Websites

These were fun to read:

http://www.positivityblog.com/index.php/2007/12/03/how-i-quit-drinking-coffee/

http://www.stevepavlina.com/blog/2005/05/how-to-give-up-coffee/

http://thedailymind.com/health-at-work/give-up-coffee-how-to-quit-coffee-with-meditation/

Not really sure I can ever really quit completely, but I'm definitely not dependent on coffee as much as I used to be. I can get through the day with tea, and switching to decaf is totally working...I didn't know I could fool myself so easily.

xoxo

Support

Not surprisingly, some of the most support I've gotten in my endeavor has come from fellow MPHers. Since I love to hear myself talk, I've discussed our class projects with all my friends in the program, and they've been great at monitoring and talking to me about my coffee intake. They judge me when I walk in with starbucks, and although that may seem like a bad thing, I think about their dissapointed faces when I'm standing at line ordering my complicated beverages. Since it is all of my peers that I have to face every morning, it helps when they call me out on my excessive coffee intake.

On that note, have you noticed what awesome people public health attracts? Gotta love it!

Quick Update

This week: Two midterms, one quiz, Tess's project, facilitation.

So the thing is, even though I've greatly reduced my coffee consumption, coffee still makes me happy. I look forward to the days I let myself have coffee (like I'm happier driving to class Monday mornings because I know I'm going to starbucks). I feel like in order to have sustainable change, I have to not be emotionally attached to my coffee.

But the smell, the taste, the way "Grande, no whip, zebra mocha with three pumps white, two pumps mocha" rolls off my tongue...how can I resist?

At the same time, I'm not dependent on coffee as much as I used to be. I can make it through the day without coffee. I'm definitely meeting that goal of 3 cups of coffee/week. Now to see if I can take those 3 cups down to zero. oh, it hurts to even think such thoughts.

Difficult Situations

Last week, I was blacklisted from United Airlines. My flight was canceled, and since I had an interview the next morning I freaked out. After waiting in line for 40 minutes, being told that I couldn't get on a flight I had a boarding pass for, and subsequently being told that I had to fly standby no matter what later flight I chose, I lost it. I called the supervisor incompetent and told her that she should have been the first person to be laid off since she didn't know the first thing about customer service (I may have also said some other things about the degree to which she was incompetent, but we'll save that for a rainy day). I flew Southwest that evening.

I was exhausted, physically and mentally, so I had coffee on the plane. It was gross, and I should have just had water, but my caffeine demons were whispering sweet nothings into my ear.

The moral of the story: Don't fly United, they suck at life.