Negative effects of drinking too much coffee

Efua Eshun

June 17, 2021 10:11 AM

Coffee is one of the most consumed beverages in the world. It is effective for increasing mental alertness – which explains why people usually drink it in the mornings – and helps relieve mental fatigue, amongst other benefits. Although excessive intake of coffee can have negative effects on the consumer. Here are a few of them.

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Insomnia

Coffee contains caffeine which makes it difficult for you to sleep. Excessive consumption of coffee can result in a disruption of your sleep pattern. When this occurs frequently, it results in insomnia which affects your mental health, physical fitness, amongst others.

Headache

Drinking coffee makes the blood vessels around the brain narrow hence stalling blood flow. Once coffee consumption is cut or reduced, the vessels reopen causing blood to rush to the brain. When this happens, one experiences what we call caffeine withdrawal headache.

Agitation

You know how the body naturally responds to high adrenalin or threatening situations? That’s how excess coffee intake causes the body to react as it is stimulated by the caffeine in it. It is therefore advisable to avoid excessive intake.

Caffeine dependence

Excessive intake of coffee which contains caffeine will cause you to develop a sort of dependence on it or even an addiction. In extreme cases, consumers are not able to go a day or two without coffee and may end up getting headaches, fatigue and generally feeling miserable because of its absence in the body.

Increased heartbeat and breathing rate

Caffeine from the excess coffee can increase the calcium in the heart cells. It is this calcium that regulates all the heart cells responsible for its beating and pumping, hence an increase will distort the normal beating of the heart hence affecting the breathing rate.

Caffeine intoxication

Excessive intake of coffee can also result in caffeine intoxication. Depending on your caffeine tolerance level, symptoms may include high blood pressure, insomnia, panic attacks, bowel irritability, among others.

In order to be safe from these and many other negative side effects, it will be best to either reduce your coffee intake to at least 2-3 cups a day or cut it out completely.

Efua Eshun