how coffee helped reduce my anxiety
featuring the best cup of coffee I've ever had
For the majority of my adult life, I did not enjoy coffee.
My parents are the type of people who drink multiple cups of coffee in a day - black or with a small splash of cream. My sister used to constantly be re-loading the family Starbucks card, and whenever we went out of the house together it seemed we were stopping to get her a caffeinated beverage. My brother actually worked as a barista, brews 5-gallon buckets of cold brew, and drinks coffee at odd hours of the night just for fun.
I tried to match their energy, but in general, whenever someone offered me a sip of their coffee, I couldn’t help but say: “Ew.”
Don’t get me wrong - I loved a good frappuccino.
When the energy levels called for it, I would drink brewed coffee or buy myself the sweetest coffee drink I could identify on a menu. But in general, two major things put me off from coffee: the taste (too bitter without loads of milk and sugar) and the effects. When I consume too much caffeine, it heightens my anxiety and contributes to my physical symptoms (increased heart rate, fast breathing, nervousness, and headaches).
Until I participated in exposure therapy.
To give some perspective, let’s back it up a little bit.
I moved from Ohio to Missouri to start graduate school in 2021. Until then, I’d grown up in the same house and lived with my parents for over twenty years. So while leaving my family was incredibly difficult, it was also the first time I experienced life with complete independence. While this newfound freedom was thrilling, I also realized that I was comfortable in my hometown. I had my little bubble that I traveled within.
This bubble burst when I moved.
My general anxiety was exacerbated by this big move, starting graduate school, and being a #adult. However, within the first few months of living in Missouri, I began to find my routine and my anxiety became more manageable. But I found that I was in the habit of going to school and coming home. And rarely going anywhere else - at least on my own.
I spent a lot of time waiting for other people to become available to go do things - in the beginning, before I had built many friendships in this new city, I was primarily waiting on my partner. Rather than choosing to explore the city on my own, I would wait until he was available to go do things together.
Sometimes this worked out, but most of the time, waiting on him made me feel both guilty and annoyed. He was working a full-time job that was incredibly draining, so he didn’t always want to go do something after work or on his days off (plus he is very much a homebody). So I experienced these mixed emotions of feeling like I was dragging him out of the apartment, but also annoyance that I felt stagnant as I worked what I wanted to do around when he was available.
On top of that, being a speech-language pathologist graduate student is one of the most streamlined pathways to burnout.
My life was essentially: clinic, class, assignments, and part-time job on repeat. Plus the chores that come with living and the rest required to keep doing these things. Life felt monotonous and out of my control. Additionally, my anxiety was contradicting itself: it increased when I wasn’t out doing fun things that I chose to do, but it also increased when I was out of the apartment and on my own.
I was going stir-crazy, cycling between campus and my apartment. I had to figure out something that would help me feel better, but also allow me to be productive and not break the bank.
Because waiting to live my life because I was scared and anxious would not cut it anymore.
So how does this tie together?
I came up with a personal challenge: Once a week, I would haul my laptop and textbooks to a coffee shop, purchase a drink*, and sit down to get some work done.
With every passing week and new coffee shop, it got easier to not only go to new cafes but go to other places by myself. I would never turn down a friend wanting to join me on an adventure, but I no longer let if someone else could accompany me be the deciding factor of whether or not I would go.
I also started saying yes to more outings with friends and hosting some get-togethers.
My little mantra became, “I can do whatever I want.” I would ask myself what I wanted to do and prioritize that as appropriate.
I later learned from my therapist that I had #girlbossed myself into Exposure Therapy.
*How coffee comes into play: The drinks I ordered were not always caffeinated. Once I realized my sensitivity to caffeine, I would only visit coffee shops that sold decaf or tasty matcha - both of which don’t make me feel my fight or flight is kicking in one hour after drinking it. But over time, as I drank more caffeine, my body began to adapt to higher levels of it.
This post was originally born of my wanting to share all the pretty latte photos I’ve taken.
But as I reflect, it makes me realize how much growth I’ve experienced over the past few years alone. My Personal Challenge of visiting a coffee shop every week helped me improve in an area and begin to overcome my anxieties - something I thought I never would.
The irony is not lost on me that consuming caffeine heightens my anxiety, yet every week, I would order something from a coffee shop as a means of reducing my anxiety and incidentally introduce exposure therapy into my life…
Maybe there’s another lesson hidden in there somewhere.
Whether made at home or ordering a fancy latte from a coffee shop, coffee is still a special treat for me.
Little treat culture has firmly taken hold of my life, so the, now occasional, coffee shop visit still holds up as being one of my favorite parts of the week.
Plus I don’t feel so anxious anymore - when I consume caffeine or order something for myself. :)
What’s your go-to coffee order?
Thanks to my experience, my secret superpower is knowing which espresso drink is the best on the menu - but if you really want to know what’s best, get a vanilla latte. You can tell a lot about a cafe by that simple drink (plus it’s just delicious).
Let me know your coffee order below.
Until next time,
I’m also a sucker for a good vanilla latte! A local coffee shop here has something called the honeybee which is a vanilla latte with honey and it’s the best. Whenever I go to a new coffee shop though I try to get one of their special drinks :)
how I wished I liked coffee! i found it too bitter ("why would you add more bitterness in life?!") but maybe i haven't found the coffee that changed my life.