7 people, 21 days to weight loss goals

CAFFEINE WITHDRAWAL

I don’t know what you know about caffeine addiction. It is easy to joke with friends about needing another coffee to get you going in the morning or a soda to perk you up in the afternoon. However, the truth is that your body may truly be addicted to caffeine and if you are addicted the withdrawal from caffeine will be painful.

The symptoms of withdrawal are headache, fatigue or drowsiness, irritability, difficulty concentrating or flu-like symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, muscle pain and stiffness. For our challengers this was no laughing matter.

The first day without caffeine was not an easy one. Irritability happened early. We had several challengers who are diet soda drinkers. Diet soda is strictly off limits more because of the artificial sweetener because it can trick your body into craving more sweets. Sleepiness was also an early symptom of the caffeine withdrawal. That was one that everyone could fight through. The food helped keep everyone on track.

It was the severe headaches that had some people adjusting their caffeine intake. One challenger spent two nights in a dark room with a pillow over her head trying to recover before deciding it wasn’t worth it. She decided a diet soda a day was not going to derail her goals too much and gave in. It ended her suffering and she was able to stick to the challenge.

Other suffered similar symptoms and adjusted accordingly, giving up caffeine for several days when they could and giving in when the symptoms became too much to bare. They knew that their results would suffer because of the cheating, but felt if they were in too much distress they would give up on the whole challenge.