I needed better sleeping and tried various things. In the end I stopped drinking coffee and tea. For me its now just hot or cold water, sometimes a herbal tea, and an occasional beer or orange juice.
First caffeine-free weekend I had terrible headaches, than came weeks of strong urges (I felt I was an addict). In these weeks I just fell asleep on the couch or even at my desk at work. I slept a lot these weeks, during the day, early in the evening, like my body had catching up to do.
Now I'm fine, I sleep like a baby. I feel really good and have strong concentration.
On moments I have a 'coffee urge' I take a little walk outside, for 10-20minutes. My colleagues know by now, I'm the guy who goes out once or twice a day for a little walk...
Reducing total caffeine intake has improved my sleep quality, but I find there are diminishing returns to making it nil consumption. My sweet spot is a single small cup of tea or coffee in the morning. Research suggests that some trace amounts of caffeine can remain in your system many hours.
Another anecdote: whenever I go off coffee I just feel a bit more dumb, and I don't like losing an easy mechanism to quickly boost my energy levels.
The first few weeks without caffeine are rough, then I just turn into a more boring version of myself: I go to bed early, have consistent energy levels throughout the day, and I'm a little less intelligent.
I don't really want my energy levels smoothed out throughout the day: getting out of the gate quickly in the morning and getting ahead of my goals for the day is far more important to me, and having a few hours each day where I'm really "on" is better than my brain being a little sluggish forever.
I don't personally have issues sleeping through the night though. (But with caffeine I do shift my sleep a bit later).
Cutting caffeine does seem to be a reasonable place to start for people who are having sleep issues, or anxiety, but for me I've decided the pros vastly outweigh the cons.
I can +1 this. I'm on caffeine now, but once a year or so I will "detox" from it to reset for a few months. The first days/weeks are exactly like you said.
The only difference is that after a month or so, I go back to coffee - just at a greatly reduced volume. That first cup is absolutely heavenly.
Agreed, went caffeine-free almost 3 years ago and feel so much better. Had initial brain fog, and like you described some pretty debilitating headaches and migraines from the caffeine withdrawal, but it passed after a couple weeks.
If you're interested, I found a not-quite-coffee alternative that seems to satisfy my craving. It's a dandelion root substitute, the brand I drink is Dandy Blend. More like instant coffee than a good ground bean coffee but it does the job.
First caffeine-free weekend I had terrible headaches, than came weeks of strong urges (I felt I was an addict). In these weeks I just fell asleep on the couch or even at my desk at work. I slept a lot these weeks, during the day, early in the evening, like my body had catching up to do.
Now I'm fine, I sleep like a baby. I feel really good and have strong concentration.
On moments I have a 'coffee urge' I take a little walk outside, for 10-20minutes. My colleagues know by now, I'm the guy who goes out once or twice a day for a little walk...
Try it for a few months!