‘Will coffee kill my sleep?’ This is probably one of the most common questions that sleep clinicians get.

In reality, everyone has a different sensitivity to caffeine. Someone might have caffeine late at night and not feel any effects… While somebody else might swear they cannot have it any time of day because it’s definitely going to affect their sleep and how they feel.

Can you fix your sleep by cutting coffee?

By cutting coffee or caffeinated products, you’re not necessarily going to fix a chronic sleep problem. Even if it was caused by drinking too much coffee in the first place.

That’s because it’s probably habitual by now, meaning it’s ingrained.

So, even if you take away the original trigger, we’re still left with that habitual pattern. And it needs to be eliminated by other types of behaviour.

When it comes to coffee, I think you should enjoy it in moderation like most things in our diets.

Have it in the morning if that’s how you would like to start the day. Then, maybe, start thinking about tapering it off during the afternoon so that it doesn’t affect your sleep.

If there’s not really anything going on with your sleep but you just want to see if you can boost the quality, you can try cutting down caffeine and seeing if it makes a difference… But if it doesn’t, you know that it’s probably not as sensitive to you as it is to others.