The downside of coffee for many is the gut devastation. For others, if we’re talking caffeinated, not decaf, it’s the jitters. Some women rely on it for pooping. (That’s not good by the way. We may want to restore your factory settings, because you never needed this as a child, right?)  Your DNA may determine how well you metabolize caffeine but so can presence of other stressors, whether you have eaten or not, and medications.  Caffeine may temporarily raise metabolism, boost workout intensity and fat burning. But for those of us most likely to send up a cheer, it may not be us. The caffeine kick is only really supportive for those that don’t regularly consume large quantities of caffeine (>300mg/day).  When I was in high school, I rarely drank soda. I just didn’t. I wasn’t “not drink pop.” It just wasn’t a staple at my house unless someone had the stomach flu. I’m not sure at this point how effective 7-Up was but that’s when we most often drank pop. Or with a popcorn at the movies.  So when I first went out with a guy I’d been serious about for 5 years and we hung out with others at a pizza joint, and I had a Diet Pepsi without a second thought, I was up all night. The 9pm soda was not a wise move. When I told the guy, he was like, “I was hoping that was because of me.”  Maybe I should have played my cards differently, because although the guy was great, that sleepless night was most definitely the caffeine.  The next year at college I was introduced to soda regularly for the stay-up-all-night and don’t drink your calories benefit. The summer after that I was introduced to coffee by my brother and sister-in-law and diet cokes in the afternoon. I thought I’d discovered the secret to thin Southern women: they weren’t fit, they were dehydrated since they seemed to drink Diet Coke like it was water.  Throughout college and grad school, getting up to teach 6am classes or getting energy up again to teach 4:30 classes, I relied on Diet Coke way too much. To study before my 6am start and to teach another class at 4:30 or 5:30pm, I was relying on it.  It’s about then that the caffeine stopped helping me. I didn’t just reach for a can before a class. I reached for two.  You might guess what happened next. My gut was a hot mess. And though I didn’t know at the time, artificial sweeteners in diet sodas are 400x as sweet as sugar and still can trigger blood sugar spikes.  I was unintentionally a hypocrite teaching health and fitness and living kind of a junk food life with 24-packs of soda a part of my weekly grocery list.  My Coffee Drinking Start Then, when it wasn’t my Diet Coke, it was coffee I was introduced to during my first summer of college. That substitute was unfortunately a concoction of chemicals, bad oils and artificial sweeteners or sugar or both. But from that point on I don’t think I’ve had many mornings in my life without caffeine.  Fast forward decades. I began offering DNA testing for clients who really wanted to deep dive into their genetic predisposition for disease, identify how they can exercise and eat most optimally and have the optimal expression of their genetics by changing daily habits.  I never share something I haven’t used first. So, in addition to information like I do better to include a higher percent of endurance training than others, I do well with a slightly higher carb count, and I’m predisposed for obesity, I also learned I metabolize caffeine quickly.  A coffee-drinking girl likes that! But, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t or can’t spike a mid-life woman’s blood sugar or wreak havoc with her gut.   If you regularly have more than 300 mg caffeine a day more isn’t going to give you an ergogenic aid nor will what you’re having already. Your body has adapted. Is it better to have that prior to exercise? Possibly, so you can metabolize it. For some though it makes you jittery or negatively impact your blood sugar during exercise.  If you tolerate caffeine, don’t have much regularly or have it infre