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I gave up coffee and acquired a Pro Plus habit – now I have the energy of a 15-year-old | Zoe Williams

Lifestyle
May 12, 2026 · 4:35 PM
I gave up coffee and acquired a Pro Plus habit – now I have the energy of a 15-year-old | Zoe Williams

With my usual espressos off the menu, I was looking at a future of sluggishness and headaches. Then I embraced an alternative caffeine delivery system

For reasons purely related to vanity, I’ve had to give up coffee. It’s not for ever, unless it takes me for ever to get my teeth whitened, so I’m not minded to wean myself off caffeine entirely. But it’s not for a short enough time that I can simply stop whining and weather the low-level headache, the mental sluggishness and the frankly unbearable taste of water.

No problem, I thought: I will survive on energy drinks. What’s embarrassing about that? What could possibly be shameful about going into a Tesco, picking up a black and neon green can of Monster Energy, its name in a satanic font, at 8.05am? What could conceivably make anyone give me the fish eye, that I’m setting off the age-verification flashing light, and a dude is having to come over and attest that I am indeed over 16? All of that social opprobrium was before I’d even opened an energy drink and had to taste it.

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