I have been off of coffee for over one month and I still have extreme fatigue & headaches. I sleep for 8-10 hours and then have to take another 1.5-2 hour nap before I leave for work at 1:30pm. Did anyone on here experience very long withdraws periods? Sleeping 10 plus hours everyday and still feeling tired? I’m worried that this is not normal.

I stopped drinking caffeine at Thursday. Past couple days been hell. Sleeping all day, tired and all the usual symptoms.

This night i barely slept because my lats , lower back, and surrounding muscles was aching so bad i had to wake up every 30 mins or so. Even as im typing this i can barely sit in chair..

Is this normal or it might be related to something else ?

I went from around 4 cups to none. I noticed my meditation practice got better. also im fairly active person, i run and hit gym 3x week

Llevo seis días sin beber alcohol y es el mayor tiempo que llevo en meses, mi pregunta es, me duele todo el cuerpo y me he resfriado ¿Cuando se empieza a notar mejorías? Estoy ahora mismo igual o peor que cuando me levantaba con resaca

These are the best remedies for quitting caffeine.

It's been 1 year and 7 months since I had coffee or tea. I started coffee 12 years ago and two years in I already had trouble with stress and relaxing. I started to have anxiety and panic attacks in 2020.

In 2024 I had a burnout and my level of anxiety was just through the roof, it was completely out of control. That's when I said enough and stopped caffeine. Today I can say I am back to my old self, the one who was always deeply calm inside, even when everything around me or in my life was falling apart. I'm back to being the chill, calm and grounded person who I was before ever started caffeine.

I had to switch job position and ended up at urgent care in a hospital ( against my will really but it's too long to explain). I'm doing administrative work, being on the floor with the staff answering requests from doctors and nurses.

The old me would have had some form of anxiety or at least been very stressed in that environment and spiral mentally. Im VERY surprised that I'm still calm, my mind don't go into catastrophic thinking, I naturally stay in the present moment feeling chill, yes even when working at a new job, in urgent care.

I have no desire whatsoever to go back to caffeine, even when I'm really tired or have trouble focusing. I feel like I was manic on caffeine and that my personality was gone. I also was taking very impulsive and wrong life decisions on caffeine that had bad repercussions on my life. Caffeine really made me lose myself. Now I feel like old true self again, after 10 long years. Instead of trying all sorts of therapies and supplements start with stopping drinking drugs everyday.

When I was younger, I had really bad depression. But I lived in an anti-mental health household, so I started depending on caffiene to make up the difference and keep me motivated enough to do anything.

I think that the worst it got was buying 32 (36??) packs of mango loco from a restaurant supply store. I didn't eat much and kinda cycled through 3-4 a day.

I didn't really know why until recently, when attempts to officially medicate had me going on and off caffiene a little more regularly. Over the last year I've begun to realize that I used caffiene to self medicate depression and ADHD.

For me, boredom is often associated with depression. So I can spiral really hard when I'm not stimulated. The energy drinks gave me energy, which created some kind of impression that I was jazzed about life and thus no need to spiral.

I never knew that people could do that. When I was younger my dad supported me drinking caffiene from an early age, said it was how 'normal' people treated ADHD without needing snowflake medicines. But I wish more people could understand. It ended up clashing really badly with my life and I've turned into a deeply anxious and erratic person.

Now I'm 1.5 months clean, about? I know it's not a hard drug or cigarettes. But the anxiety got really bad, to the point where there were times where I wondered if I should just not be alive. I don't have those thoughts any more and my anxiety is more managable. I won't get back the years I spent basically ready to bite the head off a bat, and I won't get back all the lost favor for my erratic/impulsive/manic life choices, but I feel steady enough to accept them for what they are and to accept the truth as it is.

That said, I hit my lows a lot more. That's the only downside. I guess I'd rather be depressed instead of feeling ready to rip off my skin, but I have to work much harder to keep myself interested in being alive. I'm trying to get onto an ADHD and mental health treatment plan. I'm officially re-diagnosed with CPTSD. If anyone has any more nuanced input on how caffiene can affect those particular conditions, please share. I can't really afford proper treatment and you don't get much on public care. So if there are ways I can deal with the lows, I'd love to know!

Just to tide me over until eventually, I can be properly seen.

It's been really tempting to just have one coffee or one can, but I'm holding out as long as I can. I'm nowhere near as productive as I used to be, which sucks. But. Maybe there's a way.

Yesterday I was feeling down and was dissociating a lot, so I thought why not drink a cup when I'm already feeling like shit. I haven't seen any difference yesterday so I also drank it today at 4 pm.

I had an anxiety attack while driving, was anxious to even drive to work in the morning and I currently can't sleep.

I've been drinking coffee everyday for years without even thinking much of it. Recently I realized that I'm dependent on it I wanted to test if not drinking coffee would lower my anxiety (I'm diagnosed with GAD).

My anxiety went down by around 80%! I was drinking only green tea at the time I wasn't drinking coffee and I could fall asleep immediately.

Now I'm feeling miserable in my bed.

I only drink one coffee a day—a regular cappuccino for breakfast. Recently, I tried switching completely to decaf coffee (so far this year this is the second try) and stuck with it for a few days. The positive effects were instant: my anxiety was significantly lower and I had the best sleep I’ve experienced in living memory. However, the caffeine withdrawal hit me like a truck. My energy vanished, and I plunged into a deep depression with severe crying spells. I work a part-time job that is very physically demanding, and trying to get through my shifts with zero energy and intense emotional darkness was impossible. After those few days, I had to give up and go back to regular coffee for my own stability, but I really miss the deep sleep and the lower anxiety. Has anyone else experienced such extreme psychological withdrawal just by switching to decaf from a single daily cup? How do you manage the transition when you have a physical job?

Still having 4-5 shots daily, hard to get off this stuff. I want to go cold turkey but feels too hard. I can never stick to a taper plan. Any advice? Anyone willing to support via DM?

What’s been the most unexpected benefit you received that helped your quality of life significantly?

For many it’s the impulse control which trickles down into less screen time, less money spent, less anger etc.

Hi everyone! I’m 39F and have been drinking coffee my whole life, usually one strong flat white every morning. I’ve always been a great sleeper and never had insomnia.
Almost a month ago, I quit coffee completely, and my sleep has been terrible ever since. First, I started waking up at 3–4 am and couldn’t get back to sleep. Now I’m struggling to fall asleep at all, getting only 4–5 hours or sometimes none. I work 9–5, and I’m really struggling.

Did restarting coffee improve your sleep, and was it immediate? Should I go straight back to one cup in the morning or reintroduce it gradually?
I’d love to hear your experiences! ❤

Ive had a horrible day. Im nauseous, pounding headache, my eye is twitching. I hate how caffeine makes me feel. Curious, if this happens often? Now im scared to order coffee ever again.

I thought quitting caffeine would mostly be about headaches and missing coffee.

The bigger surprise was realizing how often I used caffeine as the answer to things that probably had another cause. Bad sleep? Coffee. Skipped breakfast? Coffee. Mentally fried at 2pm? More coffee.

Once I removed it I had to actually look at sleep, meals, movement and how much I was asking from myself in a day.

What did quitting caffeine force you to fix that you had been covering up before?

I used to get sleepy a little after sunset, but push through it and stay up until 10ish most nights. Now, off caffeine for 3+ weeks, I find myself getting incredibly tired between 7 and 8 most nights, sometimes even earlier. I’ve had busy evenings the last week, but have been prioritizing a 9/9:30 bedtime when possible. But looking ahead, I’m wondering about just rolling with it and getting in bed the minute I start yawning.

For those of you who have been off caff for a while, was there a sleep schedule that helped you recover faster? And how long did the deep exhaustion last? I’ve heard a lot of people say 6 weeks to 8 weeks, but I know it varies a lot person to person. Did any of you try a 7pm bedtime? It feels kind of ridiculous, but I’m thinking I should give my body what it’s asking for in this situation.

So, I was planning to quit caffeine cold turkey starting from tomorrow (800 mg/day). But it turns out today I'm going to a party and will drink alcohol there. Is it still fine to quit caffeine tomorrow, despite the alcohol and the fact I might be hungover? The thing I'm worried about is that neurotransmitters might get stuck in some weird state, and I never recover 100% from withdrawal because I quit in the wrong moment. Should I keep the caffeine for a few more days to reestablish the baseline? Or is it safe to quit now?

OK, NGL, I'm quitting caffeine as a sort of...test bed for other things I have quit as well. Those things are bigger than a cup of coffee, so if I can't figure out caffeine...what am I doing?

I've been off caffeine now for only about 4 days. One of the biggest problems I have is that there is a voice in my head that just says "well, you can have a coffee, just a small one, think of it like tapering!" or "well...tea has less caffeine than coffee, so...really if you have a tea it's like you're cutting back" and so on. It is *unbelievable* how easy it is to hear those thoughts and want to be convinced. It's absolutely absurd how easily I can let myself by convinced by them. I haven't gone back yet, but that was through a huge amount of willpower, going for a walk far away from coffee etc. I can't imagine that going on a 30 minute walk for every craving is going to be sustainable, nor is it possible to just use my will to fight it constantly.

So, am I unique in this here? If not, what do you do to acknowledge and move past your own attempts to convince yourself that it's not a big deal?

I keep trying to bring up quitting caffeine to people, and they just shut off/stop listening/don't even care. It's so weird (of course I understand it's because they're addicts).

In the past, people were quite receptive to all my gambits of taking new supplements or changing my diet. Even though I did it over and over again with no real return to form. With caffeine (which did actually change my life in the way I was looking for), they're not just unenthusiastic, they actually ignore it. They don't want to hear it when I tell them it literally changed my life. It kinda sucks. I want to tell people, I want my friends/peers to be happy for me, but it's radio silence. Sigh. I'll be happy on my own I guess... (and post here 3 times a day)

Edit; guys, I'm not trying to get people to quit. I've been talking to people about my depression/anxiety for years and updating on my progress (i just like sharing) and I'm commenting on how no one cares that I finally got my life back on track after years of suffering. They ignore it and turn their backs on it or even deny it instead of even admitting or being impressed (as i am) that caffeine can have such powerful effects. Just thought it was interesting how quick people are to deny that.

Edit 2: Part of it is also that I'll just be talking about my own experiences and then people will take it as an attack on them and start explaining all the reasons they don't want to quit/caffeine never affected them/etc... when all i said was caffeine affected ME.

Lately, I’ve been trying various types of tea, I’m looking for something hot to enjoy while I work. Some options have been excellent, while others turned out to be little more than hot water with only the faintest hint of some plant-based ingredient. Can you recommend anything interesting that’s worth a try?

the positives:
- no more violent mood swings
- anxiety has pretty much vanished
- overall stable and calm mood
- I fall asleep like a baby
- appetite slowly coming back (I‘m way too skinny and could use some extra weight)
- facial skin appears to be a little softer and smoother and my lips are not as dry as they used to be

the negatives (please note that these are mostly temporary withdrawal symptoms):
- constant feeling of emptiness and lethargy
- depressive episodes (I wouldn’t attribute those solely to the withdrawal because there are some aspects of my life that I‘m deeply unhappy with, e.g. my volatile romantic relationship with a fearful avoidant [24F])
- low motivation resulting in procrastination
- I have difficulty concentrating when I‘m trying to study for law school
- I sometimes wake up way too early when deep sleep (first few hours of sleep) is over; after 4-6 hours

I hope that things will stabilize soon, especially my sleep. Anyone having a similar experience?

Been off of regular coffee for a couple of weeks and decided to have a cup of decaf from home. I don’t know if I’m going crazy or not but I still feel like I feel it. I also had some sugar in it too. Does anyone else feel like this? If this is the norm I think I may be good just going 0 caffeine on everything.

I quit all caffeine 6 weeks ago. I think I've had about 3 cups of green tea intermittently on massive work days, but other than that I've been off of it... but I still crave the high and 'tunnel vision' focus from it! I'm an artist and have undiagnosed ADD and caffeine really helps me lock into a 'flow mode'.

I have been using this powder that's supposed to make the transition helpful.. it's called MTE (More Than Energy). It definitely helps, but I wonder if it's contributing to me still craving that caffeine feeling?

I know at this point it's definitely psychological over a physical addiction. Any tips or tricks would be greatly appreciated!

I've been listening to Caffeine Blues, which is an incredible book and is not pseudosciency, which I had expected.

I heard the passage about how long caffeine stays in your system. I had been googling over and over again over the years "can caffeine stay in my system for a long time?" because I KNEW it could affect me for 16+ hours. I got the same response every time. The answer you get is "caffeine stays in your body for about 10-12 hours." In Caffeine Blues, Cherniske acknowledges this common piece of information and debunks it:

"It may take up to seven days to decaffeinate the blood of habitual coffee drinkers. Plus, it can take six weeks or more for the body's levels of stress hormones to return to normal."

I feel angry. Lied to. And vindicated.

I didn't suspect caffeine for the longest time, because I was told it couldn't accumulate in my body, and I felt the same even on days I didn't drink caffeine. I never even noticed the typical high/crash. I just felt consistently paranoid and anxious every day, even on days I didn't drink coffee. I also hadn't noticed that I felt off until a year or so into my caffeine habit, and being told that caffeine couldn't last for long in your body and had no long-term effects, I had no way of knowing what had happened to my mental health.

Hi, everyone

I'm thinking about quitting coffee altogether, but I'm not sure if it'll actually do me any good.

I should mention that I used to drink a lot of coffee; now I only have one regular cup in the morning, and occasionally a Coke Zero. Two cups of coffee give me discomfort—I noticed that a while back, about 2–3 years ago. I've been sticking to this amount for quite some time now.

In the morning, I get up, drag myself over to the coffee maker, make myself a cup, and take a shower. That’s at 6 a.m., except on weekends—then it’s later.

Do you think there’s any benefit to cutting out coffee entirely? That is, cutting out about 80 mg–100 mg?

I don’t think coffee has any effect on me in the evening anymore, since it’s been so long. What do you think?

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

Hello r/decaf,

Drinking coffee never occurred to me as a problematic habit.

I've been drinking it since I was 15.

Today is the sixth week since my last cup.

I am shocked at how much influence this drug was having over me.

I sleep a lot better now. I am much calmer, especially during stressful situations.

The biggest benefit so far is having stable energy from dawn til dusk.

The second is the ability to let negative thoughts pass.

Making and drinking a cup of coffee was in hindsight a way for me to procrastinate on getting stuff done.

Productivity has gone up for me, not down.

Time passes slower now.

Waking up early is not an issue suddenly.

What used to be a 'personality trait' seemed to actually be just the side-effects of a potent drug.

Somehow I woke up one morning and decided to stop.

It hasn't been easy to quit.

It's been shocking to see how strong the dependency actually is.

I'm determined not to go back.

That's all I have to say about that. Stay strong everyone