Coffee: Health Drink or Socially Acceptable Drug? - So Frickin' Mini

Megan J. McCrory: Hey, Danna.

How are you doing today?

I'm okay, Megan.

I have a question for you

Megan J. McCrory: I have an answer

How many coffees have you had already today?

Megan J. McCrory: Uh, today I actually brewed coffee.

I didn't do Nespresso, so we have both.

So I sometimes like to throw it back to brewed coffee, and I brewed

a pot, and I've had three no, two normal size cups of coffee.

And I'm putting this up for you to see.

It's the not gigantic half a liter mug

Like I do, yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: diner style coffee mug.

Maybe there's 200 of

Yeah, 200, 250 at most.

Okay

Megan J. McCrory: about 50 liters of milk in,

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: just 200.

So I've had two of these,

Okay.

How do you… Because I, I love this, I love talking about coffee because nowadays

we know that there are actually a lot of good benefits to drinking coffee.

Of course, again, everything in moderation, people.

Like, you cannot be healthy if you're drinking 20 cups of coffee a day.

there's, a lot to say about when you're drinking the coffee.

But we do know that it is healthy and helpful to a certain degree, and

sometimes even more so with ADHD.

A lot of people use it as actual replacement to medications.

Um, but I, of course, am ultra-sensitive to caffeine, ultra-sensitive to

the point where sometimes even if I have decaf, I'm reacting to it.

If there's maybe caffeine in the coffee that was made in the machine

before, or I don't fricking know why, but I sometimes react to decaf even.

I'm jealous of people who can drink coffee on the reg.

My husband drinks, like, four cups of coffee every morning right in front of

me, and I smell it, and I'm like, "Ugh."

So let's talk coffee.

Megan J. McCrory: yeah, so actually to that point, I think, and this

is one of the things that comes with any kind of, um, I would call

coffee a supplement or a drug,

Mm-hmm.

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: and your body does adapt to it.

So I would be very curious if you did an experiment where you drank decaf coffee

every day and monitored your symptoms and then slowly added some caffeine in and

see how your body might to the caffeine.

So that's a great question, and I can tell you that if I

drink decaf on a, on a daily basis, I get more sensitive to it.

To the decaf.

To the freaking decaf.

So, but again, I, I think we will record another mini about my gut health because

I think there's a lot to say, and I discovered a few things lately again,

Megan J. McCrory: Yeah

after having a rough time.

But yeah, so maybe I'm not the best person to experiment with that.

Megan J. McCrory: But in general, uh, like you mentioned the coffee with

the ADHD thing, and that is definitely a story that I've told many times.

Uh, back in 2018, I stopped drinking coffee.

part of actually why I was doing my health coaching training at that

time, and I had a friend, and she also wanted to kick caffeine for a period

of time for other health reasons.

So we decided to do it together, and that was the first time that

I realized that the caffeine was holding my brain together from an

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: point of view.

Like, I don't feel excited.

I don't feel anxious.

I don't… My heart does not palpitate.

And I mean, of

Okay.

Megan J. McCrory: I drink like 16 cups in a day, of

Sure, sure

Megan J. McCrory: uh, in general, it was more like self-medication.

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: and when I took it away, that was actually

when I realized, oh, still have ADHD, and I still have symptoms.

And like, I

And the coffee was helpful, yeah

Megan J. McCrory: adult life thinking, "Oh, I've got this thing managed."

And my entire adult life I had been drinking coffee up to 2018 when I

stopped drinking coffee for six months.

And it really took a long time for, like, the body to readjust to that, right?

So, like, you have that initial couple day thing where you're like,

your body's reacting to the lack of caffeine, uh, which you can

counteract by just decreasing slowly over time and then getting rid of it.

But it was really, it took almost six weeks before I stopped

thinking about coffee every day.

Yeah.

Wow.

Okay.

Megan J. McCrory: from smokers,

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: who quit smoking.

say, "You never stop thinking about having a cigarette."

Right.

And that's why it's so hard.

I mean, like, it's a drug 'cause, oh, it's, it's so much harder.

Yeah, of course

Megan J. McCrory: But, but in general, okay, so we, we thought

about this topic because of, like, blood pressure, hypertension, and,

Mm-hmm.

Megan J. McCrory: bad things that people talk about with coffee.

And recently was talking about blood pressure with somebody else, and they

were saying they were on blood pressure medication, and they were saying, "Yeah,

I test my blood pressure at night."

And I'm like, "Yeah, no, you can't do that. To get an accurate reading,

you need to test it first thing in the morning before you get out

of bed, basically." The, the, the, the best, you know, way possible.

No caffeine, no nothing, just take it immediately.

And they're like, "Well, yeah, but if I take it at night and it's good then,

I can assume it's good in the morning."

And I'm like,

Hmm.

Megan J. McCrory: you do you,

Yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: anyway, but I can tell as well, I've do- I have an at home

blood pressure cuff, and people are like, "Oh, but if I drink coffee, my blood

pressure goes up." And yes, for a minute,

Yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: there's also some things, you know, like, uh, in terms of

your vascular health and other things that, that coffee does so, oh, moderation

should be the name of our podcast.

I mean,

Actually, yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: it to so freaking moderate.

Yeah, that's not a bad idea.

Megan J. McCrory: yeah.

Um, but so you wish you could drink coffee just because you enjoy the flavor of it?

I mean, the smell, the flavor, yes, but also I do know

about it, being, you know, it's actually good for vascular health.

It's actually good for, you know, again, it kinda does help you

to sometimes focus a little bit more, or especially with ADHD.

I find that a lot of people actually mention that.

yeah, I mean, I think… I don't know.

I feel like there's so much that I could enjoy from it, let alone just being part

of that social, like, let's get a coffee or… And I'm like, "Oh, should I buy

tea?" And I, I hate buying tea because I feel like it's the biggest waste of money.

I'm like, "I'm not paying seven francs for hot water."

Megan J. McCrory: Yeah.

You know what I mean?

Like, it, it just drives me insane.

So,

Megan J. McCrory: I,

coffee."

Megan J. McCrory: think that it's, uh, you know, the co- the type of coffee that

you drink and, everything from the extreme Italian walk up, you get a ristretto

espresso and it's super super potent,

Emporia

Megan J. McCrory: the Americans, like, um,

Starbucks frappuccino.

Megan J. McCrory: I used to work in a manufacturing facility, and they

had manufacturing was going 24/7, and they had literally a can of syrup, so

similar to like soda syrup, you know,

Yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: soda s- you mix soda syrup with soda water, uh,

Sure

Megan J. McCrory: make soda, right?

had the same thing.

It was cans of coffee syrup that you could say how, how intense you

wanted it, and that would be how much m- water was mixed with it.

Okay

Megan J. McCrory: that to me is like the complete opposite end of then the, you

know, Amer- the Italian espresso, you

that's not coffee.

That's blasphemy.

That's just

Megan J. McCrory: mean, it's technically co- but that, that's the thing.

People would drink a lot of it and, that was the thing.

If you needed a break, you went down and got a coffee.

Or if you smoked, you could go out and

Yeah.

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: you know, taboo, at least in the US.

So,

I mean, you brought up a good, good point though, which is, you

know, I'm kind of talking about, yeah, there's a lot of health benefits to

drinking coffee, but it also depends how you drink that coffee, right?

If you're putting two teaspoons of sugar and, like, a gallon of milk and

a little bit of coffee and you're like, "This is my health drink," no, it's not.

So of course, when you're drinking it, you know, the more pure… As for everything,

the more pure you're consuming something, the better it's gonna be for you.

but do keep that in mind as well

Megan J. McCrory: and that's why I like to drink every once in a while…

So I- the Nespresso's just easy.

I put it in, I hit a button, and it comes.

And, but it's also so intense,

Mm-hmm

Megan J. McCrory: I have to have milk or, and/or sugar with it,

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: right?

Whereas, you know, drip coffee, cannot make this strong enough

where I need to have some sweetener.

So I lo- I mean, I like milk with my coffee regardless because I feel

like it gives a good mouth feel.

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: And then I, I can also adjust the caffeine as

Yeah

Megan J. McCrory: I, I mean, I'm glad Nespresso has some decaf stuff now,

but I can adjust the, the drip coffee by putting in one scoop of caffeine,

caffeinated and two scoops of decaf,

Right

Megan J. McCrory: can drink it till all day.

You know what I mean?

or just using a big pot of decaf in the afternoon.

So, I don't do it all the time, and I realize that that was part of, um…

I know we're getting close to the end of our 10 minutes, and that's a

whole nother topic, but having milk in my coffee and drinking a coffee

every other hour is also, my body is ingesting food, and I realize that this

is not helping with my insulin levels.

You

Yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: of course, then it doesn't really matter.

um, anyway, that's another topic for another day.

So if you're listening to this and you are like Danna, let's, uh, let's find

some other unicorns out there that,

Yeah.

Megan J. McCrory: drink coffee so

I hope we don't 'cause it sucks.

Megan J. McCrory: club.

And let us know, do you use coffee to, like, basically

self-medicate in any kind of way?

let us know how, how you react with coffee and if you want a bigger episode

with coffee because I'm sure, we can find some people to talk with about coffee.

Uh, that would

100%.

Megan J. McCrory: talked with yet.

All right, Danna, I'll see you

Cool.

All right.

Bye, Megan

Megan J. McCrory: Bye.