Episode Summary:

A college coffee habit born out of cold Illinois winters eventually dictated a man's entire life schedule. He ignored chest pains until a doctor appointment for a nagging back issue revealed a serious heart murmur. It took a blunt warning from a fellow patient and two heart surgeries before he finally broke free from his dependence. This confession covers how caffeine can silently mask and worsen cardiovascular issues, and the profound physical and mental relief that comes with finally letting it go.

What You'll Hear in This Episode:

How a harmless habit to stay warm in college escalated into a daily necessity that controlled his schedule. The ignored warning signs of dull chest pain and a skipping heartbeat. What happened when a routine back checkup uncovered a heart valve problem at age 27. The stark advice from a stranger in a cardiology waiting room that ultimately changed his life. How eliminating caffeine improved his temper, his marriage, and his overall physical health.

Key Takeaways:

Caffeine use can quietly escalate until it dictates your social life and daily schedule. It is incredibly easy to brush off serious cardiovascular symptoms, like heart flutters, when you think you are young and invincible. Heavy caffeine consumption can worsen underlying heart conditions, and reducing it is often crucial for cardiovascular health. Breaking a caffeine addiction can level out your temper and significantly improve your relationships. Sometimes a major health scare is the exact catalyst needed to reevaluate dangerous daily habits.

Who Should Listen:

People who arrange their entire workday around their next coffee break. Anyone experiencing chest pain, palpitations, or racing heartbeats while consuming daily caffeine. Those who feel like their temper is short and their relationships are suffering because of their stimulant use.

Resources & Links

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📖 Confessions of a Caffeine Addict by Marina Kushner

📩 Share your own caffeine confession: https://linktr.ee/UnwiredLife

🛒 Live Unwired Merch: LiveUnwired.org

Stay away from caffeine I have often joked with friends that the only vices I ever had were coffee and caffeine. I loved the taste and jolt caffeine gave me. I didn't smoke, only occasionally had a beer or glass of wine. And I didn't have an addictive personality.

Or so I thought. Caffeine and coffee crept into my life like the slow drip of a percolating pot of Columbian dark.

It was insidious, innocuous, and I didn't know it was happening. I started drinking coffee regularly in my freshman year of college. It began late in the first semester, as I started to cram for final exams.

I was studying at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois, the birthplace of barbed wire.

That setting alone would drive anybody to reach for something to kill the pain of depressing cloudy days and cold, lonely nights against a dull brown landscape. However, that wasn't my reason for drinking coffee. Like any college student, I was experimenting and trying new things.

The walk from the dorm to the Library was only 10 minutes, but it was a long 10 minutes as the daylight grew shorter and the air colder. DeKalb was in the middle of corn country and was flat and low.

The wind would come howling off the plains of Canada, through North Dakota and Minnesota and into northern Illinois. There was no buffer, nothing to stop it. You'd be chilled to the bone by the time you walked from one end of the campus to the other.

At first, I was looking for something warm to drink. I had a habit of stopping at the library canteen before I'd even attempt to sit down. Hot cocoa was my drink of choice when it got cold like this.

One evening when I went to the canteen vending machine, the hot chocolate selection was empty. I was disappointed that I would not be able to enjoy hot chocolate while I tried to digest Plato's Republic and Psychology 101.

The only other option that evening was coffee. I hadn't developed a habit of drinking coffee at this point, and my first reaction was to turn away and head to my cubicle to start studying.

I only wanted something to warm myself up. I wasn't looking for caffeine high, and I hadn't given much thought to it, but the hot cocoa had been giving me some of that.

I deposited a quarter in the machine. I chose coffee with cream and sugar.

I was a neophyte, and although I had tasted coffee in the past, I didn't like the flavor, so I sweetened the coffee to kill the taste. That first night, I felt the quick buzz from the caffeine for the rest of the semester. My first stop at the library would be the canteen.

I'd grab a cup of coffee and retreat to a cozy nook with my books for the remainder of the evening. Sometimes I'd get the second fix and then the third. Coffee became my steady habit.

It was something I could rely on to alter my mood, sharpen my focus and get me through the arduous hours of studying. I ended up turning my back on hot cocoa. It was now too juvenile for me. Coffee was an adult drink with an adult effect, and I loved it.

The years passed. I transferred schools, graduated and got a job, and eventually I got married. In fact, I met my wife over a cup of coffee.

It was during my senior year of college. I first met her in the English section of the college bookstore and struck up a conversation about J.D. Salinger and John Updike.

We took the conversation down the street to the corner cafe and sat down to a couple cups of coffee. High on caffeine, we spent the rest of the evening talking about English literature, movies and aspirations.

My wife wasn't the only person who I met over a cup of coffee. I met many friends and companions while enjoying coffee. A cup of coffee was also a good excuse to shut down for a while, kick my feet up and relax.

That's what made it so difficult to stop drinking coffee. As strange as it may sound, I had arranged my life around coffee. My schedule was dictated by coffee breaks.

The day would start off with the automatic coffee brewer going off at 5:45am I didn't know I had a problem with caffeine until I was sitting across from the doctor during an annual physical examination. I had experienced discomfort in my chest for quite some time. It was a dull pain that would come and go.

Occasionally it felt like my heart had skipped a beat, and that would catch my attention. It was most prevalent and noticeable while I was at rest.

I knew that I had to have these symptoms checked out, but as soon as they would appear, they were gone. I might not have another incident for several days or weeks, and I denied to myself that anything could be wrong. I was young and invincible.

What could be the problem?

What drew me to the doctor's office wasn't the pain in the chest, but the allure of a hiking trip that I'd planned to take with my wife in the Southwest.

We were going to spend some time in New Mexico, and she had persuaded me to make a visit to the doctor first to check on another nagging issue with my lower back. Dr. T. As everyone called him. He was Italian and had a difficult name to pronounce, reassured me that my back was fine.

As the exam continued, he put the stethoscope against my chest and seemed to pause, then took another listen. Breathe in and hold it. Okay, you can let go again. Breathe in and hold it. Let go, said Dr. T. He looked concerned. The words came out of his mouth.

You know you have a pronounced murmur. It was a question and a statement all wrapped into one. No, I didn't know. What does that mean? I asked him. I was scared.

I'll need you to have some tests done to evaluate it, he said. The problem seemed to be with one of my heart valves. It wasn't closing and was causing a fluttering sound to the trained ear. His tone was dry.

I'll set up an EKG echo and a stress test, he said. He couldn't tell me the extent of my problem then, but he knew it was serious. He was acting with a sense of urgency.

As we spoke, he wrote out scripts for each of the tests. From this point on, my life would change. The murmur was one of the best and worst things to happen to me.

It made me reevaluate my life, my habits and decisions. This included changing my diet and reducing my alcohol and caffeine intake. I was only 27 years old. I'm too young for this, I thought to myself.

It was a bright, sunny June morning. The sun blasted through a side window into the waiting room. Across from me sat an attractive middle aged woman. Mixed emotions ran through me.

I was still groggy from interrupted sleep and no caffeine. I felt irritated and nervous. I had been told not to have any caffeine before I went for the echocardiogram. The woman must have sensed my anxiety.

We were in the cardiac wing of the hospital, so she knew that we were both here for only one reason. Do you have to have an echo? She asked. I said yes, and from that point on I became more at ease.

She explained that she had been living with a mitral valve prolapse problem for nearly a decade without having to have any corrective surgery. Mitral valve problems are more common for women, she explained. Is there anything you can do to stop the progression of the problem? I asked.

Stay away from caffeine, she said. Anything that has caffeine, stay away from it. No energy drinks, she emphasized.

I told her how I loved that first cup of coffee in the morning, looked forward to my mid morning brew, had to have an afternoon pick me up and would close out my day with a hot cup after dinner, she nodded her head in agreement and then, in a matter of fact way, let me know. That would all have to change. That's the way it was, but not the way it's going to be.

The fluttering feeling will only get worse and may exacerbate your problem. These were harsh words. My way of life was being challenged and I didn't like. It's been 10 years since I met that woman.

When I go back for my annual echocardiogram, I'll look for her. I haven't spotted her since and I wonder what became of her. Did her problems progress? Did she have to have surgery? I did. Twice.

I'd corrected surgery first, but the fix was only temporary. Five years later I was back for a second round under the knife.

That conversation I had with that woman in the waiting room 10 years ago still strikes a nerve with me today. It wasn't until I underwent the second surgery that I totally accepted her philosophy and finally weaned myself off caffeine.

I'm not beholden to it anymore. I'll occasionally have a cup in the morning, but my day isn't ruled by it. The irritation that I used to harbor if I didn't get a cup is gone.

My relationship with my wife has improved. I'm not as short tempered as I used to be. I'm better off both physically and mentally.

I didn't really have a choice in the matter when I gave up caffeine. The choice was put in front of me and it was my decision to accept it or reject it.