Originally Posted by GerandTwine

I drank coffee and ate man-made sweets for years after I quit drinking/drugging. But now I do not. The reason I quit is because I did not like to drink less than five cups of coffee per day, and I was beginning to clearly see my physical dependence upon it. The few times I quit for a while to see what happened to me, I went through severe headaches (which I otherwise never have) and the joints in my body went through a painful aching for about a day. So, I decided that great high it gave me first thing in the morning wasn’t worth it. I quit coffee and caffeinated beverages.

Then I started to buy and eat large quantities of the giant semi-sweet hershey’s chocolate bars which were also giving me a lower degree of that same caffeine high. So, I quit all chocolate and anything caffeinated.

I was afraid that no caffeine would mean I wouldn’t be able to stay up on the rare occasions I needed to do so for two days in a row. But, low and behold! I was able to do it better than when on caffeine and with more energy. And this remained true even after I gave up all man-made sweets (not all carbohydrates). This fine tuning of my body has truly made life much better for me.

I eliminated all these substances with simple pledges of permanent abstinence (including nicotine). For me, that has made it very easy to deal with the ubiquitous presence of those substances going forward.