I know for health reasons that I need to totally give up caffeine (Soda Pop, Coffee, etc.) but I am totally addicted. I quit smoking a long time ago cold-turkey. I'd like to do the same with caffeine. Suggestions?

I recently cut out most of my caffeine as well. I wasn't as addicted as I was in the past, so I didn't really have a problem. One thing I did was get some caffeine free tea to drink in the morning. It kinda filled that hot cup of 'something' part of the morning.

Do you have specific health reasons to give up caffeine (i.e., doctor's orders) or do you just think it's bad for you?

It's not bad in and of itself, but if you have high blood pressure etc. it can cause problems.

In moderation, coffee and tea have health benefits.

It's recommended to give those up entirely just to save your OWN health. However, it's just too easy to get back on those habits. I know. I sing and eat/drink that stuff too.

I recommend trying to stay off complex sugars, caffeine and soda for a month just to give your health a boost. You might also look into taking Fish Oil for your digestion difficulties and also seaweed, to give your cells a lift. The result will be strength and energy, which you are asking for.
find something else to be addicted to. not anything unhealthy. try umm..like tea or propel or gatorade or something. or maybe a different kind of candy. such as jolly ranchers, or gummy worms or something sugary that could treat that sugar craving.

Propel and Gatorade have way too much sugar. Stick with tea.

I'm with Brad. Unless you have some specific health issue, I don't think there's any reason to give up caffeine completely. Ditch the soda immediately. Even diet soda has vaguely negative health effects. You might think about switching to tea, which has less caffeine and is very beneficial to your health.

I love coffee. It tastes like a bit of heaven, puts me totally on point, and it doesn't keep me awake at night. Also like tea, but I like something in the morning that makes the hair on your neck stand on end. And they told me I shouldn't bring Scotch to work anymore

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coffee_and_health

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_ ... _on_health

Ryan

From a press release from Harvard Medical School:

Coffee is earning a better reputation on the health front as a result of several studies. In summer 2005, Harvard School of Public Health researchers evaluated studies including almost 200,000 people and concluded that coffee drinkers were less likely to develop diabetes than people who didn’t drink coffee. A couple months afterward, two reports suggested that coffee blunts spikes in blood pressure due to mental stress and makes people more alert by perking up the brain’s short-term memory center.

At about the same time, University of Scranton chemists reported that coffee beat out fruits and vegetables as the number one source of antioxidants for Americans. It turns out that a cup of coffee delivers a decent jolt of potentially protective antioxidants along with caffeine and hundreds of other substances. And since we drink so much — the average American has three cups a day — the antioxidants add up.

And in early 2006, more good news came from a Harvard-based study of more than 150,000 female nurses. Over the 12 years that researchers followed the women’s health, habitual coffee drinkers didn’t develop high blood pressure any more often than women who didn’t drink coffee. In fact, women who drank three or more cups a day were 7%–12% less likely to have developed high blood pressure.

There was a hint of bad news for people who prefer decaffeinated coffee. A study presented at the American Heart Association’s fall 2005 meeting randomly assigned coffee drinkers to three to six cups of caffeinated or decaffeinated black coffee a day. The researchers saw complex changes in blood fats and cholesterol among the decaf drinkers that could tip the balance toward heart disease. This result, and what it means for long-term health, need further study before anyone who drinks decaf should feel the need to abandon it.