I’m glad I have managed go all five weeks without caffeine – no coffee, no tea, no dark chocolate to be on the “safe” side… That’s all nice, but looking at the purpose of the decaf period, did it make any material difference? And was it any different compared to the previous two times when I did this? The result is not totally clear cut to me, it definitely was much clearer in previous times. No experiment running for five long weeks in real life can really just change one parameter (me with/without caffeine in this case), while keeping everything else the same. Thus changes or lack of change is harder to interpret.

One main target was reducing “jumpiness”, as it seemed to be pretty well correlated to coffee consumption. This didn’t seem to happen this time very much, or rather it feels like the “jumpiness-cycle” is more connected to: a) I’m like that by nature, b) how stressful work was at any given point, c) how much I’ve meditated. Thus points at just being more aware of being jumpy in the future, and deploy a variety of coping mechanisms, instead of a substantial tool like this.

Another target was improving on my sleep. That did happen, definitely crashing by 23:00-23:30 these days, instead of staying up later. Also waking up better in the morning, though not much earlier, if at all, compared to my benchmark 8 hours of sleep. I guess there’s a lot to improve on my sleep quality, but there was some positive effect at least.

This time the substitutes I had were different. The main one was switching to infusions (fruit teas), and those seemed to have worked out well, I think I keep some of that up later. The other substitute was decaf coffee. That felt a bit stranger, drinking decaf knowingly made me feel a bit empty inside (why would someone actively choose a “faux” version of something like this?), but had the right effect of me being able to use the cafés’ social aspect while not breaking the fast. Definitely good choice when getting a “coffee” late in the afternoon and in the evening, and not want to be influenced. The taboo is gone, so I might use this again, but likely not without shaking my head at myself inwardly. Still learned some new things, such as when getting a drink one day, I’ve thought why not go one step further and try replacing the normal milk with something else. Even if asking “decaf cappuccino with almond milk” made me almost laugh out loud because this is one of the most hipster things I’ve done, the result was pretty good, I’m a fan of almond otherwise and now I know that it is indeed good with a hot drink. Also an affirmation to keep experimenting.

I was surprised also, that when I had any cravings, it was for a good strong English breakfast tea, instead of a coffee. Since cravings point at weaknesses, now I’m more wary of the breakfast tea…

There are other health effects that I can’t really measure myself, but would have been nice to know, such as my iron levels. I get some good feedback on that when I go donating blood (and the last few times my level was lower than I’m used to), but there’s still a few weeks till next time, not sure how clear it will be any difference from these weeks.

All in all, I’m glad I went ahead with this decaf period, more mindful than last times. While the results are mild at best, that’s a signal too. Now let’s see how the old habits will come back or some things have changed more permanently.

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The first time it was a very special experience, many aspects really stayed with me. The most important memory I carry over is the expected way the caffeine withdrawal should play out, based on this first time. The first week is kinda easy. The second is harder. The third was really rough, I reverted to pretty much to be a manchild, (figuratively) banging on the table and shouting “I am a grownup, I can have coffee whenever I want!” Then the last week was very good, much better mood, much more balanced physical functions too. It was bliss. Was almost strange to stay in that state for only a week, and resuming having coffee .

The second time was less memorable but had its own lessons. The rough phase happened much earlier and was less rough. Also, I think I had a hard time working around this no-caffeine limitation when going out. Seemed like every drink that I could have either had caffeine in it, or was full of sugar, or was just not worth the price, such as a single tea bag in a cup of water the same price as cappuccino in many cafés? Still survived, and was worth it, even if this second time was less transformative than the first.

This third time I started again because of the warning signs listed earlier were unmistakable. Today’s day 6 and so far it went down as such :

• Day 1: really big coffee craving, feeling almost useless the whole day, crashing at 10pm (hours before previous sleep time).
• Day 2: quite refreshed after long sleep, almost no craving, this should be eeeeeasy.
• Day 4: cravings slowly creep back, for example when others have coffee around me, just by smelling them. Starting to have enough of the teas I’m having.
• Day 6: the “child tantrums” are lurking, I catch myself with similar thoughts already. On the other hand, waking up better in the morning, and not feeling especially tired through the day, much more even energy. I, however, catch myself thinking “this goes well so far, I wonder what should be the first drink to have when I’m finished, to make it special?” This is really my brain subverting the effort.

I’ve also tried to do a little bit more thinking and checking when starting. For the hot beverage cravings, I choose more rooibos (or red bush) teas or flower/fruit teas if need to. I have to say, I couldn’t really stand the flavour of rooibos tea before, but now I’m acclimatized to it. Don’t think I would ever choose over all the wonderful (but caffeinated) teas of Taiwan if I had a choice, but I think it will carry me over. There are other drinks like MILO that I can fall back to. Curiously enough, decaf coffee still has caffeine in it (just much less), I’m still on the fence whether having that is acceptable within the rules of this game, but the jury is still out on that one…

Another change is cutting down on chocolate as well (or actually skipping it as much as possible), as that has caffeine as well. I guess that’s a win on the sugar side too, but have to watch snacks in general. Having said that, I do feel that when the craving moods hit, a piece of dark chocolate would sort me out – have not tried (as playing by my own rules), but I’m pretty certain it would work.

This time to match some plans that I already had in place, I choose not “1 month”, but a 5-week interval for this detox. There’s a clear ending (with a trip at the end of the 5 weeks) that makes the whole experiment self-contained, which feels nice. Also, when I get to the bliss-phase, hopefully, I should have a bit more time to enjoy it.

In the meantime, hope everyone else can enjoy their choice of drinks , regardless of what silly things I myself am trying to do…

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