Pep and Shakes From Lip Balm?
It's just after 10:00 on Monday morning, and my coworkers are congregating in the kitchen area to refill their coffee mugs. A vending machine offers cappuccino, espresso, hot chocolate and flavored coffees, but it's unreliable - it tends to eat your money or deliver only hot water and foam. Most of the editors and artists in the building bring in a coffee machine from home, establishing time-shares and coffee budgets with small groups of colleagues. I participate in the aroma for free.
I'm one of the 10% of U.S. adults who try to avoid caffeine, the mostly widely used drug in the world, consumed mostly in coffee. A moderate amount of caffeine gives me the shakes and keeps me awake at night. Everyone tells me that a cup or two of joe (what I consider moderate) before noon cannot possibly affect my sleep 12 hours later, but every time I get back in the habit of a morning cup, I sleep less and drag more. Humor me.
The problem is that I love coffee, especially lattes from the gourmet fast-food coffee shops like Starbucks and Peet's. I typically drink decaf at home, but - confession - it's embarrassing to order decaffeinated at Starbucks et al! I do feel that lovely pick-me-up that comes from a cup. That's part of the reason I tend to get hooked a few times a year and then need to dry out. Should I remain a serial decaffeinater, or should I try to build up a tolerance?
Research on the effects of coffee is all over the place. Studies suggest that coffee can lower your risk for Parkinson's disease, gallstones, liver cirrhosis and colon cancer; that it can help manage asthma and headaches; that it elevates mood, increases attention and improves work performance. It's also been linked to osteoporosis, infertility, risk of miscarriage, cancer, hypertension and heart disease. Who knows? And is it the caffeine in coffee that matters?
The other day I received a sample of coffee-flavored lip balm in the mail. Yummy. Then I noticed "caffeine enriched" on the label.
Why would anyone want caffeine in her lip balm? It turns out that caffeine is now big at the fancy cosmetics counter and the down-to-earth drugstore aisle. Its diuretic property is touted when it's an ingredient in eye creams (Kiehl's Abyssine Eye Cream) and cellulite lotions (Avon Solutions Cellu-Sculpt Anti-Cellulite Slimming Treatment). Its stimulant effect is the draw when it's an ingredient in toothpaste (Kiss My Face Wake Up Certified Organic Aloe Vera Toothpaste) and soap (Shower Shock Caffeine Soap and Shower Shock Caffeinated Body Wash). Whether caffeine actually works as a diuretic or stimulant when applied topically, and briefly, is another question.
In any case, I'm using my new lip balm. I hope it doesn't make my lips slimmer, but firmer and more energetic I could live with. As long as it doesn't keep me awake.