Coffee Jitters: How to fix it?
A lot of us coffee drinkers won’t start the day before getting that first cup of coffee. It can give you a lot of benefits, mostly that energy shot, so you can start to kickstart your day at the office.
As with most things when it comes to consumption, consuming too much of something does have some consequences. Coffee is not different. Some people experience the coffee jitters.
The what? The coffee jitters are feelings, sensations you can experience after consuming too much caffeine. This can vary from shaking to feeling your heart beat stronger, before crashing.
Luckily you can avoid this by using some of our tips and tricks like drinking decaf coffee or low-acid coffee.
What are coffee jitters exactly?
Coffee jitters are the physical sensations you get after consuming too much caffeine.
This can be experienced by feeling shaky and having serious heartbeats (suddenly). These effects will wear off after some time though.
Adults can tolerate about 400 mg of caffeine per day. Of course, the discussion here isn’t if all of this 400 mg intake comes from coffee alone or not. There’s caffeine in a lot of products like green tea, coca cola, chocolate, energy drinks like Redbull, and so on.
This tolerance level is reached by about 4 cups of coffee per day. As long as you’re under that level of 400 mg, you’re likely to see positive benefits from caffeine intake like better concentration, stronger physical health, and energy boost.
Does it mean, once you reach 400 mg of caffeine that you’ll have a lot of bad consequences? No, it’s different for everyone.
How do coffee jitters happen?
Caffeine acts like a natural stimulant for the nervous system. It blocks the effects of naturally-
What can cause coffee jitters?
The coffee jitters can be caused by consuming too much caffeine. The tolerance level is about 400 mg per day. Tracking your caffeine intake is key.
Caffeine is a stimulant and is known to block our body from sleepiness after a bad night’s sleep or staying awake too long. They’re blocking the adenosine receptors.
If done on a small scale, your concentration and energy level will raise because of this effect.
If you’re consuming more caffeine, it can cause you insomnia, irregular heart rate, headaches, or be bad for your stomach and make you poop. Coffee can be bad for you.
Some people drastically quit their caffeine intake and this causes a large gap and comes with negative effects. Most people will still drink coffee but look for various alternatives like low-acid coffee, decaf coffee or espresso, and so on. A high caffeine intake is also not good for pregnant women. Simply increase your hydration by drinking more water
Some side effects of caffeine on your body
We’ve gone into the subject here above a little bit but the best-known use of caffeine for your body is blocking the adenosine receptors and battling the need for sleep after a bad night’s rest or long day. Students do this often when they need to study for their exams. This works if done shortly and not frequently.
Consuming caffeine will block this and increase your blood pressure, and heart rate.
When you consume larger doses, say in total above 400 mg per day, can severe these effects and cause headaches, insomnia, and just give your stomach some major issues.
People react to this in several ways: slow and fast.
- Slow: they slowly decrease the intake of caffeine and combine this with an increased sleep pattern, extra water intake for hydration or moving more during the day, and eating healthier. I find that cycling for some time helps you clear your mind.
- Fast: they quit their caffeine intake very abruptly, leaving a serious “gap” and causing that feared energy drop. They can move and sport more, and eat healthier but this doesn’t cover the abrupt loss of caffeine.
How long can the coffee jitters last?
Caffeine stays in your system for about 8 hours, no more. This is an indication as every person has a different body and different habits.
Caffeine is a stimulant that can take effect in about 30 to 60 minutes after intake.
The coffee jitters, shaky feelings, headaches, stomach issues, and so on can happen throughout this period of 8 hours, depending on your situation.
How can you get rid of coffee jitters
Simply, sweat it and wait it out.
Depending on your personal and medical situation, you can be more or less sensitive to caffeine intake.
You can do some of the following things to help battle these effects:
- Reduce or quit caffeine intake: this one is obvious but won’t solve the problem directly as you’ll have to wait up to 8 hours until the effects are gone. If you abruptly quit your caffeine intake, you can have that feared energy drop or an energy crash.
- Sport and move more: sports and workouts will help as they can help reduce your headaches by breathing fresh air and moving in the open. Cycling can be very helpful.
- Eat healthy: Student food as we call it can help, consume foods that are rich in fiber, some nuts, raisins instead of chocolate cookies, and others. It can help to battle the energy drop.
- Hydration: drink water, our body exists for the most of water. Water is key to life. It will battle the dehydration effects. This depends on your situation and body but generally, drinking a glass of water makes you feel better. When you’ve stayed up well last night and had a lot of coffee, just start with a glass of water when you get up, it can do wonders.
How to drink coffee without the jitters?
Luckily, in today’s life, there are some alternatives available for coffee lovers to keep drinking coffee and heavily reducing caffeine intake and thus enjoy the good stuff without the bad consequences afterward.
Switch from Arabica to Robusta beans or a blend
An important part of your coffee brewing method is the selection of your whole coffee beans.
Robusta beans are known for their higher caffeine % compared to their Arabica counterparts. They’ve about 2 to 3 times more caffeine.
You could switch to a selection of 100% Arabica beans or a blend to reduce the amount of caffeine intake directly.
No more instant coffee
Instant coffee is in most cases made of 100% Robusta or blends that are dominated by Robusta beans. This increases their caffeine %.
It can be wise to select another way of brewing your coffee instead of instant coffee. You can opt for drip or pour-over coffee as a quick fix.
Low acid coffee
As the name suggests, coffee can cause a lot of acidity and trouble for your stomach. Luckily some low-acid coffee beans are lower on caffeine as well. You can try this yourself and see if it increases or decreases your coffee jitters.
Decaf coffee
The next level and probably the easiest way is just to brew your coffee with decaffeinated coffee beans. These beans still contain some degree of caffeine but nothing close to the regular coffee beans.
Some even state that they taste quite similar to the “real” coffee.
Cold brew coffee
Most of the acids or caffeine causing our coffee jitters are caused by the hot brewing method. Because of the heat. A great alternative is brewing your coffee by using the cold brew method by letting your coffee steep for more than 12 hours up to 24 hours. Brewing your coffee “cold” can reduce the acids by about 70% and thus low-acid coffee.
Reduce the sweeteners
A lot of people add sweeteners to battle the bitter taste of their cups. Depending on these sweeteners, like their sugar rate, sugar can also cause you some coffee jitters and a combination with caffeine won’t decrease them, on the contrary! Other sweeteners like maple syrup, brown sugar syrup, or even milk also contain sugar.
If you’re unsure, you can seek professional advice from your dietician or nutritionist so you’re you won’t compromise your daily needs for good health.
Wrapping up on the coffee jitters
Having the coffee jitters can heavily impact or simply ruin your coffee experience. Coffee should be something you enjoy every day.
When you have the jitters, go and drink a full glass of water and reduce the caffeine intake to regular levels of about 4 cups a day. Stopping caffeine intake will cause an energy drop. Go outside and take a good breath when cycling.
Luckily, there are some things you can do to prevent this from happening like drinking decaf coffee, low acid coffee, switching to 100% Arabica beans or simply leaving the extra sweeteners (and sugar) on the table.
Drinking coffee shouldn’t be a pain!
Enjoy your coffee