About a year ago I listened to podcast by Dr. Andrew Huberman of Huberman Lab called Master Your Sleep, and it blew my mind. The snippet that really fascinated me was the actual process of how caffeine effects the body and our neurotransmitters, and how to optimize for better performance. Who doesn’t wish to wake up refreshed, focused, alert, productive during our waking hours and then drift off to deep, restorative sleep? This tactic can help with both.
Here's How: Establish your caffeine window
Delay your caffeine 90-120 mins after waking
Stop your caffeine consumption around 10 hours before you plan on being asleep
Example:
If your wake time is 6 am and you want to be asleep by 10:30 pm then your ideal caffeine window is 7:30-12:30 pm.
Why is this?
Many of us get out of bed in the morning to immediately head for our morning caffeine of choice to get the day rolling and to wake up. The problem is that this sets us up for an inevitable crash in the afternoon. How this works is that adenosine, which is a byproduct of ATP (what our body and brain uses for energy) binds to adenosine receptors. This binding causes drowsiness by slowing down the nerve cell activity and dilation of the blood vessels to let in more oxygen while we sleep. To the nerve cell, caffeine looks like adenosine and it binds to the adenosine receptor. Instead of slowing down, the nerve cell speeds up, and the adenosine has nowhere to go so it builds up in the system. When the caffeine wears off 6-8 hours and leaves, our system is flooded with adenosine rushing to bind to the receptors that have just been vacated. This binding results in the overwhelming feeling of fatigue mid afternoon, which is why many of us drink more caffeine later in the day to keep us going. The later consumption has the caffeine hanging around in system far longer, preventing us from reaching the deep restorative sleep we acquire in the beginning of our night's rest. Thus, making us wake up feeling less rested/groggy and then cycle repeats.
By delaying our consumption, the body is given the time it needs to complete the natural spikes and elimination of chemicals that aid us in waking up. Since caffeine has half-life of 6-8 hours and a quarter life of 10-12 hours, stopping around 10 hours before bed allows the majority of caffeine to clear the system. Therefore, we are able to hit the deep restorative sleep in the beginning of the night fully. Even if you can have a cup of coffee and immediately fall asleep, the caffeine hinders our ability to reach deep sleep.