I'm kinda pissed cause my entire post got deleted but nevermind! I will just write it again!

Anyways. I realised that we have been investigating food in the solid form so today, I have decided to do another state of matter - liquid!

Basically, decided to do coffee because coffee is so prevalent in today's society. Haha.Imagine this:

In the wee hours of the night, the house is pitch dark. However, there is a stream of light coming from a table lamp in the room. Going closer, you find an individual sitting at a desk, his table piled with stacks and stacks of documents. Then, he picks up his cup of coffee and takes a sip, and then continues ploughing through his documents. Just then, you spot 3 other cups on the table, all empty, but with coffee stains on the sides...

Ok. So it's imagination and exaggeration but the idea is this: people are so so reliant on coffee!! And worst still, it's not just working adults but teenagers as well that rely on coffee! Trust me, there are schooling students that need at least one cup every morning or else they will be walking zombies for the rest of the day...Therefore, it's a serious societal problem!

But, can people really become addicted to coffee? Or is it just a psychological thing?

Actually, it really depends on your personal definition of "addiction". Most people don't consider coffee to be an addiction mainly because so many people drink it!

I don't really know how to explain this. Erm. In an exaggerated manner, you could then say that people are addicted to meat because the majority of the world's population consume meat at least a few times a week! (If they have the means to, that is )

But you cannot really say that people are addicted to meat, can you? So in the same stream of thought, one cannot really say people are addicted to coffee because of its immense popularity!

Moreover, coffee is not associated with the typical symptons/behaviour that would occur when one takes hard drugs or smokes. If coffee, however, were addicted, then these symptons would occur - need for more and more coffee, anti-social behavior, severe difficulty stopping consumption.

On the other hand, if one day, a daily drinker decides to cut it out of his/her diet entirely, then he/she may develop headaches, fatigue or drowsiness.

So like I said earlier, it depends on your definition of addiction. However, if you ask me, it's more of reliance and the body's adaptation. Because if you are so reliant on coffee, then your body would naturally get used to the idea of having coffeee in your system. Therefore, if it is suddenly deprived of this liquid, it would definitely react to the sudden change.

So what's the solution to eliminating coffee?

The trick is really to GRADUALLY decrease your caffeine intake rather than eliminate coffee cold turkey. And if you should get a headache due to caffeine withdrawal, there is always anacin to cometo the rescue! Anacin, which is essentially pain killers. However, certain anacins (the ones that you should take for this coffee thing) contain both asprin (to relieve pain) and small amounts of caffeine. So yeah, bacially, based on my "evaluation", it is just gradually minimising your caffeine intake as well as suppressing any discomfort/pain you receive.

Now for the bad effects of coffee. I'm sure everyone knows that it stains your teeth and gives you really bad breath. But there are other bad effects:

1. Hypertension
Caffeine can raise blood pressure for a few minutes, and in some cases hours. However, this uaually only apllies to people who already have hypertension. If you do, a cup of coffee may temporarily raise blood pressure, thus increasing the risk of having a stoke!

2. Heart disease

Caffeine can cause irregular or fast heartbeat. Moreover, if you consume six or more cups daily, then the risk of having cardiac arrest is increased much more. And just to clarify things further, this study was conducted with NONsmokers, so for those who want to use "ai ya, these people msut be smokers lah" as an excus, sorry to burst your bubble! (iuts kinda funny how we always find excuses for ourselves? I'm guilty too, sometimes...)

3. Headaches

Although caffeine does increase the effectiveness of headache medicines (like anacin, excredin), these combined products can actually cause rebound headaches. This is actually affectionally known as the “take a pill feel better, then worse” cycle! Therefore, such over-the-counter medications shouldn’t be used for more than two days at a time.

4. PMS

Caffeine acts as a diuretic and should decrease discomfort and bloat. However, it can also cause a fall in blood sugar, which increases symptoms of PMS. There can be a three-fold increase in PMS if we drink more than three to four cups of coffee a day! So it's like one cup one fold?!

5. Bladder conditions

Caffeine speeds up the kidneys’ processing of fluid, as such. we have to go more frequently. It can also irritate the bladder, leading to certain forms of incontinence.

6. Sleep!

Caffeine stimulates the brain and also affects levels of melatonin, which promotes sleep. It takes four to seven hours to metabolize caffeine. Howeever, because of the fact that the older we are, the longer time we take to sleep, excess caffeine can thus cause unintentional insomnia.

7. Anxiety - high doses increase the chemicals in the brain that are associated with anxiety.

8. Heartburn

Coffee, even decaffeinated coffee, can increase stomach acid production and affect the closing of the valve between the stomach and esophagus, leading to reflux and heartburn. If you do have this problem, then its probably best to abstain from any types of coffee.

There are many other problems too, like miscarriage (which is actually one of the more serious and crucial bad effect of coffee).

However, if you've noticed, most of the bad effects apply only if you already have existing problems. Moreover, it is no secret that caffeine is still effective in perking people up. Still, there are many other better healtheir foods that we can take as an alternative to coffee if our main objective is jsut to perk oneself up. Apples, for example, have been proven to be more effective than coffee!! (Bet you didn't know that!)

So yes. ABSTAIN FROM COFFEE OK?