When you sit down with your cup of coffee in the morning, you expect the caffeine to hit you pretty quickly. However, sometimes you may feel more of a caffeine crash than a rush. So, in this guide why does coffee make me sleepy? I will discuss that. Read More Below Article.
If coffee makes you tired, there’s probably a reason why. The caffeine in coffee keeps you awake by stopping adenosine receptors in your brain. Adenosine is the molecule that tells your brain that you’re tired. Sometimes, things like cheese and sugar added to your food may be the real reason you’re tired.
Read on to find out more about why coffee makes you tired and how getting a better night’s sleep can help lessen the effects of a caffeine crash.
How Does Caffeine Affect Sleep?
Caffeine affects sleep because it can mess with adenosine, a chemical that controls sleep. By blocking adenosine receptors, caffeine messes up the messages that make you tired and make you want to sleep. This can make it take longer to fall asleep and can lower the quality of sleep. Even if you do get to sleep, coffee can make your sleep lighter and less restful, and you may wake up more often during the night. Also, drinking caffeine in the afternoon or evening can mess up the body’s natural circadian cycle, which can make it hard to fall asleep at the right time. Different people react differently to coffee, but if you want to sleep well, it’s best to limit how much you drink, especially in the hours before bed.
Why Does Coffee Make Me Sleepy?
Caffeine interacts with adenosine receptors in the brain, which explains why coffee makes you feel sleepy. Adenosine is a natural sleep-inducing chemical that builds up during the day, making us feel sleepy. However because caffeine has a similar structure to adenosine, it can bind to these receptors and block their actions. This can temporarily mess up the body’s natural sleep signals, which can make you feel tired or groggy when the effects of coffee wear off. Also, the effect of caffeine on the circadian cycle and differences in how sensitive people are can make some coffee drinkers feel sleepy when they didn’t expect to.
3 Reasons Coffee Is Making You Tired
Many different things happen to people when they drink coffee. Some people can drink cup after cup of coffee without getting sick. Some people can’t predict how they’ll feel about coffee.
Here are some of the most common reasons why coffee can make you tired and mess up your sleep cycle:
1. It can lead to a sugar crash
Are you putting a lot of sugar, full-fat milk, whipped cream, and caramel in your coffee? If the answer is yes, you may have figured out why you’re tired.
Too much sugar in your coffee can make you feel sleepy instead of awake. When your coffee has too much sugar, you can get a sugar rush and crash, just like when you drink energy drinks or pop.
When your body has too much sugar, it responds by making more insulin to help balance out the extra glucose in the blood. Insulin is very important for controlling how much sugar is in the blood. It does this by telling the liver and other cells in the body to take glucose from the blood.
As the body makes more insulin, blood sugar levels can drop, which can cause a quick drop in energy and lead to feeling tired or sleepy. Not just coffee, but other drinks or snacks that are high in sugar can also make you tired.
The Solution? Cut down on how much sugar you put in your coffee. This includes things like whipped cream types, which are made to taste sweet. If you can’t drink coffee without a little sweetness, you can try swapping out refined sugar for stevia, agave nectar, or maple syrup, which are all better for you.
2. Adenosine receptors are getting blocked
Adenosine is a chemical that helps you sleep. When you drink coffee, it gets into your bloodstream and goes to different parts of your body. When caffeine gets into the brain, it fights with adenosine to make people feel more awake and alert. This is how caffeine can give you a quick burst of energy.
Caffeine sticks to and stops adenosine receptors, so the brain can’t use these molecules to make you sleepy. After a few cups of coffee during the day, adenosine builds up, and when your body breaks down the caffeine, you may feel more tired.
Too much adenosine can often stay in the body until the next morning. People who drink a lot of caffeine every day but still feel tired when they wake up are likely in a loop of adenosine buildup.
If you drink too much caffeine for a long time, it can change the way you sleep, and some people may feel like they don’t get the same boost from caffeine as they used to. Because of this, drinking too much coffee can actually make you less energetic overall, which is why some people become hooked on caffeine.
The solution? Write down how often coffee makes you feel tired. If it happens every day, this could be a sign that you need to work on your sleep routine. It can help you get the most comfortable mattress and set up your room in a way that helps you sleep well.
Limit how much coffee you drink and try not to have any after 3 p.m. to improve your sleep cycle and get rid of adenosine.
3. Coffee is a diuretic and can cause dehydration
Have you ever had coffee and felt like you had to use the bathroom more than usual? There’s an easy reason for this: coffee is a “diuretic,” which means that it makes you more likely to urinate more often.
The more often you have to go to the bathroom, the more likely you are to become dehydrated, which can make you feel more tired. When the cells in your body lose water, they can’t work as well, which is how you feel when you’re tired after drinking coffee.
Vasoconstriction is another thing that coffee is known to do. This means that some of your blood vessels are likely to get smaller, which can change how blood moves to different parts of your body. This is another reason why you might feel tired after your normal cup of coffee.
The solution? Getting enough water will keep you from feeling tired and weak in the long run, especially if you drink a lot of coffee. Most experts on sleep say that guys should drink 15 cups (3.7 liters) of water every day, while women only need 11 cups (2.7 liters).
How To Minimize These Effects
There are a few things you can do to try to keep from falling asleep after a cup of coffee.
First things first, you should start with some general health tips. Try to sleep at least seven to eight hours a night in a nice bed. This can help you feel less stressed, think more clearly, and concentrate better. All of these things will lessen how much you need coffee to keep going.
Second, don’t drink too much coffee, even if you need an energy boost during the day or just like having a cup of coffee every day. The Mayo Clinic says that people shouldn’t drink more than four 8-ounce cups per day.
Last, don’t forget to drink water. Make sure you drink enough water with your coffee to keep yourself from getting dehydrated. The Institute of Medicine says that men should drink 13 cups of water a day and women should drink 9 cups. That includes the water you get from food, but you’ll get most of your water from drinking it.
Final Words
If you’re wondering, “Why does coffee make me sleepy?” it’s not the caffeine itself, but how it makes your body feel. not getting enough sleep or water? Caffeine won’t help. It will only make things worse. If you take care of your body first, you might be able to enjoy your morning cup of coffee more. If you don’t get enough sleep, that coffee might make you tired because your body has other needs that caffeine can’t meet.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why does coffee make me sleepy immediately?
Caffeine can stop adenosine from working, which is what makes you feel awake after your first cup of coffee in the morning. But once the caffeine goes off, your body may have a sudden buildup of adenosine. This is why coffee can make you feel tired.
Is it bad if you feel sleepy after drinking coffee?
Caffeine in coffee is a stimulant, but it can only do so much. You might feel tired as adenosine builds up, you lose water, your blood sugar drops and other things happen. Different things can make you tired, but if you watch what you eat before bed, you might be able to sleep better.
Does coffee make people with ADHD sleepy?
Researchers think that the amount of caffeine needed for these effects might be different for people with ADHD because of how caffeine affects dopamine. Some people with ADHD feel more tired after drinking coffee, which is the opposite of what you would expect.
How do you get rid of sleepiness with coffee?
The National Coffee Association’s “Golden Ratio” is 1-2 tablespoons of coffee for every 6 ounces of water. If you use more coffee or less water, you’ll get a “stronger” cup, but it might be too strong or even too bitter to drink. 160 beans (0.53 ounces or 15 grams) per 8-ounce cup is a good place to start.
