The Caffeine Component

I am noticing that caffeine tends to exacerbate a lot of the ED behaviors that I've been trying to get under control. I am technically not "supposed" to have it at all, but I do give myself doses when circumstances demand. I have to drive across the state for my job every Friday/Saturday (I'm in a motel right now, listening to a dog barking in the next room), and I always have to have some form of coffee to keep myself awake on the 5 hour drive.

So, I juice myself up to make the drive, but then I'm stuck with the stimulant in my system for the rest of the day/night. Ways that caffeine appears to feed into (pun only slightly intended) ED issues I'm supposed to be working on:

-Decreases my appetite

-Gives me tons of nervous energy, which I then feel a compulsion to burn, making the "decrease exercise" goal harder to stick to

-Keeps me from sleeping, which gives me time to lay in bed and run numbers and other obsessive thoughts through my head into all hours of the night.

Back in high school I routinely consumed somewhat toxic amounts of caffeine. I averaged around 12 cups of a coffee and 3 diet cokes each day. I should have just hooked up an IV drip of the stuff. I could drink a cup of coffee 30 minutes before bed and still sleep like a rock, I was pretty much immune to the stimulant. Then I started having severe heart palpitations, my doctor told me to "cut the caffeine." Being the all-or-nothing type of person that I am, I went cold turkey. . . that was one of the most miserable weeks of my life! Once my system recalibrated, though, I noticed that I had even more energy post-caff than I had when I was so dependent on it. Now I am completely unadapted to it, even a single cup of coffee gets me wired for hours and hours.

So, what is the point of this post? I have had a rough day, as far as body image (aka a Fat Day), incentive to eat, urges to overexercise, etc, and I am trying to be a good therapy patient and use my analytical powers to figure out what factors are behind "rough days." I know my body isn't significantly different than it was 24 hours ago, but what makes our perceptions of body and self swing so drastically? I know that there are other issues influencing everything, there is a lot going on in my life right now, but I do think that the caffeine does play at least some role in fueling nervous energy and making compulsions a little harder to resist. Just thought it might warranted a mention. I wonder if there have been any studies done on the role of caffeine consumption in different psychological conditions?

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