This troper has to have caffeine not because it helps, but because if I don't I get painful headaches. It has no energy boosting effect for me, but I get headaches without it.

I think that's called withdrawal.

This Troper is something of an inversion: she hates caffeine and its effects on the body, but loves the taste of coffee.

Mmm, coffee ice cream...

Ah, caffeine, the life-bringer, where would This Troper be without you?

During and after his service, this troper has often reflected that somehow cutting off the caffeine supply would destroy the US military's combat readiness more thoroughly than a global thermonuclear war.

Not to mention the effect on AmericanLawEnforcement.

...and all of emergency response in general.

Don't forget health care.

The entire ''concept'' of graduate school would grind to a halt upon a supply cut-off.

Hell, America as a whole could be brought to its knees if all the Dunkin Donuts were taken out, because, as we all know, America Runs On Dunkin'.

Thousands (I think) of Americans (Soldiers, Civilians, and dependants of soldiers) survive without Dunkin' Donuts in Germany.

At least the Germany this Troper lives in has plenty of Dunkin' Donuts Stores. :-)

This troper has long joked that the smartest business decision a certain hospital system ever made was to open a Starbucks in the main lobby of each of its hospitals, keep them open 24 hours, and allow employees to pay for beverages with a badge swipe. Those have to be the most profitable Starbucks in the city.

Historically speaking, this is not untrue in the least. Coffee was strictly rationed in America during WorldWarTwo because it basically ''had'' to go to the men 'n' boys fighting the war. And guess what Americans (well, patriots, anyway) drank after the Boston Tea Party? It wasn't tea, I'll tell you that much.

The US Army spends more on its Coffee Budget than some nations spend on nuclear armaments.

Wait, don't some countries ''not'' spend money on nuclear armaments?

I thought most nations didn't have any kind of nuclear weapons. Which means firing a single pistol round in the US military costs NaN more than most nations spend on nuclear armament!

This Troper was at New Freeway Hall for one of their monthly meetings. I cracked a joke that if the world's ''coffee producers'' went on strike, global capitalism could be toppled in nothing flat. #QUOTE#'''Old Lady Socialist:''' Yeah, honey, but you'd also incapacitate half the revolutionaries!

This troper manages it on sheer willpower. (Well, and lots of sugar.)

There are estimated to be more people in Europe addicted to caffeine than not, and the same is probably true of North America.

This troper hardly touches caffeine due to an unfortunate incident with addiction in school, ending in a broken rib for someone else for no reason other than 'they were annoying me'.

Subverted with this troper. Caffeine tends to make me tired. (Sugar on the other hand...) I still love coffee and tea though.

This troper is a rare breed- a grad student who doesn't touch coffee.

I'm also a grad student who drinks no coffee - but simply because the best way for me to ensure projectile vomiting in the next 24 hours is a cup of coffee. Also, immune to caffeine. The only thing which seems to do anything is taurine, so I keep myself awake with cheap energy drinks - no Red Bull, though, that's the only one which has no effect on me.

This troper also doesn't drink coffee and is an undergrad. Not quite as impressive, but still. I'll let other things kill me.

This troper adds to the ranks of college students who don't do coffee. She hates the taste.

Amen, sister! This troper has always wondered how people can drink enough of it to get used to and even like the flavor.

So have I! I like the scent, but the taste? Yuck.

I don't even like the smell. Smell, taste, all of it is awful. I have been bitterly tricked several times with coffee-flavored candies (especially in Japan) when I thought they were root-beer flavored. Ugh. I also refuse to touch energy drinks just on principle. I do quite like tea, though.

I despise coffee, but I still need caffeine, so I drink a lot of tea.

After making coffee for my mam since I could boil a kettle, I HATE coffee. I'm NotAMorningPerson though, so I need tea and choclate to wake me up in the morning.

Diet coke is my poison. I hate it when people "go out for coffee", I always end up being the one asking if wherever we are has anything with no coffee in it and getting crazy looks.

This Troper isn't anywhere near college yet, but let's see: Half of the grade has taken up coffee, some becoming Must Have Caffiners, if you will, and we all need caffine boosts in general. (thesiiiiiiss)The solution, m'colleagues? Tea. A lot of tea. Around half of what I drink. And Cola-Cola, in quantities when you *really* need a boost. Like now.

One of the things this troper really, really, ''really fucking hated'' about his undergraduate classes was the smell of the morning coffee his fellow students brought in. On some days it seemed like half the class had it. Mercifully, my one year of actual classes as a graduate student were generally later in the morning or in the afternoon, so I was spared the coffee stink. I'm especially proud to say that I '''never''' needed coffee to get started in the mornings.

Past college now, but, at 30: have never cared for coffee, think tea doesn't have enough flavor (though I like tea ceremony tea - thick, frothy, bright green...), reduced pop to "on occasion" a few years back. Aside from chocolate, caffeine isn't a factor in my life. Then again, I also made the decision to not get a driver's license, so count me unusual.

I think you're me 10 years down the line.

This troper enjoys cutting off all caffeine intake each summer. Given the inevitable addiction built up over the previous months, this results in three days of sleep followed by a week-long high of sorts.

This troper did something similar in high school, giving up all forms of caffeine for Lent. Going to Starbucks on Easter Monday and ordering my usual triple venti latte, the day of a computer science exam, probably wasn't the smartest thing I ever did. It's hard to type when your hands are shaking that badly...

This Troper's mother has a routine: The last thing she does is filling the pot with water and coffee. Then the first thing she does each morning is putting on the pot, go out on the balcony for a cigarette and return in time for the first cup of coffee. This Troper is equally intrigued as revolted when witnessing this.

This troper actually can't have coffee, due to a stomach issue, and so turned to sodas. It was only after a 92-hour, Jolt-fueled awake period during finals that she cut the intake by half.

When this troper was 12, her stepcousin offered her a few sips of this hyper-caffenated slurry (I think it might've been Jolt) that left her buzzing for about five hours. My caffeine resistance is better nowadays: I can drink an espresso an hour before bed, no problem. Strange.

I enjoy an occasional cup of (usually herbal, sometimes green or white) tea and like chocolate, but that's the extent of my caffeine habit. I don't drink coffee at all (can't stand it, which makes me an oddity on a college campus) and the types of soda I prefer are invariably caffeine-free, and in any case I rarely drink soda at all. I've noticed that I am highly sensitive to caffeine when I do ingest it, however. This is probably because of the fact that I tend to try to avoid it.

While this troper's caffeine intake is limited to a daily dose of chocolate and the occasional pop, several of her friends as well as her mother seem to always need a coffee or energy drink of some sorts at least once a day. It disturbs her how reliant and addicted some of her friends are to energy drinks, however her mother's need for coffee is more amusing, and it typically gets her a free bagel when her mother runs out to Tim Horton's for her daily fix on weekends.

Some of you may be familiar with the website Instructables, mad science on the small scale, this troper considers most of the coffee entries to be "for sissies."

Caffeine is useless for this troper: she has ADHD, and stimulants improve her ability to focus rather than energizing her, in a sort of ReviveKillsZombie effect. It's kind of annoying, because I find having to sleep highly inconvenient, and it'd be nice to be able to stay up for 24-48 hours yet feel slightly less like I got hit by a truck.

This Troper has the same issue, but finds that drinking enough caffeine in a short enough period can cause a hyper focused state, during which you won't be tired. As soon as you stop paying attention for a second, though...

When you think about it, Ritalin and other ADD drugs are stimulants (at least according to the doc monitoring me). This ADHD anonymous troper uses sugar-loaded coffee as a substitute for his meds whenever he can't get ahold of the real stuff. It helps, but not solves. He always wonders how many people are there who are undiagnosed because they can function normally on coffee.

This Troper had caffeine so regularly and frequently over the years that at some point he developed a RESISTANCE to the stuff. Caffeine no longer affects him, though a good supply of sugar helps keep him sane. Kool-Aid packets are cheap, thankfully.

Contrary to popular belief, it's actually quite easy to build up a resistance to caffeine. This troper rations her intake for that very reason -- if I'm gonna take a drug that improves my performance, I should at least be sure it does so when it counts. I suspect that a very large amount of coffee-before-work drinkers are running not so much on caffeine as the comfort of habit, with a possible placebo effect.

I've also built up a bit of an immunity to caffeine over the years (I'm a soda-drinker, actually), but I don't drink as much as I used to (for a while, I was going through the equivalent of 8-9 cans of soda ''A DAY''). My reason for cutting back? My father. I'd told him many times: "If you give up smoking, I'll give up caffeine." He hasn't given it up, but he's cut back a great deal from how much he used to smoke, so I had to keep up my part of the bargain.

This Troper became so addicted to the stuff during second year that he would pop out during lectures two or three times to fill up the largest cup the University cafe had. A week of coffee ended up costing over 25$. This does not count coffee made at home. By winter break, this troper had an expresso maker and French press which were often in use (while still buying coffee on campus). I became completely immune to the caffeine and drank it simply for the taste. The damage done to my stomach lining forced me to stop by winter break of my third year. I'm currently in a bet with several people to stay off coffee for six months. This troper's addiction to coffee is nothing short of epic.

This troper has a Delayed Sleep Phase Syndrome - he can hardly get any sleep before 2 AM. Regardless, he has to wake up at 6 AM. So after 4 hours of sleeping, he must get his fair dose of caffeine in order to function properly as a human being. And his sarcasticising circuits are always on-line, but they go off the scale without his first espresso. This led to some hilarious SophisticatedAsHell moments when somebody forgot the "Do not talk to {{Gerusz}} before his first coffee" rule. Also, he can rarely be seen without a cup of coffee during the day too.

Recently he accomplished a nice feat: he drank only caffeinated drinks for two days. His blood ''killed a damn mosquito''.

~awe-stricken applause~ I think that counts as a CrowningMomentOfAwesome.

Well, caffeine is a natural insecticide. I think that's the actual reason some plants contain it.

This troper had a coworker claim they could keep up with his caffeine intake. The first drink? A quadruple espresso. Said coworker said the next day he couldn't do that again "because it made my heart feel funny."

This troper cares much more about sugar than caffeine and enjoys caffeine-free sodas as long as they have sugar in them, as those artificial sweeteners taste revolting. He also uses the fact that heat increases the solubility of sugar to put a quarter cup of it into a single cup of tea, as otherwise it simply doesn't taste sweet enough. He can't stand coffee though, not even the smell.

This troper loves coffee, but can't handle caffeine. Seriously. If she has about one cup of coffee she becomes the hyper version of drunk, and then has to pass out for ~eight hours. Luckily, decaf has enough caffeine to perk her up a little without going absolutely batshit nuts.

This troper is a shameless example of the trope. However, since he finds coffee unpalatable and hot drinks in general unpleasant, his intake comes from soda. Normally Pepsi. Lots of Pepsi. How his teeth haven't rotted and fallen out of his head is a mystery.

ThisTroper likewise can't stand coffee or tea. His entire caffeine intake comes from Diet Coke or Coke Zero.

This troper is the exact same way. I get all my intake from non coffee-related sources. About 70% of it is soda (or as we call it around here, Coke. Yes, it's both a generic term and and a proper name. Don't ask). I'll occasionally drink tea, but only if it's presented to me.

This troper dosen't touch coffee. He can't start his day without a cigarette, however.

ThisTroper can't actually have caffeine, not in any quantity. Tachycardia, means my heart rate occasionally jumps to up the low end of humming bird range. Caffeine seems to exacerbate the effect. Thus no more coffee, tea, or soda. Though the soda was cut out due to the fact it's like chugging syrup.

I had a female friend who could only drink Sprite (in terms of sodas, caffeine) as a result of something like this. I think?

Amusing inversion: a friend of this troper, who was also a physician, was always ''bradycardic'' before her first cup of coffee. Just for laughs, I checked her pulse one morning before work. Pre-coffee: 40. Post: 64. We used to joke that Dr. A would actually go asystolic if her blood caffeine level dropped too far.

This troper recently discovered that he actually gets ''some'' schoolwork done if he drinks coffee. If you knew me, you'd realise that that in itself says wonders for the drink.

In the recent heatwave, this troper stopped drinking coffee. A few days in I began to realise just how caffeine-dependent I am. Thank goodness I'm on holiday. (It was about a week before I realised that I could just make iced coffee...)

This troper hates the taste of coffee, so he doesn't drink any.

This troper, after waking up at 5:30am, walking to the next suburb, swimming laps in the pool that's only 20 degrees Celsius and then walking home again, likes to turn on the machine and pump out a double-strength double-shot of that sweet, sweet coffee, add three sugars and a dash of milk, downs that in a few minutes, then makes another one while he begins the rest of the morning routine. I give fair warning to everyone else: if you disrupt my caffination, I will *** your *** up.

This Troper doesn't regularly drink coffee. He prefers to use it medicinally; if he's had to pull long hours, a concentrated cup of coffee is an appropriate remedy. Otherwise, no.

Charlie Brown: One troper, 3 examples!

Father has developed caffeine ''immunity''. Because he likes the taste, '''he has a cup TO BED.'''

It's debatable whether it's genetic: I'm currently at "highly resistant" (a cup buzzes me for an hour, tops) but definitely not at "nightcap" status.

A close friend is an ''inversion''. A few ''sips'' of a cup of joe and he's '''stone cold asleep''' in minutes.

This editor can't see any effect from caffeine and can't stand the taste of coffee. He suffers from a variant instead - he's incommunicato until he's eaten breakfast.

This troper has been drinking coffee since she was ten, and can't function with less than 6 cups a day.

Ditto for this troper. Although the grown up-ness my friends thought I exhibited by drinking coffee at such a young age was diffused when I told them I only drink mocha lattes. Because, you know, I totally wasn't using those teeth...

This troper recently drank 24oz. of triple caffeine coffee and now has a new favorite drink for finals week next year.

Where can I find some of that?

This troper walks the perilous line between being both addicted and sensitive to caffeine. The addiction always wins out over the sensitivity.

This troper had been known to enjoy the occasional cup of coffee, but the bulk of his caffeine addiction intake is in the form of Mountain Dew. LOTS of Mountain Dew. So far as he knows, he's only ever been wired twice: once on Mountain Dew and once on a 24 oz. cup of bottom-of-the-pot ridiculously strong coffee. After years of caffeine use, this troper has developed a [[{{Understatement}} fairly high caffeine tolerance. Ah, the cycle of addiction.

Update: this troper has since quit drinking Mountain Dew. His coffee intake has increased exponentially.

This troper hates the taste of coffee, and only ingests energy drinks on rare and desperate occasions, like an all-night karaoke session (seriously). Soda consumption is mild, but existent.

This troper will go with his coworkers to get coffee, tea, or soda at any point they go to get some. At one such trip for coffee, his coworkers finally noticed what he was putting in his coffee. This troper was getting the strongest coffee, adding a bit of cream, then about eight or so packets of sugar (for a single cup). One of the coworkers sampled it and commented that it "wasn't as sickeningly sweet as you'd expect" but "still thinks it would kill him to drink it." This troper also adores vault, mountain dew, expressos, and black teas.

This troper uses coffee for two main purposes: one, in order to be able to function correctly until noonish, seeing as she usually sleeps about 5 hours a day, 6 tops. Two, to actually ''raise'' her blood pressure -- her normal levels are 90-40 mmHg, and if she's hungry or it's mildly hot they can go frighteningly low. If she doesn't want to see tiny sparks under her eyelids when standing up, she must have some caffeine, either a soda or a cup of coffee.

Huh. So ''that's'' why my vision used to fog over. And why it doesn't now.

This Troper's old boss was notorious for this. She drank full pots of coffee.

In college, this troper belonged to a club that would adjourn its weekly meetings by going to a local pub which sold soda in pint glasses. Troper's love of Mountain Dew + unlimited free refills = a caffeine immunity which still exists ten years later.

I have 2 500ml bottles of Coke every day, near enough.I seem to have some form of caffeine immunity.

This college undergrad doesn't drink coffee because ''making it takes too long.'' When I MustHaveCaffeine, I must have it ''now.'' Instead, I substitute soda and/or iced tea in massive quantities.

{{tzecco}}, by virtue of working nights and going to school in the morning lives on the stuff. Coffee is good, but his drug of choice tends to run towards Sobe [=NoFear=]'s or the Amped drinks. However, is highly resistant so they don't last too long and has been known to be able to drop to sleep even after downing a can of energy.

This Troper read a book called the [=UnDutchables=], which is a humerous study of the Dutch people and their quirks and habits. According to one of the writers if we could hook up an IV and inject pure caffeine into our bodies and survive it we'd go for it. Fair enough, I must have one mug (Starbucks nicked, natch!) before doing anything else, and then drink my second during the course of shaving, ironing shirt, doing the hair etc. First thing he does at work after he's arrived and assessed the workload? Get a cup of coffee in the kitchen.

Please, don't forget to give the {{Quillpaw}} her Diet Coke. It has become so crucial to this troper's ability to function, that telling her teachers she can't work because she missed her morning Coke is a ''legitimate excuse''.

In an odd twist on this trope, this troper requires multiple bottles of Diet Coke at every volleyball game she attends, and also whenever she's feeling particularly tired. The rest of the time, her addiction is [=VitaminWater=] [=XXX=].

This troper is... addicted to say the least. A tall cup of coffee is essential first thing in the morning for anything resembling function, and even then he has a tinge of a headache by the end of his school day, which leads to drinking at least 5 sodas a night (don't worry, they're all Diet), usually one just before bed. He fears the day that he gets into college, because undoubtedly, it will be even worse.

Da_Nuke. Currently capable of drinking 2 liters of coffee when under school pressure. His stimulant of last resort is a pint of strong coffee with large amounts of glucose-rich corn syrup. More due to mental conditioning than actual risk, though, he will only touch energy drinks as an ''absolute'' last resort.

{{Dinru}} loves Mountain Dew... only problem is, one bottle is enough to turn her from {{Cloudcuckoolander}} to AttentionDeficitOohShiny (Or at least very similar). Sometimes, HilarityEnsues. Other times... you don't want to know about the other times...

If it didn't upset my stomach to drink more than a cup or two at a time, I would drink coffee nonstop! I love the taste of coffee, and it really keeps me hopping all day. I love nothing more than a pot of coffee made with 5 scoops!

Thid troper is a coffee addicted high school teacher. For Lent this year, I decided to give it up (the other choice was alcohol, and any high school teacher will tell you that that's not gonna happen). Needless to say, my students learned the true definition of "evil."

This troper sleeps 4 hours, maybe less per night during the week before Math Team competitions. Her solution to the inevitable zombieness during school? Why, a cup of triple-shot coffee, of course! It makes her a little hyper, nothing else. During camp, she does the same thing, only with soda instead. Ergo, a terrible sleep schedule.

Along with a gatsby cap, glasses and trenchcoat, 'a bottle of coke' has been listed as one of the defining features of this troper.

This troper has a bit of a system; he does not do diddly squat until he has had coffee. Considering that neither of his first periods allow him to bring drinks in, he must chug before the bell rings. A scalded tongue is nothing compared to the head-splitting headache that would ensue in a matter of an hour without it. He can chug a cup of coffee directly before bed with no problems-- he doesn't rely on caffiene to stay awake. He relies on it to remain functional, thanks to an utterly crippling addiction complete with violent withdrawl if he doesn't have it. (It also leads to violent rebellion when the troper says "we need more soda" but his father says "we have plenty", and the 'plenty' is all non-caffienated. Who invented such a vile thing!?)

This troper doesn't much care for coffee (because of the taste), but is severely addicted to other sources of caffeine (chocolate, tea, energy drinks, ''caffeine pills'' etc.). My usual first thought upon waking up: "* groan* caaaffeeeineeeee...."

This troper used to know a guy who never drank any form of caffeine. One night he was having trouble staying awake, so his visiting cousin, who couldn't live without his stovetop espresso maker, offered him a shot. The poor guy finally managed to crash around dawn.

This troper is mostly immune to caffeine... the only time she remembers where coffee had any noticeable effect on her whatsoever was when she was insomniac for three days straight, felt the crash coming on when having to go to class and then had some venti or another from Starbucks - with six shots. It only served to keep her awake until class was over, after which she went home and passed out for 14 hours. This was three hours after drinking said concoction.

This (British, naturally) troper doesn't like coffee, but drinks a ''lot'' of tea. Specifically, PG Tips. Litres and litres of it. With breakfast, lunch and dinner. He's relying on it to get him through university, and he often reflects that quite apart from anything else he wouldn't survive any sort of apocalypse because of this particular necessity of his.

This Troper requires at least one cup every morning. Failure to have one makes for a bad day for me and everyone within twenty feet. One camping trip where I'd forgotten to pack some resulted in my staring into the cooler repeating "No coffee" repeatedly. My friend heard what I was saying, ''kicked'' his brother awake with "*** , get up, there's no coffee! We've gotta go get coffee!" We ended up driving twenty minutes into town to get some. And on a similar note, another friend would have a Pepsi after school, everyday without fail. When the school ran him through a psych evaluation, they sent him to counseling because they thought he was addicted to something worse.

This troper doesn't function under high stress without at least two bottles of Mountain Dew. Going without causes serious caffeine headaches, to the point where (since I couldn't afford a soda at school) I had the choice between drinking black tea (which I hate nearly as much as coffee) and just sucking on the black tea while it was still dry and in the bag.

This Troper started drinking coffee at age 14 and it's only gotten worse. At this point (6 years later) I have such a high tolerance for caffeine that to have a noticeable impact, I drink quadruple shots of espresso (a coffee cup, about 6 ounces, filled almost to overflowing) which works for about 2 hours.

This troper and her mother would be the living dead without caffeine; however, it doesn't make them hyper. It just makes them awake and alert, and even calms them down. Her mother has limits; she have yet to discover hers, if they exist. She's had a twenty-four-ounce and a sixteen-ounce mocha latte in one day and felt nothing but awake and cheerful.

This Tropers has been drinking coffee almost all her life (Of course, in a very milked down version when she was little). She's addicted to caffeine, but she can go a day or two without having any form of it. Of course, when she makes coffee she makes it so strong that the neighbors wake up. She's also had to put up with snarky comments from her father (See: "Is the spoon supposed to stand up?") on the strength of the coffee. During breaks and on weekends, she is able to go without anything to wake her up, but during school she has to have some from of sugar or caffeine or she sleeps through her morning classes.

This Troper used to be addicted to caffeine until he stopped drinking soft drink as much for weight loss. He despises coffee and tea and now drinks only one can of Pepsi a day but, back in his prime, he could down 3 energy drinks in five minutes without any ill effects.

For This Troper it's not coffee or caffine but Twix. If I do not have a Twix every morning... Zombiefied.

This troper doesn't drink coffee, but has a lemonade intake that must be seen to be believed.

This troper treats orange juice the way most people treat coffee. She [+ NEEDS IT+ ] to speak coherently at all in the morning (and sometimes chugs it it she gets it late) and if she doesn't get it at all, the rest of the day is a struggle. Many of her friends have compared this behavior to their coffee addictions.

This one here doesn't drink coffee, thinks the taste is pretty ick. So for me it's soda. LOTS AND LOTS OF SODA. Coca-Cola preferably.

This troper also drinks a lot of soda (she considers it her equivalent to coffee, considering the amounts she chugs down...), but coffee isn't her style. However, if she needs a rude wake-up call, cold Cuban coffee always does the trick. At the cost of it being VERY bitter...

This troper had a heart attack at thirty (IGotBetter). His cardiologist attributed the cause to "enough caffeine to kill an African elephant." Life has been pretty sad since.

If not requesting some caffeine from my mom and her damn good espresso, I run on Pepsi. Lots of it...I sleep at 2 AM at the earliest. ._. Not healthy in the least.

Not being able to stomach the taste of coffee, this troper has, on the occaision that I require caffeine, mixed diet cola (usually Coke Zero) with diet Mountain Dew. The end result is known as "Sex". I heard about it from a friend, and I personally really like it. Note that "diet" is not necesarry for this, I just have diabetes.

This troper is also diabetic and finds himself going through sugarfree Koolaid and Crystal Light like it's nobody's business. My current addiction is Oceanspray Sugarfree Cran-Grape juice. I have a permanent koolaid mustache from it.

This troper hates coffee, but developed a nice, heavy resistance to caffeine thanks to homebrew "energy drinks" to function in early morning speech competitions. The recipe basically came down to stirring a cup of sugar into one can of Pepsi. After downing three of those in an hour, hilarity always ensued.

I had to check your contributor link to make sure you weren't me. No speech competitions, and my version was made with Pixy Stix in Mountain Dew, but that's about right. First time I had it (20 oz. Dew + ~15 Stix), I got my first sugar rush/caffeine buzz ever. The second time was for my AP US History test- a 1 liter Dew with three giant Stix, chugged. I got the shakes, nearly threw up... and went on to get a 5 on the test. Since then, I've been immune, with two exceptions. First, sugar wakes me up faster (instantly, instead of in about 10 minutes). Second, I can't have caffeine for an hour before I go to sleep, or I won't. I just lay there, exhausted, but unable to slow my thoughts down enough to fall unconscious. I treat Dew, Diet Coke, and iced tea the same way- like water.

This troper never had any need for caffeine, although it never works when he would potentially need it, and he generally dislikes coffee in any form. (Go to local hipster coffee shop, get a smoothie, have all the hipsters scoff at him.)

This Troper used to be a bona fide caffeine addict. At the height of his addiction, he would drink a pot and a half of coffee per day, plus various other caffeinated beverages (Green Tea and Coca-Cola were the norm). Then one day he quit. He went through full drug withdrawal symptoms. It wasn't pretty. But he managed to kick it! Now he'll have one cup of coffee every two weeks or so, but never more, and caffeinated soda is right out. He's never been more alert.

This troper's high school drama program has declared its official drink to be coffee. As far as she can see, most students walk into school every morning with a cup of coffee (she has a thermos), and we hold improv performances advertised for all-you-can-drink Starbucks coffee. The coffee need is worst on tech weeks or performance nights, because after a straight week of staying at school until at least nine at night, the actors and techies are all exhausted. Coffee is nearly worshiped these weeks. She also tells each new student to start drinking coffee if they don't yet.

Everyone remember Surge? That carbonated drink that had obscene ammounts of caffeine, even more than Red Bull? This troper had had about three half-liter bottles of Surge in the space of a week back in first grade (or sometime thereabouts). He's been addicted to caffeine ever since.

This troper finds coffee and caffinated beverages delicious, but rarely ever drinks them. Orange juice and chocolate milk are far superior.

This troper comes from an entire family of caffiends. Her father drinks so much coffee he's turned it into a comic shtick at work; her mother, who grew up abstaining, developed the habit after marrying; this troper herself puts two tablespoons of instant (1 teaspoon=1 cup=70mg) in her morning Slim-Fast. Now her adolescent brother thinks caffeine addiction is something to ''aspire'' to, and cadges Red Bull and Frappuccinos whenever he can in hopes of building up his tolerance. Nobody, though, beats her uncle's Norwegian college roommate, who would supposedly drink an entire ten-cup pot before breakfast.

Strange example with this Troper. I literally can't have coffee (pseudo-allergic due to not being old enough; IOW, since I'm only a teen, coffee is toxic to me), yet I need soda on a semi-daily basis. Pepsi and Mountain Dew are my favorites, though unlike some other examples on this page, I just have the soda straight. Adding extra sugar would probably make me barf (and if I did it at college, I'd likely be so hyper, Sensei would be a bit nervous). But one exception to this: I can't drink ''diet'' soda. No sugar = '''''no flavor''''' in my opinion. I'm still shocked that other teens at the college are able to drink coffee, as it's supposed to be toxic to ''anyone'' under the age of 18. I can't even be in prolonged proximity to coffee, as the smell has an effect similar to NauseaFuel, minus the Bleeprin. Not sure if I'll drink it when I'm physically old enough, but in the meantime, I'll stick to soda. Oh, and the occassional can (yes, a can) of green tea.

Coffee is toxic to teenagers? This troper's been drinking it regularly since the age of 15 or 16, with no noticeable ill effects unless she has too much. My Google-fu isn't turning up anything on the subject of age-based coffee intolerance, but I'd be interested to read more about this if anyone has a link.

According to TheOtherWiki, that's more UrbanLegend. Caffeine (coffee) legendarily would affect growth, but no studies have confirmed this at all. I think that was started by someone who was trying to keep their children from developing a caffeine addiction.

This troper used to get in trouble with her parents for smuggling the French press into her bedroom late at night. Now her coffee consumption is a comparatively modest three mugs per day with none in the evening, but coffee is still her top priority when she wakes up. In a twist that will no doubt make other contributors to this page blanch, she prefers instant to ground.

This troper pretty much gave up on Coffee due to costs. He needs a Venti Mocha with six(!!!) shots of expresso to get meaningful kick. At that point it's really just a large glass of expresso with coco powder in it.

This troper doesn't really like the taste of coffee particularly so she drinks mochas (coffee mixed with hot chocolate, the hot chocolate cuts the bitterness down enough for her to enjoy the drink. Even so she really only drinks the stuff for the caffiene and doesn't understand the point of decaf coffee. And she only drinks a single cup when she has morning classes since otherwise she wouldn't be able to pay proper attention to school in the morning due to taking quite a while to reach proper levels of functionality.

All the males in my family practically live off of caffiene (mostly coffee).

While this troper isn't nearly the caff-fiend he used to be, he did invent a drink he called Neapolitan Wirewater back in his more caffeine-guzzling days. The recipe is this: Brew a pot of extra-strong coffee using caffeinated water. Brew espresso-style coffee using this coffee. Add this to Jolt Cola. The result is enough to cause one to ping off the walls like a ferret on methamphetamine. He never did the math, but one of his cow-orkers at the time estimated this stuff had on the order of 750mg of caffeine in a 0.5L bottle.

8:00 am classes 4 times a week for three semesters straight and not a drop of coffee or grain of sugar the whole time. Wow, I'm pretty amazing. Except, when you have 8:00 classes 4 times a week you begin to wonder what the point of living is.

This troper has a soda addiction. She's a lot better with it but she still perks up quicker with some caffeine.

This troper isn't addicted to coffee ''per se'' (only a cup on the weekends normally), but the rigors of high school junior year and its blizzard of AP classes forced me to craft a solution: very strong black coffee, run through the machine ''twice''. The resultant mixture has, at its strongest, made my hands tremble after I drank it. I dubbed it "rocket fuel", reserved it strictly for emergency use, and credit it with keeping me alive and sane through that year. Even my former AP English teacher, himself an acknowledged coffee addict, called it weird.

Additionally, my Chinese ethnicity meant that I was introduced to tea early on, sans milk or sugar (green tea, hurray). It doesn't seem to affect me, as I routinely have a cup before bedtime, but in High School I developed the habit of bringing a thermos of it to school, where it proves most helpful right after lunch, which is, appropriately, Mandarin class.

I heard of someone doing that with coffee (running it through the machine twice.) Bear in mind that ''soldiers'' told this guy that he makes terrible coffee to begin with; when he double-brewed his infamous coffee for an all-nighter, he and his classmates weren't quite right in the head for close to a ''week!''

Averted hard here. This troper, being Mormon, has never even tasted coffee or tea and drinks caffeinated soda VERY sparingly (one every six months or so, but that's just because I don't like soda very much). During high school, I got up at 5:30 every morning and went throughout my day as usual, going to bed at about 10:30 without anything more powerful than a small square of chocolate crossing my lips.

My entire ''family'' is this trope, me included. I drink two caffeinated sodas a day, my mother drinks two or more cups of (milk-and-sugar heavy) coffee a day, and my dad HAS to have a cup of coffee when he wakes up. On another amusing note, my guitar tutor always has a ''massive'' cup full of Pepsi with him. I've seen two or more empty 16-oz (or so) bottles of Pepsi in there. How he stays so laid back and calm with all his caffeine I have no idea.

{{MonkeyPhysics}} can't actually remember the last time he went a day without caffeine. It's got to the stage where the most eloquent thing to come out of his mouth pre-caffeination is "mngrfl".

Strangely, caffeine has no effect at all for this troper.

Aversion: This tropper is rather embarassed to be the eldest son on my Dad's side, all avid Black Coffee drinkers, who ''doesn't'' like it. I blame my SweetTooth, but I'd probably go nuts without my beloved Country-Time Pink Lemonade...

This troper managed to make herself more popular than the class home-brewer in nursing school. The secret? Home-roasting coffee.

At my first science-fiction convention, This Troper literally watched a very hung over fellow in more silver lame than an Elvis impersonator walk straight to the coffee pot, check if the industrial-sized pot was full, and proceed to worship it like a heathen idol. Funniest. Thing. Ever.

This editor is addicted not to coffee, but to diet coke. Caffeine-free diet coke is my BerserkButton.

Not a coffee person, but this troper absolutely loves tea, coke, and energy drinks. Twenty cups of tea a day, a bottle of coke every two days and a energy drink a week (unless it's an examination week, in which case it's five energy drinks for five days). However, this troper has quite the caffeine tolerance and so needs at least a large can of Mother to get buzzed.

This troper loves coffee, tea, and to lesser extent coke, but purely for the taste. In fact caffeine is the reason why he doesn't drink more of it lest it ruins his delicate sleep pattern. He also despises energy drinks because they taste horrible and make him jittery and hot, rather than energized.

This troper drinks coffee as much for taste as for the caffeine, preferring it to every other form of caffeinated beverage. His fondness for strong black coffee has becoming a running joke to those who know him.

Subversion (I guess): This troper loves his iced tea, but as far as he can tell, the caffiene doesn't do a damn thing. It's purely for the taste.

Aversion here: I have almost no tolerance for caffeine. I drank sodas when I was in college, though my preference was for Sprite - ''the one non-caffeinated soft drink available at the cafeteria.'' About seven years ago, I got seriously wired from only three cans of Dr. Pepper, and more recently even ONE 12-oz can of cola is enough to leave me buzzing. Anytime I've had coffee I either add so much milk/cream as to almost make it into a different beverage, take a really small cup, or some combination of the above.\\ My brother, however, plays this one pretty straight: he used to go through about two two-liter bottles of Coke per day. At one time he was slugging down coffee in the morning, Coke in the afternoon, and taking ''caffeine pills!'' He's gotten better about it over the years.

Mira-chan and her mom avert this trope entirely. For us, caffeine doesn't do a damn thing. Not a daaaamn thing.

ShadowOfTheSun gave up caffeine to be an alcoholic instead.

this troper is an admitted caffeine addict. she goes without it on days she has no plans, but on days she has work or plans to do anything she NEEDS her caffeine. she does everything, but is trying to keep consumption of carbonated beverages in general down. she's used various energy shots (and is really liking redline 7 hour energy, it's cheaper than the 5 hour shots and you only need half a bottle), coffee, tea, yerba matte, caffeinated mints, caffeinated gum, caffeinated gummies, caffeinated hard candy, and she's probably forgetting something. she especially loves Java Monster, tho. but she also has a very good reason for caffeinating herself to get by, she developed chronic fatigue syndrome at age 6 and now at age 30 also has been diagnosed for fibromylagia as well and several other conditions. she has plenty of medications she can take to manage her pain levels, but no effective prescription medications to deal with her extreme fatigue levels. to compensate for her fatigue she use to drink the equivalent of 4 pots of coffee a day, but has since cut down to no more than two doses of caffeine per day (except on really bad days when she has to work when she slips in an extra half dose).

This troper's aunt drinks so much coffee that Grandmom almost bought her a shirt with the words "Without coffee, I have no personality" on the front. She only refrained from buying it because the color was too ugly.

This troper's house has been without coffee for over a week. A few days ago, she found a nearly-empty bottle of Kahlua. It was empty two minutes later. She didn't even want any alcohol, but...

This troper cannot run without her morning tea. She refuses to drink coffee unless it is mixed with large quantities of tastier things (read: sugar).

This Troper MustHaveCaffeine ''to offset the effects of sugar''. The troper loves coffee, but caffeine just causes calmness, mellowness, or in severe cases drowsiness, but a sugar high (such as from candy or decaffeinated sodas) can jump-start a run of CaffeineBulletTime. Said troper drinks large, non-creamer ice coffees, has one of those novelty Tigger mugs that could hold at ''least'' a regular bottle of soda, and drank from the pot itself several times (and then refilling it) when it had cooled enough for direct lip-skin contact by the time the troper got to it. If not for the Broke Arc, a new (i.e., working) coffee/espressomaker would practically be running all day, every day.

This male under-grad needs coffee to start the day. Not only due to the fact that I'm a college student, but because I'm awake and at work before the Sun gets its lazy ass up. I just hope I can get stronger stuff when I get to grad school (from what I've heard you can't get a psychology degree without potentially lethal amounts of caffeine in your blood at all times).

This troper was wondering why she was getting headaches in the morning all of a sudden. Then she noticed they go away after a cup of tea. She didn't even know physical dependence on ''tea'' instead of coffee was possible.

This troper loves coke zero, coffee and red bull. None of which gets in the way of his booze drinking!

This troper drinks about 2 mugs (not cups, mugs) of strong coffee or tea a day. Ironically, she also has a crippling phobia of addiction (rather, a fear of dependence on anything) so has several times cut off her caffeine supply for a few days just to make sure she's not psychologically addicted. However, doing so gives her a headache but she is easily able to function without the effects of caffeine. Mainly she drinks it for the concentrating effect it has on her.

This troper becomes this later in the workweek, because he is NotAMorningPerson and his job requires him to get up at 6 am. With an inability to fall asleep before 11 pm, he must make up for the sleep deprivation with coffee. Sleep debt and caffeine tolerance build up during the week, so he avoids coffee on the weekends to drain the tolerance off (so the caffeine will actually work the next week.) Beats full-blown caffeine addiction.

This troper's addiction began at the age of twelve during a particularly grueling community theatre production. It's gotten to the point where, at fifteen, she needs a double espresso every morning to keep her from killing someone, having a nervous breakdown, or vibrating on the spot.

On a somewhat related note, does anyone know if caffeine actually stunts your growth? I've never been able to find conclusive evidence on the topic.

This Troper is 6' 3" tall (190.5 cm for the rest of the world) and absolutely adores the mix of coffee and Mountain Dew his friend makes, Mountain Coffee. It does not help that the drama department has a coffee pot ''specifically'' for [[StageNames thespians.

How this college-attending troper makes it through midterms every semester: cup of coffee, extra sugar at night, cup of coffee in the morning, super-energy drink at school, three-hour nap afterwards, repeat for a week. She's actually started vibrating in her seat a few times because of it, though. And one time she actually added instant-coffee crystals ''to'' a cup of freshly-brewed coffee.

Averted with this anonymous European troper. I don't drink coffee. Or any warm beverages. For some reason, I start feeling very sleepy after drinking something warm. For staying awake, I have a considerable amount of Heroic Willpower to draw upon.

Tropers/TheMysteriousTroper had long preferred "Wolf Coffee" (mild blends with "lotsa cream and lotsa sugar") with no desire to learn about any fancy, rarefied ideas from Europe... until they discovered the Cafe Mocha. Hot Chocolate with distilled essence of coffee? Yes, please.

This troper, NEEDS. HIS. CAFFEINE! Preferably 3 cups per day. ^_^

Not as extreme as the other examples above (especially not the example above), but I tend to be impossible to get a conversation out of if I haven't had a cup of tea with my breakfast (4 Wheatabix is typical, but considering cutting down a bit). Luckily (for everyone else), I become more sensible (read: understandable) after 9AM (which, by a strange coincidence, is the time school starts where I live). I will occationally drink coffee, but I need so much sugar in it that the point is kind of defeated (and I need milk in it as well).

Forgot to add: I've also recently developed a bit of an addiction to sugar. Case of point, try drinking 4 litres of Vimto (not diet) in 2 hours without being hyper. I managed it...just (let's just say that people wondered there was vodka in it, as I far more noisy than usual. Since I was in a show on that night, though, it was worth it). This was followed, four days later, with 3 litres of coke (again, not diet), drunk in 2 hours. Unlike the previous time, I was completely fine. Maybe I have guts made of steel...or, failing that, enough insulin in my body to kill a blue whale.

The joke about Seattle is that we have an espresso cart on every corner. The truth is that, in a commercial area, we have two or three ''per block.'' Justified trope in that it is gray, rainy, and cold nine months out of the year...and during parts of the other three months.

We're not called the coffee capital of the world for nothing... since we thrive off of it.

Third Seattle-area troper confirming this. In my small town, we have four Starbucks plus three small drive-in espresso stands. I've been trying for years not to get addicted, but calculus class has finally killed my resistance.

In college, this troper drank Mountain Dew like water. Me and a friend took to calling it "Nectar of the Gods". (Who you calling an addict?)

This troper adores the taste and smell of coffee and always has a cup every morning. While she isn't as insanely addicted or immune to caffeine as some of the other tropers, she can distinguish the various ''brands'' of coffee by their taste after drinking it since sophomore year in high school. [=McDonalds=]' (hot) coffee is obscenely bitter unless she puts tons of cream and sugar in it (which then ruins the taste for her). Starbucks coffee has a general "roasted" flavor and while unremarkable, is not half so bad as people say it is. Instant coffee tastes like water with caffeine pills mixed in. Coffee that's been freshly-roasted and ground up (or at least packaged in a vaccuum-tight container after grinding) tastes like a breezy summer's day at the park.

Having heard horror stories about addiction, I've decided it's a particularly bad idea to get addicted to any caffeinated substance... couple that with the fact that I don't like coffee or tea (and for a brit that's unusual to say the least) and am not particularly keen on cola either (it's a case of Diet Coke ''if I have to'', or once in a while), and the only caffeinated beverage I partake in is Irn-Bru, which is a hideously unhealthy Scottish sugar hit and is bad for you for other reasons... Essentially I limit myself to one a week. Being able to be awake without drugs is a good thing; now to sort out the irregular sleeping habits... [Finlay]

This trope's band director, to the point that the students use it as mocking fodder. We've decided that the coffee is why Mr. Lewis is so short, and this is used to our advantage. A boy this troper has known since she was very small put Lewis' coffee on a shelf... just out of his reach, just to see what would happen. Lewis stood on a table to get it back. He also has an addiction to gummi bears, which comes into play as a Freethrow distraction at basketball games that goes as such: "coffee coffee coffee coffee coffee- GUMMI BEARS!". It is named after our director, naturally (he was flattered and amused by this). Similarly, the band runs on energy drinks, coffee, and soda at football games. We're actually told to do so by the aforementioned director, since the more spirit we have (read: the more loud and obnoxious we are), the better our funding. In addition, the only "Joe" this troper likes is her friend, since she much prefers tea... with lots of sugar. This troper's friend prefers Mountain Dew, and after a while, doesn't shut up and more or less acts like she's high.

Averted with this troper, who hates tea and coffee with a passion. Played very straight with her mother, who loves it and is not fully functional 'til she's drunk some coffee.

This Troper drinks caffeinated drinks because they make him shiver. He enjoys it.

This troper has a natural sleep cycle of 2am-10am. This troper has a job that necessitates a wakeup at 5am. This troper's normal brew is described in the KlatchianCoffee troper tales--and that's just to start. Some weeks, if he hasn't had time to sleep in and endure a caffeine purge and the associated hangover to reset his tolerance, this troper has been known to 'top off' with a number of red-eyes (coffee with one or more shots of espresso) from the nearby Starbucks--and still finds it too weak.

Additionally, this troper's then-girlfriend (now-fiancee) did not like coffee until said troper introduced her to the Ethiopian Harrar varietal. Now she also requires coffee.

This troper spent six months learning how to brew coffee in such a fashion that even those who claim to hate the taste of coffee love it. Which is odd, considering he's perfectly fine just munching on the unground beans. But then again, a bad cup of coffee is like a GroinAttack in your stomach, a mediocre cup of coffee is a bitter concoction to get you through the day, but a well made cup is like a high-five from God.

This Troper used to be a coffee addict in high school, though diluted a bit...sort of (her mother makes/drinks her coffee European-style, so Turkish ground, then 3-4 scoops in 1 1/2 cups water, resulting in one hellova strong kick; this troper would take 1/4 cup, then add milk and Nesquik to drown out the taste). Any fluctuations in amount resulted in incredibly painful migraines, so she weaned herself off, sticking just to the hot chocolate for the most part. Then she discovered the joy of drinking tea at a part-time job, and since then, a cup of caffeinated tea (black, green, white, does not matter, TEA!!!) in the morning, or else you're talking to a zombie. Decaffeinated tea is her afternoon to evening hot drink of choice, but either way, gives us the tea, and no one get hurt.

Unless it's iced, this troper refuses to drink coffee. Instead, I drink tea and sodas and, on occasion, a certain energy drink that begins with "M" and ends with "onster". Granted, the only reason why I drink Monster is because I love the taste, but heaven help you if I forgo common sense and buy myself a BFC.

This troper is firmly in the "Coffee smells great but tastes terrible" camp. Diet Pepsi, however, is her life's blood.

I want to remind you tropers: Isn't caffeine basically a stimulant, aka the same drug as ''cocaine and meth''? So that's why we all universally love it.

This troper prefers tea or energy drinks when she needs a caffine fix, but her group of friends were legenday for their adiction to coffee, as well as their lack of sleep, to the point it made it into the roast the junior class does of the senior class. -> Junior as friend #1: Here's your coffee Friend #2 -> Junior as friend #2: Ah [=WaWa=] Nectar of the Gods! Thank yo- wait a minute! this is the 12 oz. I need the 24 oz. FAIL!

This tropette's dad gets his caffine from Pepsi. HE HAS. TO. HAVE. PEPSI. Sometimes he'll run into a gas station and by a 1L bottle when he already has a 1L bottle UNOPENED in his car. I used to joke that whenever he bought Pepsi when he had an unfinished bottle, a polar bear died, or said that it was amazing how the people at the plasma donating place (dad donated plasma for extra money, and I can't remember the name of the place) didn't find Pepsi in place of blood. Did I mention that he'll have Pepsi for breakfast. Not with, FOR.

I don't need coffee very much. Usually when at work, I'll have a double choc-expresso with milk at lunch time. If I've stayed up too late I might have a single choc-expresso at morning tea. If I'm having any before I start or in the afternoon then I probably didn't sleep.

This troper is thirteen, and she already needs a cup of coffee each day. If she doesn't have coffee, she manages to sleep through most of her classes and turns into a raging monster. Usually she has only half a cup per day, but on trips she gets as many as her dad does, so five or six cups of coffee aren't uncommon.

This troper drinks Coke Zero almost exclusively at my mom's. So when I go to my dad's, I go through withdrawal. It's worth it though.

This troper has been told by her doctor to give up caffeine because it's an acid reflux trigger. Since said troper is in college, majoring in biology, she has not had an easy time of it. Lack of caffeine makes her irritable and tired and headachy. Which just plain sucks anyway, but especially with school.

This Troper needs at least two cups of coffee in the morning, or she falls asleep during history, or biology. She also has around two to three cups when she gets home from school. She has horrible headaches when she doesn't have her coffee. The excuse is that she's almost in college...and she's getting ready for the future!

An inversion for This Troper: Too much Caffeine tires me out to sleep.

This troper does not get tired per se, but caffeine keeps my mind from racing, which helps me fall asleep. On the other hand, I need coffee to wake up in the morning. Not for the caffeine, but the taste. Decaf wakes me up just as effectively as the regular brew.

This troper's younger brother was, in elementary school, dependent on hot chocolate to operate in the morning. Cola, tea, and I think we even gave him some coffee once, had no effect. Only Swiss Miss.

One of Jinjoman's friends drinks a cup or two of coffee a day, and is very defensive of it. Try to steal the thing of coffee he carries around and he'll rip your arm off.

Caffeine - be it chocolate, coffee, Coca-Cola, any soda but Monster, really - keeps me relaxed and awake: I need it to stay alive. If I overdo it I start literally bouncing off the walls. And to anyone who likes coffee and Coke: MIX THEM TOGETHER IN EQUAL PARTS. Whever I have it, I SWEAR I see the manifestation of God, if a god truly exists.

When this troper was in her final exams phase in school she went on... about... *counts* twenty cups of high-school-cafeteria-coffee-wending-machine-coffee. My usual amout back then was 10 cups. Now, six years later I'm at university and have the healthy amount of 6 cups home brewed stuff per day (yes, that ''IS'' healthy! Since it makes me work! It is! It IS IT TOTALLY IS...) - well, as long as there is no semester-ends-exams-phase or I have to hand in a paper... in latter case expect me to have 20 cups again, spending several weeks without any sleep at all.

Having drunk his first coffee at the age of 5 and drinking coffee regularly since the age of 8 or 9 (which is 12 years ago), it's safe to say that This Troper MustHaveCaffeine.

This troper is trying to find some kind of powerful energy drink, because caffeine is great, but not in the quantities she needs it. Suggestions?