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Comment by BatteryMountain | Hacker News Reader

I've had the same experience. Caffeine is super addicting, the ritual & habits surrounding it is a potent pull. For myself, it makes me erratic, impulsive, more reactive and agitated. One cup a day puts me on edge, makes me sweat more, makes me more intolerant, makes everything feel too slow. It such a sneaky drug and it can really get under your skin without you realizing how much it changes you.

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I don't have the same experience, and I drink one cup of coffee (270 ml) almost every day. No agitation, no impulsiveness. I can drink coffee in late evening (let's say 8 pm) and sleep well. I guess I'm trying to say that we should not project our own experience on others, everyone is different.

In my experience, this is common among people with ADHD (myself, friends with ADHD, family with ADHD, psychologist’s patients anecdotal evidence). YMMV

I have adhd too, but cannot use stimulant medications (they are too strong). I've had to use non-stim meds.

What if long term caffeine use causes some of the adhd symptoms? It interesting to ponder because if I stop using caffeine for a month, some of my adhd symtoms go away completely. I've done stints of complete caffeine breaks, content consumption breaks (one week or more without screens) and I felt amazing and alive. The first couple of days of using caffeine feels amazing but then I feel dead inside again and live like a robot. So in my mind, caffeine is my main target when I try to adjust my routine/behaviours.

Hmm, this is an interesting observation. I do have signs of ADHD.

It's not, really. Coffee is an anxiety and insomnia machine for me, while nothing made me as calm as amphetamine (even my heart rate was lower).

I do have a professional diagnosis for ADHD.

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