Cybertoad's Blog

I hadn’t really thought about it but I’ve been noticing some jittery, wired moments in the afternoon with accompanying headaches. I am not a big caffeine drinker (no daily coffees and a limited amount of carbonated drinks) and subsequently notice that I am a bit sensitive to it. The symptoms I am having in the afternoons always reminds me of how I feel after having a cafe mocha or I drink more than one Coke. So, I started to think about my daily habits and think I found the problem…

Lately, since I’ve been on a diet, I’ve been drinking Snapple’s diet peach tea with 0 calories. Not being a big tea drinker either, I completely forgot to take into account the fact that tea has caffeine since the in the past I’ve only really had hot herbal teas which are typically decaf.

For whatever reason I decided to look up the caffeine info and lo and behold, I’m having almost as much caffeine ounce per ounce as a Coke. Even worse is that a Coke can is only 12 oz so I’m only ingesting 34 mg (2.8 mg/oz) while the tea bottle is 16 oz. so I’m get a whopping 42 mg. of caffeine (2.6 mg/oz)! I think I may have found part of the cause of my jitters and headaches!

I am taking medication that can have these effects on me but they tend to wear off over time and I’ve been on it for over 6 weeks so the effects should not be as strong as they are. I’m going to cut out these diet teas completely and see if I feel any better at all. I hope that it helps.

Update 2:06 PM: Damn. I’m still getting jittery and I feel a headache coming on – despite a tea free day!!! Ughhhhhhhhhhhhh!