Coffee troubles.

Date: Thu, 5 Oct 1995 20:21:50 -0700
Sender: HERB.TREARNPC.EGE.EDU.TR
From: Howie Brounstein <howieb.TELEPORT.COM>
Subject: Re: Herbs & Coffee

>Howie - how can can you tell something so wrong, you make it appear that coffee is a drug and something bad.

Coffee is an addicting stimulant. There are very few times that this is actually healthy. Perhaps you are healthy enough to not feel or "shrug off" the bad effects, but the fact remains ... COFFEE is an ADDICTING STIMULANT.

>It is obvious that if your having sleeping problems - then don't drink coffee, tea, cacao or cola just before your going to bed.

I don't have sleeping problems, even when I drank many pots of coffee a day, I could drink a cup before I went to sleep and still sleep just fine. Now that I'm down to a few cups a day I can't drink it late.

>Coffee enema?? is this your own envention???

No. I didn't invent that. It was popular a number of years back.

> I have read that herbs containing 57-77% tannins have been used for haemorrhoids i China, becouse of their astringent action. Tannins are found in many plant families. Coffee when prepared, contains only very little tannin. Tea contains 10-24% tannins - and if there are 24 % tannins your would say that it was a bad/cheap tea.

Only very little. Ok, but take it from someone who has extracted caffeine from coffee in a lab, those "very little" tannins are nearly impossible to remove from the glassware. And even if there is only a little, it still binds with drugs and foods rendering them unusable.

>--just recently, I saw a report on 20/20 that basically said that if coffee (rather than drinking or smoking, etc.) is your only vice, then you are leading a pretty good life.

I agree! but that doesn't negate coffee's health risks.

>As far as I know, coffee has been given a bad rap. Yes, if you drink cups upon cups upon cups a day, you will have a slight problem--all that caffeine will not allow you to sleep and you will be edgy--IN SOME PEOPLE.

At first perhaps, but let's look closer at cups and cups a day:

Coffee is a stimulant. Taken every day it is sure to mess up your normal energy levels.

Coffee acts as a laxative for most folks. Would you take a laxative every day? How many coffee drinkers need a cup to have a bowel movement.(laxative dependancy)

Coffee is a diuretic. Would you take a pharmaceutical diuretic every day when healthy? Coffee dehydrates you, by causing you to pee whether you need to or not.
Hope you don't have kidney problems to begin with, it could make matters worse.

Coffee irritates you gi tract. Perhaps you don't feel it in moderation, but long term use definately screws up your digestive tract.

Coffee supresses appitite. Perhaps you are supposed to eat, because your body needs food. In Any eating disorder, check coffee consumption

In tendonitis, repetitive motion disorders, and even bad muscular sprains, coffee directly increases the pain of the problem. It tightens up the muscles and ......

Any sleeping disorders , check coffee consumption.

Stress? Coffee increases your stress levels. "I don't feel stress from coffee," Anybody drinking cups and cups a day will tell you. Ask again after they've quit. Now stress causes all kinds of dis-ease. The list at this point grows quickly if you follow this line of thinking.

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Now I don't presume to be "holier than thou you better quit the evil drug or die," and I drink coffee and smoke cigarettes, and perhaps I need a daily dose of cathode rays from a computer every day. Coffee is an acceptable addiction in the United States. Cigarettes are now politically incorrect. (You can't even smoke outside of some coffee shops). But I hold firm to the fact that coffee is an addicting stimulant (read that "drug addiction"). That person who drinks cups and cups a day with little apparant effects (bet they're young and/or heathy to start with), have them quit cold turkey and speak to them in a few hours.

Sure one cup won't kill you, moderation, etc. But don't deceive yourself into thinking this plant is harmless.

Hopes this raises some heated discussion,

Howie B
C&W Herbs, Inc.
Eugene, Or USA

"It's easy to harvest wild plants, the hard part is not harvesting."