It might be part of your ‘routine’ but if you can hold off the caffeine until at least 90 mins after you wake up, you’ll find yourself feeling more alert in the afternoon and sleeping better at night!
Why? Well, there is some simple science behind it…
Caffeine interacts with a compound in our body called adenosine. It builds up during the day and helps us feel sleepy, making us increasingly more tired until we go to bed. As we sleep, the adenosine in our body clears, so that when we wake up we feel more alert.
If we don’t get enough sleep, the leftover adenosine keeps us feeling tired, and the less sleep you get, the more adenosine remains in your system.
When we consume caffeine in the mornings, it blocks your adenosine receptors. So even if you didn’t get enough sleep and the adenosine is still in your system, you won’t feel the sleepy effect it…however once the caffeine ‘hit’ wears off, the lingering adenosine will return in force, making you feel tired again later in the day!
Delaying coffee intake by at least 90 minutes after waking can help with this, because shortly after we wake up our body’s experiences a spike in the hormone cortisol to ‘wake us up’ and that helps clear the adenosine.
If you consume caffeine before this spike, its production is disrupted, but waiting to have that first coffee, you’re giving your body enough time to clear out the adenosine, so it doesn’t come back once the caffeine wears off!
Thanks The Functional Edition for more great tips
