Little drops of ... coffee

As soon as I learnt that Oggie was on his way, I switched to decaf again. Yes, again, because I had switched to decaf when I was expecting Ana, and promptly after I weaned her, I found out old habits die hard.

It was a bit of a struggle, naturally, for about a week - headaches and moodswings, partly due to pregnancy and partly due to caffeine withdrawal.

Even with decaf, I limited myself to three cups, third cup no later than 3 p.m. And, when I say three cups, it is a 6oz tea cup, not the 12oz gigantic mug that passed for coffee cups in my pre-mommy days.

And when I was nursing Oggie, I cut it down to two cups of decaf coffee, a lot of herbal tea (fennel and mint mostly), and some green tea. And, chai brewed with black tea, ginger, cardamom and cloves was a special treat.

Any incidental coffee I managed to imbibe had to be decaf, preferably done the Swiss Water way, not the chemical solvent way.

No, I never cared for any of the cola drinks, or any carbonated drinks , so, Pepsi and Coca-Cola and Mountain Dew and such have no influence over me, thankfully...

And, for the last several months, I've taken to drinking green tea, with a dash of pekoe black tea for color and body, stirred in with soy milk, in the mornings. And my last cup of caffeinated beverage for the day is taken no later than 2 p.m.

Coffee is down to nil. And, I don't miss it. Much. The wonderful dark deep Stumptown Roast brewed at my office still tempts me, but, aroma is all I drink in... and, every once in a while, I brew a small pot of decaf for myself much to the head-shaking of my colleagues...

Now, this is such an insignificant piece of trivia (as if there is any other kind) that doesn't warrant its own post, but, in the larger scheme of things, having been a coffee addict right from teenage till about four years ago when Ana was born, especially swimming in it in my grad school days, this is a place I thought I could never reach. Not just giving it up temporarily, but, knowing that I don't need it, don't crave it, don't miss it and knowing that I have developed a certain distaste for it that deters relapsing...

I know I have not given up caffeine entirely, but, to have the control - the ability to bridle the hankering and sever the dependency - is very promising... especially at this particular juncture for me, when I am consciously trying to quell the fire-breathing, red-and-black-robed, storm-clouds-over-head, lightning-bolts-from-finger-tips monster in me that inexcusably and unpredictably rears its ugly head and bellows at the wee little four-year-old for simply being a willful and energetic four-year-old.

Little drops of water,
little grains of sand,
make the mighty ocean
and the beauteous land.

-Julia Carney, 1845