Many of us do choose to give up caffeine, but it's a choice you will get to make for yourself. When I did the steps, I was drinking 4 big mugs of coffee a day. If I missed any one of those mugs, I got a withdrawal headache. I wasn't using sugar in my coffee, just milk, so it wasn't a problem as far as living without sugar was concerned, but I was tired of being addicted to coffee and having to scope out the nearest source of coffee when I traveled and then decide whether to shower first or get coffee first. It felt like the coffee was running my life, and I didn't like that.

I didn't even tackle the coffee issue until I had been steady on step 6 for 6 months. Then I did a gradual detox, mixing decaf into my coffee and gradually increasing the decaf and decreasing the coffee, until I was drinking straight decaf. I do not recommend cold turkey. The way I did it was painless and I never had withdrawal headaches.

I decided to tackle coffee last because I knew I was going to miss it more than I missed sugar and it would be harder. So it really helped me to be really stable with my food and feeling pretty good before I dealt with it.

It's not a decision you have to make now. If you are using sugar in your coffee you will need to move it to meals on step 3.
Allison

: Happy Saturday and hope you're all
: doing well!

: I was looking at P-not-P and Little
: S.A. yesterday, and the image of
: the poor spider on caffeine really
: stuck with me! I wanted to ask a
: few questions:

: - I always assume caffeine is
: 'healthy' for our minds to focus,
: to think, and for us to be awake.
: is this not true then?

: - Eventually, when working the steps
: of RR, do we all have to give up
: the caffeine? Should I try giving
: this up cold turkey or would it
: work better as a gradual approach,
: just like we are doing with the
: sugar?

: - this is silly to ask i know lol
: but...is a life without coffee
: possible?! I mean - wow that would
: be quite liberating! Sometimes I
: feel like i HAVE to have coffee
: and i hate feeling so dependent on
: something so trivial, lol.

: Thank you all and love to hear your
: thoughts, supportive advice
: always.