Coffee and Celiac Disease Ep. 75

If you're a coffee drinker but aren't sure about the benefits on a gluten free diet, or you're struggling with acid reflux, this episode is for you.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:24

Hello. And welcome back to this week's episode of the healthy celiac podcast. Now I'm quite excited to talk about this topic because I absolutely love coffee. It is definitely part of my daily ritual. I have coffee every single day and I have done so for many years now. And the reason that I'm talking about coffee with you today is because Elli reached out to me. I'm sorry if I have pronounced your name incorrectly, I, I'm not sure how to pronounce it, but I'm hoping that is pretty close. Let me know. Bettelli reached out to me and told me that she's having some issues with reflux. Since she's found out she's had celiac disease and she thinks it's from coffee. And she wanted to know if I could talk about acid reflux with coffee. So I thought I could definitely answer that on the show today, but I thought I'd incorporate it with talking about coffee and the gluten-free diet and talking about coffee in general, as far as the pros and cons go so that we could share a little bit, little bit more information with you on the subject. So if you are a coffee drinker, you totally get what I'm talking about here. As far as it being something that you love and it's a ritual and it's something that you enjoy drinking. So I don't need to sell it to you in that way, but you may hear that some people talk about it that it's not good for you, and that you shouldn't drink too much of it and all of these different things. So we're gonna get down into the nitty gritty of the pros and the cons and why I think the pros outweigh the cons and why the cons tend to be if you drink too much coffee. So we'll get into that in a moment. And then we're gonna also talk about obviously, um, the acid reflux and, and discuss that as well. If you have been newly diagnosed with celiac disease, you may want to consider cutting out coffee for a little while just while your body heals or at least cut back on coffee. Okay. Now, if you listen to my episode where I talked about cross reactive foods with gluten the other week, coffee was one of those that was listed. So if you are finding that you are still having issues and you're not exactly sure what it's from, just know that it could be coffee, your, your body may still think that you are consuming gluten and coffee is actually, unfortunately, one of those foods as such, even though it's not a food. So coffee falls under that category that it could be your body is reacting to coffee, thinking that it is gluten. So if you didn't listen to that episode, go back a couple of episodes and have a listen to that where I explained that a little bit more in depth. Um, and obviously that would be a, a thing that you would need to do a bit of a food

Speaker 2: 3:23

Challenge on maybe track your food while you are eating what you are drinking to pinpoint whether it actually is coffee. But yeah, there's a little bit more information on that episode. So the pros, the pros are that it increases physical performance. So I don't know about you, but I go to the gym early in the morning. And I know that the days that I have a coffee before I go, I find it much easier to do my workout than if I wait till I get back from going to the gym. So for me, I totally agree with that one. Um, many athletes drink coffee, so that's, that's a definite one. It can also help with enhancing mental focus. So anyone that's studied needed to, you know, stay up late and focus on what they're trying to, you know, study and learn about will totally get the enhancing the mental focus. It can also help with burning fat and supporting weight loss, which is a bonus. Anyone that needs to lose weight, it's it can help with that as well. It's got antioxidants in it and is also a source of vitamin B12 and magnesium. It can also lower inflammation, which I think would surprise a lot of people that coffee can actually lower inflammation. You would think it would do the opposite. It may also lower the risk of cancer. So in particular colon cancer, which I think is fantastic, it can reduce stress and believe it or not, it can act as an anti-depressant, which is amazing as well. And it can also reduce the risk of developing type two diabetes. So if you wanna learn more about these, you can jump on Google and you can find all this information and learn more about it. We don't need to go into each one individually to in depth right now. I just wanted to give you a quick overview of those pros. Now, when we talk about the cons, the cons are more so if you're drinking too much coffee, so let's talk about what's too much coffee. A moderate amount of coffee is approximately three to five cups a day or around 400 milligrams of caffeine. Now ground coffee has more caffeine than instant coffee. And I personally think this explains why people who drink instant coffee need to drink more throughout the day. Um, the only issue I, I really see with that is obviously drinking more means if you add sugar and milk to your coffee, you're obviously gonna be consuming way more sugar and coffee, or, uh, sorry, way more sugar and milk or creamer when you're having your coffee. So my husband, he works away in the mines and when he's home with me, he drinks two coffees a day, just like I do, and we drink ground coffee. We have a coffee machine that

Speaker 3: 6:20

Grinds the beans for us right there. And then, and then makes the coffee. And we have two coffees a day together. And then when he's at work, he says he drinks coffee all day long. And I put it down to the fact that when he's at work, he's drinking instant coffee because they don't have a coffee machine there. And to be drinking more of those cups of coffee is kind of the equivalent to drinking the ground coffee at home. So that's quite interesting if you've never kind of understood why sometimes you might have a, a ground coffee and you feel satisfied for longer than if you just had an instant coffee. So yeah, little bit of info there for you that you might not have known beforehand. Now, the cons, it can be very addictive. I could drink coffee all day long until the cows come home. I absolutely love it, but I stop myself at two. There can be a crash in the afternoon or late in the evening, if you are addicted and drink too much of it. So that is something that you need to watch out for. Some people do complain that it messes with their sleep. I know for myself, if I drink it too late in the day that it does keep me awake at night. So I do my best to have one coffee after breakfast. And then the next one sort of midday, or not too much later than midday, otherwise. Yeah, it affects my sleep. So that is something that's certainly worth keeping an eye on. For some people it can cause the jitters and restlessness, and this can come down to, if you are drinking it on an empty stomach, um, it could do with how many cups you've had. Things like that. I know for myself, if I have coffee, say, let's just say I had a coffee at 11:30 AM and I hadn't had lunch yet. My hands will start shaking<laugh> so I, I do my best to make sure I have it after I've got something in my stomach, because I know that it does affect me in that way. So if it does cause the jitters or some restlessness with you, it might be worth, you know, checking in with what you are eating, um, how much coffee you are drinking, that type of thing as well. For some people it can cause anxiety, one cup can cause some people anxiety, whereas others, it can be, you know, more than that way more than that. So again, it's about learning what works for your unique body. We are all different. And I can't say to you definitively that, you know, two cups a day is perfect for you because I have no idea what works for you. You are an individual and it's up to you to figure out which amount is good for you. No amount of coffee might be good for you. You might, you might do a little bit of a track on this and you might figure out that you're actually better off without coffee. I thought for a while there that I was better off without coffee, but I've learnt that my body is actually much better when I drink

Speaker 4: 9:19

Coffee. So I've, I've accepted that that's part of me and what I enjoy and what works for me. So yeah, again, work, work on that for yourself. And if you need support in that, then you can reach out to me. And I can, I can point you in the direction of some ways that you can figure that out as well. All right. The next one is heartburn. Some people find that drinking too much coffee can cause heartburn. Um, and another one is an increased heart rate. So drinking too much coffee can certainly increase some people's heart rate. So again, just keeping an eye on that and making sure that it doesn't affect you in that way. All right. So that's our pros and cons. I hope you learn something there. I think there'll be some surprises for some people. Um, but yeah, again, it, it, it's very individual what works for you won't work for the next person. So again, keeping an eye on that. All right. So let's talk about acid reflux. So it doesn't just have to be coffee. It can be any caffeinated drinks can cause acid reflux. So when we talk about coffee, instant coffee is more likely to cause acid reflux than, um, your ground coffee. So if you are struggling with acid reflux, then I would recommend that you switch from the instant coffee over to ground coffee and see if that makes a difference. Obviously, cutting back on the amount of coffee that you are drinking is a very simple one as well to see if that works for you. But if you are having one cup and you are getting that acid reflux, then again, it could be that you need to make sure you've got some food in your belly before you have a coffee. Um, and making sure that it has been some time now, since you were diagnosed with celiac disease and that your body's healing and that you don't, you know, some people have stomach ulcer and that can cause issues as well. So it just depends on which stage of your life you're at. And what's been happening with your body in the lead up to this as well. Now, another thing to look out for is a dark roasted be. So, uh, the longer that the bean has been roasted, the better, the quality and the lower the acidity, all right, so you can look for a dark roasted bean. Another one is drinking cold brew for a little while. So cold brew coffee is less acidic as well. So that could be something that could work for you, um, and making sure that you're purchasing higher quality coffee beans can make a difference as well. Um, and a little thing that you can do is add a pinch of salt to your coffee. Not too much, you don't wanna taste it in there, but sometimes that can be enough just to help with that. So that's something you could try as well. But

Speaker 5: 12:16

Other than that, I, I personally think again, it's it's trial and error. It's if you absolutely love coffee and you wanna be able to keep drinking it, it's it's trial and error, making sure that it works for you by doing any number of these steps. But if you don't truly love it, and it's not something that, you know, you're gonna miss, then just cut it out. It doesn't, it doesn't matter if it's something that you're not too concerned about, but if you're like me, I wouldn't, I wouldn't really wanna give up coffee if I didn't have to, I would try all these things first. If it meant I could still keep drinking my coffees each day. So yeah. I hope those ideas help you. I hope this gives you a little bit of insight and some little tidbits about coffee and the gluten-free diet and yeah. Go from there. And like I said, reach out to me if you want some little pointers that I can send in your direction to help you further, but yeah, otherwise I hope you enjoyed this episode and learned something I would love to hear from anyone that's got any feedback or any, anything you'd like to share with me about the episode. And as always, if you have any subjects or any ideas that you would like me to talk about on the show, please reach out to me. I would love to hear from you because it helps me know what to talk about, um, and know that you guys are there listening and supporting what I'm sharing on the show. So you can reach out to me either on Instagram at the healthy celiac, or you can send me an email info, Belinda willin.com. So I look forward to hearing from you and I will talk with you again next week, have a fantastic week, and I will talk to you soon. Take care.