arborelia

I opened a bag of coffee beans the intended way, by pulling on the extremely glued together part. For once I did not give up and hack at it with scissors until it can’t pour correctly or close

I came to the realization during RPG Limit Break that the headaches I get in the morning are likely due to caffeine addiction. So I'm trying to go a week or so without it.

I eased off for two days -- on Friday and Saturday I only had a can of caffeinated soda each day, and yesterday and today I haven't had any caffeine.

I really wish I had a mug of coffee to sip while thinking about work. Instead I'm thinking about coffee.

For lunch I distracted myself by having some really spicy buldak ramen.

I had a mug of hojicha today. It was glorious. I was figuring it would just fill the void of having something to sip on, but it immediately made me feel better, to an unsettling extent. I hope this doesn't constitute falling off the wagon.

Hojicha is low in caffeine. An 8 oz mug has 7.7 mg of caffeine, according to Google. I was probably consuming over 200 mg of caffeine per day before.

I'm told it takes 10 days to break a caffeine addiction, which is honestly really doable as addictions go, but I still wasn't sure I was going to see it through if I went cold turkey. I have job responsibilities that aren't just sitting around and feeling bad.

If what I accomplish in these 10 days is to reduce my baseline level of caffeine to 4% of what it was, instead of eliminating my need for caffeine entirely, I'll take it.

I got through a whole convention with zero caffeine. It wasn't even bad.

Though, on the 6-hour trip there and back, I lamented how few convenience store options there are that aren't caffeinated, or sugary like Sprite, and aren't just bottled water. Especially once we left the Sheetz Belt and Vitaminwater wasn't available anymore.

I thought maybe caffeine (and its withdrawal) had been the source of all my headaches, so last night I went for a 2-mile run, with the belief that I wouldn't feel awful afterward. I drank water before and drank two bottles of Vitaminwater afterward to replace electrolytes.

Around 9:30 PM, the post-running headaches hit me and took me out for the rest of the evening. Caffeine was not causing all my problems.

I'm going to make it to day 12, just to be sure, and I'm going to look forward to a nice single cup of coffee on Friday.

I did it.

I even find myself considering that I might not make myself a cup of coffee tomorrow morning, because I have some time-sensitive things to get done and it would be easier not to.

I could not have had that thought two weeks ago. It wouldn't have even made sense. I think that's the biggest sign that I defeated the caffeine addiction.

it tastes like coffee. This was more than enough