One of the most beautiful things we can do for ourselves at midlife is to get to know ourselves without caffeine.
Each time we introduce caffeine into the body, we trigger our flight or flight response and your stress hormone cortisol spikes in your beautiful midlife body. We rely on this early morning jolt for daily energy and often do not realize that it is robbing us of our innate vitality and our sleep at the other end of our day.
As estrogen our juicy hormone and progesterone our balancing hormone are in decline during midlife, it is easy for our stress hormone cortisol to dominate our hormone profile leaving us anxious, losing sleep at night and feeling burnt out daily. Ironically this can cause us to lean more heavily on caffeine to jump start our day and we exacerbate the cycle down into exhaustion with our morning cup of joe!
Our job at midlife is to love on ourselves with dense nutrition and stress reducing lifestyle practices so that we support our bodies through hormonal change and reduce the uncomfortable symptoms of peri-menopause that come with changing and dominant hormones.
This may mean giving ourself healthy boundaries and a midlife break up with caffeine as we move through hormonal change. In this way we can get to know where our natural daily energy lies and ensure we can sleep like a baby through our forties and fifties and avoid feeling tires wired and frazzled.
Hot Take: you can always make up with caffeine later when your hormones are on an even keel!
This morning beverage is a recipe designed to nourish the body first thing in the morning.
It is rich in our relaxation mineral magnesium found in raw cacao and boosts our happy neurotransmitter serotonin to give you that lift in the morning that you enjoy from coffee. It includes anti-inflammatory spices and calms the brain early in the day by providing healthy fats from coconut butter and the omega 3 fatty acids found in protein rich hemp seeds.
Dates are rich in iron and the B group of vitamins and collagen provides the amino acids needed to build health skin, joints and a healthy gut lining.
Above all else, where coffee jolts the brain and leaches nutrition from the body as it dehydrates our skin, this morning elixir nourishes, calms and builds your midlife health.
Coffee Replacement Chocolate Morning Drink
Ingredients
4 tbsp raw cacao
4 tbsp hemp seeds
2 tbsp coconut oil
4 dates
1 pinch sea salt
4 cups boiled water
2 tbsp Collagen (optional)
1/4 tsp cinnamon (optional)
1/4 tsp ground turmeric (optional)
1/4' fresh ginger (optional)
Instructions
Add all the ingredients into a vented blender and blend until silky smooth.
Decant into mason jars and cool.
Top with lid and refrigerate until required daily.