I’m not usually one to say this but… TGIF. Today was just rough…
The reason? Not getting nearly enough sleep last night thanks to this bad boy right here…
Pumpkin Chili Mexican Scramble
(Hands up if your minds momentarily went to the gutter)
My stomach was not impressed with last night’s dinner (beans, I’m looking at you!!), and it didn’t hesitate in letting me know. Hello pain, discomfort, and general malaise; won’t you stay a while? Ohhh, all night? Well if you insist…
😐
If you’ve ever suffered from any kind of stomach woes, you probably know that sleeping becomes more or less an impossibility. After unsuccessfully trying to fall asleep for about an hour, I decided to throw in the towel and spent the majority of the night curled up in a fetal position on the couch, catching up on old seasons of Dexter with a mug of hot ginger tea within arm’s reach at all times. It was a long night.
Needless to day, I’m a little tired today. And frustrated. I have an extremely finicky stomach – which is bad enough on it’s own – but what makes it even worse is that the food it chooses to tolerate can vary so much on a day-to-day basis. One day it loves Mexican, and the next day it doesn’t – the inconsistency makes it kind of difficult to figure out which foods I should avoid, and meal prep basically becomes a game of Russian roulette. There are foods that I know I never have any problems with, but as tempting as it sounds, I don’t think I should be living on breakfast foods alone…
I also don’t think I should be taking in as much caffeine as I have today. So far I’ve had 1 mug of coffee, 3 cups of strong black tea, and I’m currently working on my afternoon cappuccino…
As much as I love coffee and black tea, I usually try to limit my caffeine consumption to a cup of strong tea in the morning and an espresso in the afternoon. That puts me anywhere from 200-250 mg of caffeine a day, while the recommended amount is up to 300 mg/day. I don’t even want to think about how much I’ve had today, but I’m pretty sure that I wouldn’t have been able to make it through the day without it.
It’s not even the idea of the potential negative effects caffeine might have on the body that bugs me, but the fact that I don’t like pushing my body past it’s limits by giving it a fake sense of energy when exhaustion is its reality. I guess maybe it just brings back too many bad memories from the days where I starved myself and caffeine was basically the only reason I was still semi-functional… not the kind of life I ever want to relive.
Unfortunately, some days it just seems unavoidable. Life happens, things need to get done, and we need a little bit of extra help to do them. No big deal; but I think it does become somewhat of an issue when we’re doing it on a regular basis. I remember back when I used to still go to the gym, I’d often see people downing energy drinks or some kind of pre-workout stimulants so that they could push themselves harder, and I can’t help but wonder if that kind of thing is a good idea. Our bodies send us signals of exhaustion for a reason, and I think that ignoring and masking them with the use of stimulants is a good way to get into some serious trouble. Or maybe I’m wrong. I’ve never used any myself, so I can’t exactly speak from experience. And now I’m pretty sure that I’m just rambling, so I’m going to end it here and hopefully catch up on some much needed sleep tonight.
Hope you guys are having an awesome Friday, and I’ll talk to you tomorrow!
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Are you a coffee drinker? How many cups do you drink a day?
What’s your opinion on using energy stimulants before a workout?
I used to drink TONS of coffee, but I cut it out one summer because I felt I was too dependent, and now I react very poorly to too much caffeine. I have black tea in the morning, but can only have decaf coffee. I love the taste, so I treat myself to a cappuccino or coffee every once in a while (decaf, of course)
I think habitually using energy drinks/caffeine to boost performance and keep going is bad…that’s why I cut out caffeine personally. But if someone had a poor night of sleep and needs to function well for some reason (an exam, race, etc.), then I think it’s fine. I’m skeeved out by energy drinks, so I certainly believe coffee or black tea is the way to go