KOPI KOPI KOPI

MY EXPERIENCE:

I am a regular coffee drinker the last three years.

On July 10, 2010 I had a thermos full, and that is twice my regular and ritual coffee drinking habit that I had been doing

On July 11, 2010, I had uncomfortable feelings for three days in a row. I had headache, heart throbbing and pain in the back bone like a bit movement will trigger terrible pains here and there at my back, upper and lower. Well I had one pain killer a day, all ceased and I had my “wisdom”: drink beer that I tried and had been avoiding for the last whole one month. The beer drinking happened three days ago. But my coffee drinking in the morning, I keep on doing recklessly, due to the easy availability surrounding me at that time.

This Morning, three hours ago, I made it happen again with my ritual: drink one cup of  Nescafe Encore with Coffee Mate and white sugar. I sat in the verandah on a plastic covered chair and felt heavy breathing and my heart was thumping like I was running jogging, but I was on a sitting position reading Newspaper. My seat felt like moving up and down as if a small Earth tremor was happening. I asked my wife to overtake the seat, and asked if she did feel anything unusual. She said no, nothing at all. I finished my coffee. What amazed me greatly was the fact that I began burping a lot, more than one hundred times. This is similar or like a volcano erupting the smokes and dirt.. for almost an hour or so. Now I am okay, nothing is bothering anymore.

I open my computer and some emails, replied some too, and I found this, the one below. After reading it, I will now drink my ritual morning coffee, but BLACK COFFEE ONLY , no sugar and no coffee mate, and only  two cups a day.

Stay with me and remind me if I forget in the future, being older and forgetful.

Anwari Doel Arnowo –  Toronto, July 20, 2010

How Coffee Affects Blood Sugar

Coffee.

It’s more than just a beverage.

We use coffee to revive ourselves in the morning, to keep us energized by day, and to wind down as we eat our evening dessert. It is a ritual, a tonic, and a statement of friendship. When your neighbor pops by unexpectedly, what do you offer her? A cup of coffee.

More than 50 percent of Americans drink coffee every single day. And of those coffee drinkers, the average is between 3 and 4 cups a day. That’s over 1,200 cups of coffee per year. If you’re drinking over a thousand cups of something every year, shouldn’t you know if it’s good—or bad—for you? Well, the answer to that really all depends on how you take your coffee.

Here’s the short answer: Coffee itself is terrific for you. 

It’s caffeine and additives that make things go awry. Best choice for your health: a cup of black, uncaffeinated coffee.

So what’s wrong with caffeine, beyond it sometimes causing the jitters? Research reveals that consuming about 250 milligrams of caffeine—the amount in roughly two cups—triggers a small but measurable increase in blood sugar, particularly after meals. It’s not necessarily a dangerous spike, but for people struggling with blood sugar issues, why consume something that could hurt your efforts?

The answer might be that coffee has many other benefits. For example, coffee is the number one source of antioxidants in the American diet—surpassing any fruit, berry, or vegetable by a landslide. (Many types of produce have more antioxidants in them than coffee, but generally we consume way more coffee than any one source of produce). All those antioxidants have been known to protect the liver and colon, and to ward off Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease.

Plus, other ingredients in coffee are diabetes-friendly. Coffee contains a long list of natural plant compounds, called chlorogenic acids which help to bring down blood-glucose levels. It’s also rich in quinides, compounds that make the body more resistant to insulin. Numerous studies have proven that coffee lowers the risk of type 2 diabetes. In fact, the more cups of coffee you drink per day, the lower your risk. Drink one cup and it lowers your risk 13 percent, drink two cups and that number shoots up to 32 percent!

If all that makes you inclined to keep drinking coffee, we understand. To mitigate the blood-sugar effects of caffeine, spread your coffee drinking out over time, or as we said, switch to decaf.

As with most naturally good-for-you foods, what you put in—and on—your mug of coffee determines if it will be blood-sugar friend or foe. When you add lots of cream, whole milk, sugar or flavored syrup, you have turned your coffee into the equivalent of a slice of cake—a high-calorie, high-fat dessert. In fact, a fancy coffee drink with whipped cream at Starbucks often exceeds 500 calories—amazing, when you remember that the coffee itself has no calories.

Can’t drink your coffee black? Use nonfat milk or nonfat half and half, especially in milk-heavy drinks like lattes and cappuccinos, and avoid flavored syrups and sugar all together. Do that, and coffee can be your good friend for life.

Hoping this article will be useful for every one.

Analyse yourself accordingly to your own self lifestyle, not necessarily similar to mine.

Anwari Doel Arnowo – 2010/07/20

There is a comment came in just now, for CD (Cak Doel), which is my nickname in a certain group:


Dear CD,

Thanks so much for the 'enlightenment' -- now perhaps I might understand why sometimes I have hypoglycemic symptoms - only occasionally - and I knew I wasn't diabetic.  Although I've been drinking decaffeinated coffee most of the time, occasionally I would have regular (I call it 'full lead') coffee - but I never made the connection between coffee and blood sugar level.

The reason I switched to decaffeinated about 30 years ago was because all of a sudden I developed allergy towards caffeine.

I was working for Aramco Services at the time and we always had coffee as soon as we got to the office, around 8 to 9.  Then we had to change buildings.  While in the new building, temporarily, the coffee had to be serve on a cart, by someone, going around office to office.  I think it was because they didn't have the kitchen finished yet, and the coffee had to be delivered by a company.  The coffee cart would get to my office around 9.  After starting in this new office, about 2 weeks later, I started to itch all over my body, and would get worse, in the form of welts ('biduren'), until about lunch time.  I went to the doctor, and he advised me to write down everything I ate and drank.  Nothing changed in my diet that I knew of.  Until one day, my boss told me that the same thing happened to his wife one time, and as it turned out it was caffeine.  And I said 'I've been drinking coffee for years' - but apparently, allergies can develop anytime in your life. So I stopped drinking office coffee, started to carry my own in a thermos which is decaffeinated.  The itches stopped.

2 years later, I thought maybe I'd gotten over it, we were on a trip to New Orleans.  Well of course I wanted French Coffee.  I did that one day and the next day I was covered by welts all over my body.  Nope, not over it!

Now I can occasionally drink it.  I can drink regular soda once a day without itching.

However, if I drank non-decaf regularly, although I won't have the itches, my heart would be thumping really hard.  Just like CD described.  

One period it scared me that my heart thumped so hard, I made an appointment with the doctor.  

Then I thought about what I might have eaten or drank that was different.  I then discovered that the coffee beans I had in the jar, which I ground everyday, were not decaffeinated.  

I stopped drinking it.  By the time I went to the doctor 3 days later, the symptom had disappeared.  Meanwhile the doctor had ordered an EKG done, everything was normal.  So when I told him that I may have been too sensitive to caffeine, he said 'there, you cured yourself'.

I do take my decaf coffee every morning with sugar-substitute and half-and-half (not milk but not cream either), although no more than 1 tablespoon of half-and-half.  I do not like Latte because I do not like milk.  And I don't frequent Starbucks for their creamy drinks after I found out that they may contain 1500 calories in a cup - besides, the 'foam' they use are high in fat - and most of all, they are such a 'rip off' -- $5.00 for a cup of coffee that I could make at home for maybe 50 cents.

Thanks for the 'lesson for the day' Cak Doel!