Bean Road: 2019

Monday, May 27, 2019

The Coffee Experiment

An old post that I never published (until now).

Photo by Libby Bacher

George Sheehan, the doctor/runner/writer from Red Bank, New Jersey, used to say that everyone is "an experiment of one."

In that spirit, I started an experiment in August (of 2014). During the week, I drank no coffee. On the weekends, I went to the Companion Bakeshop here in Santa Cruz to get a coffee or my favorite latte. During the first week, I got no headaches. However, during subsequent weeks, I got a headache every Monday night.

Once September rolled around, I decided to cut out caffeine completely for a couple of weeks. No Monday-night headaches. Then I decided that maybe it was safe to have a latte once in a while. So I had a nice latte one Sunday, which supercharged me for the day. But come Monday night, I got a bad headache once again.

So it appears that (for me at least), the caffeine wears off after about 24 hours and I get a headache from withdrawal. I'm sorry, because I love coffee and especially a nice latte. But paying the price of a headache is too dear. I suppose I could compensate by drinking coffee all the time, but I actually feel better not drinking caffeine regularly.

I may have to embarrass myself by asking baristas for decaf latte, but it beats a headache.