wanes with the weather. The sooner the sun sets, the sooner I go to bed. Even if I can drag myself to midnight it’s usually not a very productive period of my day. I’ve definitely started watching more TV since I quit coffee.
There is no resolution here, just a missive from the journey. Getting my brain and body rewired after decades of dependence on caffeine is proving to be one of the hardest things I’ve done. I try to frame it as choosing sound, music and life over temporary stimulation but it’s a thin argument when that stimulation is so effective and always at hand. But I will keep trying.