Literally, we can guess that caffeine is related to coffee, which is indeed one of the ingredients contained in coffee, but caffeine is not only a drink of coffee, but also exists in some chocolates, and even some functional drinks, drugs and foods are added.
What exactly is caffeine?
Caffeine is a central nervous system stimulant, which can affect people's brain, spinal cord and metabolism, which is why it has a refreshing effect. The peak of caffeine in blood is usually within 1 hour after intake, and the residual event is 4-6 hours, which will be consumed with urine excretion.
Chemically speaking, caffeine belongs to an organic compound existing in plants and belongs to xanthine alkaloids, also known as "caffeine". It is light in weight, flexible and shiny in appearance, needle-shaped crystal, and sometimes white powder. No smell, a little bitter.
In medicine, caffeine can relax smooth muscle, induce diuresis and relax blood vessels, which is a medicine for treating neurasthenia symptoms and rescuing coma patients.
In daily life, caffeine exists in many drinks and foods, such as cola, red bull and coffee that many young people like to drink, tea that old friends like to drink for health, chocolate and sweets that children like to eat. However, the caffeine in these foods is within the reasonable range of national control of food additives. As long as it is not eaten excessively every day, there is basically no addiction and harm.
How does caffeine become a drug?
Coffee is a kind of drink that many people like to drink, which helps to refresh themselves. However, if you look closely, you will find that those who particularly like to drink coffee are actually addicted, because coffee contains caffeine, and the reason for addiction is the role of this substance.
Researchers believe that caffeine acts on the communication fatigue and drowsiness signals sent by neurotransmitter blocks in the brain, which is why the main function of caffeine is to make you feel more awake for a period of time, but it may also cause problems.
Purified caffeine
Because caffeine can directly affect people's brain and spinal cord, and has potential dependence and tolerance, it is listed as the second class psychotropic drug control in China. The purified caffeine preparation can only be prescribed by a doctor who has the right to prescribe, and can't be bought at a drugstore casually.
This kind of psychotropic drugs can make people addicted, which is harmful to some extent and conforms to the national definition of drugs. Caffeine is obviously a drug.
The harm of caffeine
Caffeine has a strong exciting and refreshing effect, but its side effects are also obvious. The user's spirit has been highly concentrated in the surrounding environment, and people will be anxious, nervous, overexcited, and even have unwarranted phobia and insomnia.
In fact, the exciting refreshing feeling of caffeine is also an illusion. It can't eliminate the user's physical fatigue, but it blocks drowsiness by entering the nerve. By deceiving the brain, the brain can't receive the "need to rest" message from the nerve, and people's energy is always active. The fatigue of the next day will be several times as much as before, which will make people more groggy and unconscious.
At this time, the pituitary gland in the brain will stimulate the kidney to secrete adrenaline. Adrenaline can make people more excited, make people's heart rate increase, blood pressure increase, muscle contraction tension and so on. Therefore, people who consume caffeine will also feel cold limbs, dizziness, palpitations and other symptoms.
Because caffeine can stay in the human body for a long time, this state can last for several hours. After caffeine is ingested by human body, it will be completely absorbed by stomach and small intestine within 45 minutes, and then distributed to various organs of the body. Caffeine entering the stomach can stimulate the gastric mucosa, increase gastric acid secretion and increase the risk of stomach disease.
After caffeine enters the intestine, it will affect the absorption of calcium, iron, zinc and other beneficial elements, so it will easily lead to calcium deficiency and be excreted with urine metabolism. The loss of calcium will lead to osteoporosis, cramps, backache and other adverse reactions.
If caffeine is ingested in large doses for a long time, it will also lead to poisoning, and users will have a series of physical and psychological symptoms. People's emotions will become irritable, emotional radical, psychologically sensitive, easily angry, and their memories of things will be confused and their memories will decline. Red face, numbness around the mouth, increased body temperature, increased pulse frequency, tinnitus, muscle vibration, trembling, convulsions, gastrointestinal dysfunction, increased urine output, etc.
In severe cases, people will be insane, the clarity of consciousness will be reduced, they will be delirious, incoherent, have a lot of hallucinations, and see wild animals and ghosts. The body may be paralyzed by breathing, heart failure, shock or death.
Like other drugs, after caffeine addiction, withdrawal reactions will occur after drug withdrawal, such as stiff smooth muscles in the body, depression, feeling that there is no motivation to do anything, accompanied by headaches, dizziness and other symptoms.
In addition, caffeine is also a diuretic, the main sign is that people are dehydrated, which will make the water in the human body sweat or urinate faster through the skin, which is also the reason why caffeine addicts have more urine.
Because caffeine is potentially addictive, many people stay up late to refresh themselves for long-term study and work, so they will rely heavily on caffeine physically and psychologically. Generally speaking, if a person consumes 600 milligrams of caffeine every day, he will become physically addicted within one to two weeks, and his mood will change within one day, which will obviously affect his mood and destroy his normal work and study life.
Security advice
Caffeine-containing drinks, drugs and foods are all in safe doses, so don't worry about addiction. The main risk of addiction is caffeine abuse alone.
Every healthy person should not consume more than 250 milligrams of caffeine every day. People with heart and stomach diseases, pregnant women and children should avoid caffeinated foods. Everything should be measured, don't panic too much, and don't overflow too much.