Is coffee Impacting YOUR health?
We're all different, so read on for my checklist to see if coffee is serving you as well as you might think!
As I’m always saying, nutrition is personal, and everyone will experience and react to various foods and substances differently, depending on their
genetics
environment
emotional wellbeing
lifestyle
gut health
hormonal health
use of medications (including the oral contraceptive pill)
general medical history.
Coffee has been in the news lately with research highlighting its benefits, particularly for men. However, this obviously doesn’t apply to everyone, and so I wanted to shed some light on the people it may not be serving…
Stress & anxiety
Caffeine plays a huge role in amplifying stress and anxiety in the body.
It stimulates our sympathetic nervous system, telling our adrenal glands to release adrenaline and cortisol.
Cortisol and adrenaline switch on our body’s ‘fight or flight’ mechanism, kicking off a cascade of effects in the body which would have evolutionarily helped us to survive things like sabre tooth tiger attacks! These effects include increased gut motility (think diarrhoea) and altered metabolism hormones linked to thyroid, hunger, and reproduction.
If you’ve already got a lot of stress and anxiety in your life, you’ll be working those adrenal glands hard! Adding coffee to the mix puts more pressure on them which,over time, can contribute to hormone imbalance and burnout.
If you’re a slow metaboliser of coffee, chances are that just one cup of coffee in the morning will still be affecting your ability to get to, and stay, asleep. Sleep is so vital for our health and wellbeing that regular disruption will no doubt be having detrimental effects on your body and mind.
Fertility and PMS
Your adrenal glands are directly linked to your ovaries and have an effect on fertility, menstrual regularity and overall ovarian function.
If your body is under a lot of PERCEIVED stress, it will halt ovulation to preserve resources and favour production of cortisol over progesterone (they’re made from the same precursor). This can impact your menstrual cycle, fertility, menopause symptoms, and overall experience or hormonal imbalance.
Gut issues
Coffee speeds up gut motility and, if you suffer with IBS, that means it will likely exacerbate your symptoms. This might mean you're not able to fully absorb nutrients from your food and you’ll notice other symptoms appearing over time.
Conversely, if you’re someone who relies on coffee for your daily bowel movement, there’s probably something else at play here that needs investigating. Long term constipation will mean your body is exposed to more toxins and hormonal imbalance as your body isn’t excreting them as it should be.
What do your genetics say?
Genetics are particularly important when it comes to coffee as we have specific genes that determine whether we are slow or fast metabolisers of caffeine. Ask yourself the following questions to see if coffee is impacting you negatively
Does it make you feel jittery after drinking?
Are you a ‘bad sleeper’?
Do you struggle with headaches or migraines?
Do you experience IBS symptoms and/or have an upset stomach regularly?
Do you suffer from regular anxiety or stress?
Do you depend on that morning cup of coffee to get energised and motivated for your day?
If you answered yes to any of the questions, what's next?
There’s never a ‘one size fits all’ approach, the decision of what to put in your body is entirely YOURS, not your GP’s, your nutritionist’s, or anyone else’s! You need to be asking yourself how coffee makes YOU feel.
Personally, I have an interesting relationship with coffee. One good quality coffee in the morning has always been my sacred time, my ‘me time’, my ‘let’s get productive’ time. However, I realised about 5 years ago that it really wasn’t serving me as well as I thought.
I had recently been diagnosed with an autoimmune thyroid disease and my gut function wasn’t what it used to be. Plus, I was suffering some pretty strong PMS symptoms that didn’t feel great.
Having read the literature, I chose to wean myself off coffee for a while and see what would happen, switching to high quality decaf, matcha, or turmeric lattes. On day one I did get a truly AWFUL headache, yes, but thereafter the outcomes were pretty transformative for my health. I noticed
I could sleep much better! I had no idea that one coffee in the morning could affect my sleep so much
I started to have more regular bowel movements and didn’t need to rush to the toilet after my morning coffee
my PMS calmed down and my ovulatory patterns normalised
and I was experiencing far fewer and less intense headaches.
All these improvements came about just because I changed my coffee habit! Now I know what coffee does for me and how it makes me feel, so I know when I can handle a regular coffee and when to stick to alternatives.
If you want to explore coffee alternatives, or want to investigate more about whether it’s coffee contributing to the root cause of some of your issues, set up a free 15 minute call with me and I’ll be happy to discuss how I can help.
