Author Archives: Anna Louise Simpson, CEO
3 reasons that Caffeine affects Women more than Men……..
Introduction
I am a woman. And I drink caffeine. I am also the Mama of Mama Tea, therefore I drink a LOT of Mama Tea herbal tea. Accordingly, my caffeine intake has gone down substantially, however I now experience more noticeable effects of drinking my regular Starbucks/Costa/Caffe Nero coffee. I get flushed, hot, clammy, and my heart races. I suffer headaches and feel a bit jittery. As a result, I only drink one cup of coffee a day. However, I thought it would be interesting to look at a few of the facts about caffeine and women.
Caffeine affects women more than men.
Wow – really?? I hear you ask. Well, you might be surprised to find out that “roughly, 75% of the human research into caffeine has been conducted on men” - {p225 – “Caffeine Blues” by Stephen Cherniske}.
Research shows that caffeine affects women much more than men. Why?
Reason 1 – Slower detoxification
Women detoxify caffeine much slower than men per se. However due to the fluctuations of hormones during a woman’s cycle, the “HALF-LIFE” of coffee (i.e. the time it takes the body to eliminate one half-dose of a dose of coffee) can change, varying from 5.5 hours to 7 hours depending on the stage of the cycle {M.J.Arnauld. “Metabolism of Caffeine and Other Components of Coffee” in “Caffeine, Coffee & Health”}.
All of this means that by the time you are hitting your second or third cup, your body still has not recovered from the first cup. if you want to detox, try cutting down your coffees as the first step!
Reason 2 – Caffeine zaps your iron levels
Caffeine reduces your iron levels. The reason why this is so important for women is that women often suffer from iron malnourishment. Up to 30% of women will suffer anemia until they stop menstruating, just because it is so difficult to get iron from food. {L. Hallberg, “Iron” in “Present Knowledge in Nutrition”, 5th ed.}.
“Depending on the composition of a meal, a caffeinated beverage can reduce iron availability by a whopping 50 percent” {p235 “Caffeine Blues by Stephen Cherniske}.
That’s a lot!
Reason 3 – Caffeine makes you stressed
Stress generally affects women much more than men – women’s stress hormones increase more rapidly than men’s when faced with conflict. {J. Ferri, “Under Pressure”}
What does caffeine have to do with this? Well, caffeine increases the “Stress Response”. Caffeine has numerous effects on the body. One of these is is that it disrupts the function of the “ADENOSINE RECEPTORS”.
What on earth does this mean? Well, Stephen Cherniske sums it up better than I could:
“Have you ever inserted the wrong key in a door and found that the key fits just fine but it wouldn’t unlock the door? That’s what caffeine does in a adenosine receptor. It fits, but does not perform the adenosine function……when caffeine plugs an adenosine receptor, an important biochemical message that was supposed to be sent to the cell is not delivered…….When caffeine inactivates this control mechanism, your neurone circuits keep firing, and you feel alert. The problem is, your circuits keep firing, and firing, and firing……”
This uncontrolled neuron firing creates an EMERGENCY RESPONSE in the brain – it activates the whole flight-or-fight flight stress reaction, flooding the brain with the stress hormones. And it keeps on doing it, over and over!
Combine this with the fact that women suffer stress more acutely and you can see that this fact alone is a reason for women to wean themselves off more than your one cappuccino a day!
{El Mercado de San Miguel, Madrid}
A Saturday afternoon, lost in Mercardo de San Miguel, tasting rioja and the kind of tapas that makes your belt tighten
Olives, green, black, pitted, stuffed and salty. Delicate pastries. Coffee that I want to caress.
Ancient El Mercado de San Miguel, your exterior is as beautiful as your sumptuous foodie interior.
The New Mercado de San Miguel, you are simply stunning. Go to both. Spoil yourself.
5 reasons to go Mama Tea Bouteaque
Boutique Hotels
The Mama LOVES her boutique hotels…..the stylish wallpaper, the designer touches, the plump pillows, the shiny bathrooms…..she is on a mission to find the best and the beautiful of the boutique hotels around the world.
Once she is settled in her boutique bedroom, after her boutique bath, in her boutique bathrobe, she always want to do the quintessentially British thing and have a cup of tea. Now, being the Mama, the only thing that is missing is that relaxing cup of fragrant Mama Tea…..rose-hips melded with raspberry leaf and rose petals……marshmallow leaves sipped in chamomile flowers and spearmint leaves…..fragrant rooibos dancing with elderflowers and dandelion leaves……
So, this is an appeal to the boutique hotels of the world….this Mama needs her Mama Tea on her travels.
Mama Tea Bouteaque
5 reasons to find
Mama Tea in every
Boutique Hotel!
Reason No. 1 – Looks
Stunning designer tea envelopes encasing
dainty teabags reveal the stunning collection of
Reason No. 2 – Taste
Taste is everything.
The Mama only sources the very best of herbs to
provide the tastiest cup of herbal tea this side of China.
Reason No. 3 – Social
Mama Tea is a social butterfly…….flitting from
tweet to post to instagram with a pretty flick of an app.
Mama is always chit-chatting
and loves her iPhone/iPad/Mac
as much as her teapot.
Reason No. 4 – Natural
Being natural is our thing!
We don’t like nasty additives.
We like to drink only herbs
and think that everyone else would prefer that too.
Reason No. 5 – Wonderful
Mama Tea is just wonderful.
Ask any of our loyal customers.
We think that all boutique customers
deserve a bit of wonderful too.
How to be healthy and lose the fat? Eat and drink liquorice!
Our Herb of the Day is the “grandfather of herbs” – LIQUORICE
Here at Mama Tea, we LOVE liquorice. We use it in our New Mama fennel tea to give the tea a lovely sweet taste and we are all fans of the sweet. We have always known that it is one of the uber-herbs – packed full of goodies! However, it was whilst researching this amazing herb, that we came across this fascinating research study carried out in Padua, Italy in 2003:
How to be healthy
”Effect of Licorice on the Reduction of Body Fat Mass in Healthy Subjects (Armanini et al. 2003)
In this study, seven men and eight women took 3.5 grams of a commercial liquorice product per day for two months.Test subjects has a 10 per cent reduction in body fat mass with NO change in calorific intake.
Isn’t that incredible!? I can lose body fat just by eating some liquorice or drinking my liquorice tea???
No, Mama, not the AllSorts!!
What is Body Fat Mass?
This is basically the percentage of your body that is made up of fat. Good old Wikipedia provides the nitty gritty http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Body_fat_percentage
This is an interesting blog on how to calculate body fat. http://www.bodyhack.com/blog/5-ways-to-measure-body-fat-composition-1433
Ok, so I just want to lose the fat. I am not so concerned about measuring it but I am keen to feel leaner and fitter and ultimately healthy! The idea of eating a tiny amount of liquorice every day to reduce fat really appeals to me!
“Bikini Tea”
At food fairs and tea tastings, we sell a LOT of New Mama herbal tea, mainly based on the wonderful taste of the tea. I always joke that it is my “bikini tea” that I drink whenever I am getting ready for hols/losing weight/trying to fit into THAT dress. The reason for this is that contains FENNEL the appetite suppressing herb. However, as it also contains liquorice, it is no joke that New Mama might be this Mama’s bikini tea!
Cuppa anyone?
The Mama
Mama Tea – not all herbal teas are equal in pregnancy – tea and pregnancy
Here at Mama Tea, one of our main values is respect. Respect for our staff and respect for our customers. That is why we have put so much effort into doing the research into our herbal teas and their use in pregnancy. Not all herbs can be used in pregnancy. We now see that other herbal tea companies are trying to advertise to our lovely customers but no one else has done the research nor has the specific warnings on the teaboxes.
PEPPERMINT tea and pregnancy
Therefore, no other tea company will tell you that PEPPERMINT is actually contraindicated in pregnancy, as it is a uterine stimulant and as such could cause contractions. It is actually worrying that there are tea companies out there advertising peppermint teas to pregnant women. Peppermint should also not be given to babies as it can irritate their stomach linings – therefore not a good one for breastfeeding mums. That is why we use SPEARMINT in our mint pregnancy tea.
LIQUORICE tea and pregnancy
LIQUORICE is a very well researched herb. It is called the GRANDFATHER of herbs and is fine for our breastfeeding tea, however is not ideal during pregnancy as it can cause fluid retention and can slightly increase blood pressure. Again, some general tea companies are advertising this tea to pregnant women without doing their research.
HIBISCUS tea and pregnancy
However, the really worrying trend is for the other tea companies who insist on marketing fruit teas containing HIBISCUS to pregnant women. Hibiscus is a uterine stimulant therefore should NOT be used before week 38 of pregnancy. Our Ready Mama tea contains this herb but has this warning on it. No other tea companies bother informing their pregnant customers about this.
If you are pregnant, why take the risk. Drink our well researched teas and use the brand you can trust. Mama Tea.
Mommy Thumb or Mother’s Wrist
My forearm really hurts and today the wonderful team at The Edinburgh Physio Centre diagnosed me with having De Quervain Syndrome otherwiseknown as Mommy Thumb or Mother’s Wrist (appropriate name!)
The treatment? Not using my right thumb for 4-6 weeks!!!! How will I cope??? I need some technology for speaking into my Mac! If anyone has any ideas, DM or email me!!!!!
Mama Tea Review
When my good friend was suffering with morning sickness I tried everything I could think of to help her, ginger biscuits, smelling salts,
mints to suck.
When they didn't work I turned to the Internet for ideas and stumbled upon a wonderful website, Mama Tea.
All the teas are herbal(Caffeine free) with mum's in mind, but of course can be drunk by any one that enjoys herbal teas.
Thanks for the lovely review!
I Don’t Know How I Do It!!!
As a mumpreneur, I was interested in the new movie with Sarah Jessica Parker - “I Don’t Know How She Does It”, where SJP plays a stressed out career mum. This movie is based on the novel of the same name by Allison Pearson, so being an avid reader (when I am not being a stressed out mumpreneur!), I thought I would read the book first.
The book describes the chaos the underlies the London based character’s life pretty well, however, I found the pathos and guilt regarding her juggling motherhood with a career too much. It was a bit depressing to be honest! Saying that, it was hilarious, acidic, manic and was a colour photocopy of the crazy world of a career/mumpreneur in so many ways. The film on the other hand was the Boston based low-carb, fat-free, fun-free version……..they managed to rip out all of the sarcastic leg-slapping hilarity and replaced it with a cardboard cut-out. They avoided the pathos like the plague – here is slightly dippy, slightly crazy mom. Er, “book mum’ would have challenged ‘film mom’ to a drinking game, had a stand-up fight and then borrowed her Louboutins, all whilst trying to keep her two children happy!
I thought I would do the Edinburgh based Mama version:
6am – cat scratches me awake wanting fed, watered and let out. This is the first member of the household that will want all of their essential needs met before 7.22am (if it’s a good day!)
anytime before 8.20am – must find enough time to at least shower, brush teeth, negotiate first tantrum, dress, pack all business items for the day, get every spare item for school (i.e. interesting homework assignments), get children in state ready for school, deal with next tantrum, dry hair, “style” hair,
put on make-up, have my breakfast. If any of the said items take up too much time (i.e. really BIG tantrum), then you can start knocking off the items of my list in the descending order. So, there will be days when I will leave the house with a “clean” face, wet hair (lovely curly look today!) and no breakfast.
School Run – I could be a taxi driver, calculating the speediest way to school whilst carefully working out the hold-ups of the numerous Edinburgh roadworks. Arrive “on time” and then hit the office. Exhausted!
A little insight into How I Don’t Know How I Do It!
The Mama of Mama Tea
Herb of the Day – Dandelion Leaf – Fluid Retention be gone, Old Piddlybeds!
Dandelion Leaf (Botanical Name: Taraxacum officinale) has many many picturesque names….priest’s crown, Irish daisy, monk’s head, blowball and lion’s tooth.
Dandelion was first mentioned in Western medicine in 1485 in the “Ortus Sanitatis”, although an oriental version of the herb had been used in China since the 7th century. This herb is extremely good at increasing urination, hence the French name, “pissenlit” and Old English, “piddlybeds”.
Dandelion leaf is now very common in European medicine. Although it is a diuretic, as its leaves contain so much potassium, it helps to compensate for potassium lost with increased urination. Dandelion leaf is also very good at easing bloating, which is reason enough to enjoy it!
Benefits:
- Extremely rich in potassium
- Tonic action on the liver
- Gentle laxative
- Good for fluid retention
- Good for combating pre-eclampsia
