Caffeine impacts hormones and fat loss, but a healthy balance is key. Caffeine helps get more done in 24 hours, and its benefits pre-workout are good. But finding the sweet spot—before caffeine becomes an unhealthy addiction—takes understanding the benefits and risks.
How Much Caffeine is Too Much?
Caffeine addiction often sneaks up on us. Sometimes, it starts after kids are born when we need the extra buzz to fuel longer days. Still, ironically, when we drink coffee to keep us awake because of sleep deprivation, we tend to ignore just how much we are consuming.
It can come as a shock to write it down. Because caffeine is often an ingredient in fat burners (caffeine is an ingredient used in almost all diet pills, fat burners, and other thermic agents) and energy drinks, we add an extra caffeine intake to stay in shape to the caffeine we drink to stay awake and do what we can to get the boost we need to get through workouts.
Downside Of Too Much Caffeine
The downside is that caffeine is a drug, and it’s addictive. As the body builds a tolerance to caffeine, it develops a dependency simultaneously. Regular coffee drinkers know that a morning without your coffee leads to a withdrawal headache.
Another negative side effect of caffeine addiction is increased cortisol levels. Cortisol is known as the stress hormone, and as caffeine raises the body’s cortisol levels, the side effects are irritability and weight gain. The increased level of cortisol often leads to fat and carbohydrate cravings, which inevitably lead to excess belly fat.
Yet strategic timing and planned levels of caffeine intake before a workout can increase endurance and enhance fat loss efforts.
However, cortisol production increases during exercise, so it’s critical not to consume caffeine post-workout. When cortisol levels are already naturally elevated by working out, it’s counterproductive to add more to the body.
Caffeine overload can burden your adrenal glands, triggering the “fight or flight” response. The adrenal glands release hormones to help your body handle stress, including the physical stress of exercise, infection, or illness, as well as the emotional stress arising from work, relationships, or financial issues.
You risk damaging your adrenal glands when you abuse caffeine or caffeine-rich stimulants. Because the adrenal glands carry out critical metabolic processes, taxing them with a caffeine overload can impair and shut them down. The result is being at risk for metabolic burnout, which halts the ability to lose body fat.
Too much caffeine can also negatively impact both female and male fertility and affect the hormones responsible for a healthy sex drive. It also affects the sleep cycle by not allowing the deep sleep needed for adequate rest, leaving you drowsy and sluggish during the day.
This often leads to another cup of coffee to keep you going. Yet that cup of coffee is making the problem worse as the body adapts its caffeine needs as more is consumed. It can quickly become a vicious cycle.
How Much Caffeine Is Safe?
You could consider weaning yourself off caffeine and consuming less than 300mg of caffeine a day, then working down to zero, but several studies have shown that around 300mg of caffeine (about 3 cups of regular coffee) a daily is considered safe, so it may be a good idea to limit daily caffeine fixes to pre-workout.
If you need caffeine to get through the day, your body is likely addicted to caffeine. It is probably doing you more harm than good, although caffeine in moderate doses can deliver health benefits, which include:
- Increases mental faculty.
- Increases metabolism by breaking down fat
- Increased muscle strength.
- Eases symptoms of asthma
- Increases effectiveness of pain medication
- Could benefit people at high risk for liver disease.
If you use caffeine rather than abusing it, it can be beneficial to training and fat loss goals. But keep in mind that too much of a good thing can be detrimental. Too much caffeine can interfere with fat loss efforts, while the right amount can accelerate them.
If you think that you are probably overusing or abusing caffeine, it’s time to consider slowly weaning yourself down to a safer level of consumption. One of the immediate benefits will be better sleep, which alone will help you train longer and harder in the gym.
Professional Health and Fitness Coach. Encouraging and inspiring busy working people to take time out for themselves through fitness and general health and wellness.
