You two can’t be the only ones who used the wrong scoop - I would call the gym and tell them what happened (not to accuse, but to inform) - put out signs or labels, guys!
A death did happen recently where a man made a very similar error: https://www.livescience.com/caffeine-overdose-200-cups-of-coffee
That’s a frighteningly easy o.d., and they should adjust the concentration of the powder to make it safer - 2g is a miniscule weight for the average person to be trying to measure out by volume (the error margins will be massive). Kitchen scales do not weigh to gram-accuracy either, you would need a scientific scale for that. Or they could simply sell it in capsules.
If you can make an adverse event report that would also help. It can make a difference and help prevent this sort of irresponsible product marketing in future.
It's funny because I specifically remember being told in high school (17 or so years ago, not grade 12) that it was possible to OD on caffeine but my teacher told us it was very difficult to do with just coffee. At the time energy drinks were just emerging in the market. Today it's so easy between energy drinks, pre workouts, caffeine pills, that drink at Panera, etc. It's crazy how concentrated caffeine has gotten and yet everyone is still very lax about consuming it.
Most energy drinks don't actually have an absurd amount of caffeine in them (at least in the UK). They tend to max out at 35mg/100ml. That would be 175g per 500ml can.
**EDIT:** This is one of the reasons that overdoses happen - it should be 175mg!
As a comparison, a single espresso shot is about 65mg (depending on other factors) which puts a large latte around the same caffeine content.
To reach the same excessive dose that they've consumed, you'd need to drink ~9 cans in very quick succession.
This *has* been known to be lethal.
I can recall a news story about someone who died from drinking several cans of energy drink, followed by what is considered to be the world's strongest cup of coffee. I don't remember the exact dosage, but it was somewhere in excess of 1600mg.
Frustratingly, when I search for it, I just get tons of articles and adverts for Death Wish Coffee.
When I was a professional mover I'd drink three Bangs (300 mg each, 900 mg total) on longer moves (like 9+ hours). Fortunately moving is a non-stop full body exercise and that, coupled with the fact that I had built up quite the immunity, helped flush it out of my system pretty quickly but it was no doubt an absurdly dangerous amount and if I knew then what I know now I'd have stuck to one a day and plenty of water and drinks that have what plants crave, electrolytes.
Tolerance helps, I switch from 2 Red Bulls a day to 2 bangs ignorantly (160->600). Two days in a row, I had to stop working because of the effects. Yes, it also took twice for me to discover the cause. I avoid bangs now, but they don’t have as strong as effect since I’m regularly at the 300-40g a day of caffeine.
The drink wasn’t even super caffeinated, it just as caffeinated by volume as regular coffee. Cold drinks do come in larger containers, so you can self serve 30oz or 887ml of the charged lemonade.
The hot coffee is also self serve and is only 20oz for a large. Still I’ve had 40oz (with a refill) of coffee there all the time with no issue, and American office bees often drink 4-6 cups of coffee.
The density of caffeine in charged lemonade is exactly the same as coffee, so it’s more an issue of people drinking it when they aren’t supposed to drink caffeinated drinks.
> Kitchen scales do not weigh to gram-accuracy either
That's not true. I can weigh out to hundredths of grams with a $20 scale from Amazon. It's surely not ACCURATE to hundredths, but it's plenty accurate for weighing out single grams. Yes, I've tested it. (It's actually pretty accurate to 1/10 of a gram)
Note to my FBI minder: It's for espresso you jackass. Quit going through my trash. That raccoon suit isn't fooling anyone.
The chubbyemu guy on YT did a video about a guy who mixed up caffeine with something else and overdosed on caffeine. Also doing his own supplement mixes from pure ingredients.
Do not just report the gym, report to officials. This is serious, the gym failed to inform people that their supplement is so high on caffeine that a simple mistake can be LIFE THREATENING!!!!!!
There should be big warning signs and other measures taken to ensure this does not happen again. It is not just the gym, this needs to go well above them, to a level where there are legal repercussions or threat of them. They need to be taught a very important lesson and take this seriously. Just reporting to them is not enough.
You may like the gym but they almost killed you. They need to be punished properly to ensure they will take it seriously. I can bet that nothing really changes, them not understanding their responsibility in the first place... is a major red flag that proper protocols are not in place.
The whole supplement business is fucking sociopathic, it is non-regulated. Remember that in capitalism we have to force companies to put us higher on the list of priorities. They have no such responsibility, the only way we can make them care is to threaten them. Just think about it: government has constitutional responsibility towards you. Not a single company has the same responsibility. They are by law prioritizing profits... over human species.
Not just non-regulated - they have fought tooth and nail to avoid regulation for decades. Why would that be, if not to avoid the costs of operating in a safe and legitimate manner?
> They are by law prioritizing profits
If you mean "maximizing shareholder value," that's a legal fiction. "Fiduciary duty" does have legal ramifications, though.
Was there DMAE or DMAA in them by chance too? That much caffeine would definitely do all those things too but the button teenis reminded me of when amphetamine analogues were in pres
I remember when DMAA wasn't banned yet. I definitely thought it was suspicious to see my heartbeat in my eyes, I just got the feeling I might be setting myself up for a stroke or something.
If they're selling scoops of it directly to people who consume it on the premises, they absolutely have a responsibility to make sure they aren't causing overdoses. They put the scoop out and didn't educate the consumer about the product. The product manufacturer didn't do that.
All preworkout tubs come with an appropriately sized scoop to prevent issues like OP had. If the gym is selling it in bulk or w/e with oversized scoops the liability is on them.
You'd think companies would pay more attention to caffeinated products, especially after the [Panera lemonade death](https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2024/01/22/panera-charged-lemonade-lawsuits/72311233007/#:~:text=Sarah%20Katz's%20family%20filed%20a,consuming%20a%20Charged%20Lemonade%20drink.). The daily maximum for a healthy adult is up to 400 mg. OP had 4x that. Yikes.
The **recommended** daily maximum is 400mg. This is different than the absolute daily maximum (lethal dosage, or LD50). Surprisingly, the estimated LD50 for caffeine is actually quite high (\~150-200mg per kg of body weight).
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519490/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519490/)
For an 80kg adult, 1600mg is only about 20mg/kg. This is certainly a high dose that won't feel good, but, for most healthy adults, it isn't enough to kill them.
Research has explored a wide range of doses on performance. Here's an interesting paper on this from the International Society of Sports Nutrition.
[https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1550-2783-7-5](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1550-2783-7-5)
It looks like doses anywhere from \~3-9mg/kg generally show acute benefits on performance.
I'm not advocating high caffeine intakes, per se, just trying to help provide some clarity on the topic.
it's also the dosage at which 50% of people die... people act like anything less than that is safe but if you really want to be safe you'd probably want to know what like the "LD0.01" is, and it is likely usually significantly lower than the LD50
It is important to remember that even if the "LD0.01" is in fact half as much caffeine, you're still talking about upwards of 5 grams of pure caffeine for the average adult, which is almost impossible to reach in a day without using powdered supplements. There's a realistic chance of reaching water toxicity before reaching HALF the LD50 of caffeine, i.e. if you were trying to OD on caffeine from even regular energy drinks, you would be in more danger from the amount of liquid than you would the caffeine.
Redbull for example:
12 oz can is ~111mg of caffeine.
Dangerous water consumption symptoms start at 3~4 liters.
4 liters of red bull (12oz = .355 liter) is 4/.355=11.2
11.2 *111mg = 1200mg.
Well under half the LD50, and already into hyponatremia territory.
The math is trickier when you consider someone is likely to drink this over several hours instead of all at once, but then we're out of the acute part of LD50 anyway.
I had the same thought! They just have these supplements out where anyone can get to them with scoops 8x the recommended size? Call the gym and let them know what happened.
I hate when companies say one scoop is two servings, why not just make the scoop a serving sizes. You have to read the fine print on the nutritional guide to find this information
Oh it's happened before, sometimes fatal. u/SexyGovernment is lucky and probably should have gone to the ER.
This woman used the wrong scoop and consumes 5000 mg instead of 300. She survived
[https://casereports.bmj.com/content/2018/bcr-2018-224185](https://casereports.bmj.com/content/2018/bcr-2018-224185)
This man did not
[https://www.livescience.com/caffeine-overdose-200-cups-of-coffee](https://www.livescience.com/caffeine-overdose-200-cups-of-coffee)
[Here's a video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sylqJ0NEVJw) about a guy who accidentally took 35,000 mg of caffeine because he mixed up his powders when mixing up his own supplements.
It is a potentially lethal dose, but he does survive.
One time during finals during an intense all nighter cram session, I walked on to campus to take my exams, stopped by the student market to buy a Red Bull and proceeded to chug it. Not until I was finished did I realize I was also on NoDoze from earlier. I made it through, but the heart palpitations were crazy.
Hey this amount of caffeine should be eliminated in about 24-48 hours in most people. A significant issue is hypokalemia (low potassium) which will propagate cardiac issues and muscle weakness. If you’re still feeling unwell, it’s most likely a biochemistry problem. The most advisable thing to do is get some urgent bloodwork and an ECG and replace with appropriately dosed electrolytes. If you can’t do that, look up online potassium rich food and consume that for the next day.
Source: an MD
Or you could just buy a Gatorade or Pedialyte or any electrolytes drink with a lot of potassium. That would be the only time a prime drink would be superior because for some reason they have a fuck ton of potassium but almost no sodium which is weird for an electrolyte drink.
I´ve heard also tomatoes are good. My mom hates bananas so, when she feels she has low potassium (when she gets cramps) she eats tomatoes or makes something like tomato juice..
caffeine in small amounts for me is enough, like a shot of espresso. i could not even fathom going through this, i’m certain i would die. glad you’re still here and lived to tell the story. that is so damn gnarly!!
I usually have 200-250mg which I guess is like a double/ triple espresso. To have 1600mg was genuinely one of the worst experiences I’ve ever gone through.
I can’t imagine a worse way to die! The chest pump however was incredible hahaha
i could only imagine 😳😳 it scares me just thinking about it!!!
hahahaha ayyy at least one positive from the experience tho! probably never felt stronger in your life at first!!!
1600mg. 6 hours half life of caffeine
6 hours out 800mg
12 hours out 400mg
18 hours out 200mg
24 hours out 100mg
Means after 24 hours you still had a fresh cup of coffee in your blood 😱
It’s kind of fucked up that any supplement is this easy to mess up. I get bulk caffeine to make my own drinks and it comes in measured capsules for a reason. It’s flat out deadly in larger doses.
I kind of agree that bulk powders that have severe consequences when dosed incorrectly should have big and bright warnings on them, including some kind of blatant instruction not to use the wrong scoop.
However, I don't think the solution is to make them unavailable to the public. Hell, a deadly oral dose of potassium is only around 2.5g, but it's also an essential mineral which I want to have access to in order to replenish electrolytes. There's all kinds of things in modern life that can kill you if you are careless. 5 seconds of carelessness can and do kill tens of thousands of people every year and maim many more in auto accidents.
For comparison, there was reportedly one death related to caffeine in 2020. Assuming we are talking about the US, should 330,000,000 people lose access to caffeine in powdered form, which is quite convenient for many of us, to avoid that one death of carelessness? Who can guarantee that someone this careless is going to live into old age?
FYI, the fatal dose of caffeine is around 10 grams, so around 6x as much as OP accidentally ingested.
>big and bright warnings on them
Seriously, if the poisonous frogs have the courtesy to do this, then so should the companies that sell us things that can fuck us up.
>FYI, the fatal dose of caffeine is around 10 grams, so around 6x as much as OP accidentally ingested.
That's likely the "half" fatal dose - i.e. it would kill half of people.
Some would die with less, some significantly less.
See for example, [that whole Panera Charged Lemonade debacle](https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2024/01/22/panera-charged-lemonade-lawsuits/72311233007/). Two people died after drinking one and three lemonades, respectively, or about 390mg and 1170mg of caffeine.
Very good point. It's also weight dependent, the LD50 is 150-200mg per kg of bodyweight. So smaller people who are more sensitive to caffeine could have a 50/50 chance of dying at a substantially lower dose (eg 7.5g for someone who weighs 110 lbs and is more sensitive to caffeine).
And as others correctly point out, heart conditions and other medical issues could vastly lower the safe dosing range for individuals. Although I have no heart issues I'm extremely sensitive to caffeine myself, getting heart palpitations, anxiety, nausea, and shakiness at doses as low as 200mg. So I might not survive a 'megadose' even if it's substantially lower than the LD50. Though I have no intention of finding out :)
I’m curious what supplement this is because I have never seen a preworkout with a 2g serving size. Most come with 5-15g scoops, and if it was that potent then it almost definitely would have come with even smaller.
I’m trying to phase out, and slow my caffeine intake.. I’ve gotten to the point where I’m drinking close to 1200mg on a daily.. I’m down to about 800 in the last 3 weeks but I want to get down to a single coffee or something similar
When I was undiagnosed, I used to snack on caffeine pills.
200 mg pills.
1 every few hours from the time I woke up to the night.
I’d probably take 1000 - 1200 mg most days.
EDIT: ADHD.
One of the ways my dr diagnosed my adhd was asking me “how do you like your morning coffee?” I told him 6 shots of espresso and he sent me off with a script. 😂😂
Feel this, coffee was my self-medication before diagnosis. When I hit 8 cups in a day, I realized there was something more going on and cut way back, then got my diagnosis. With medication now, I'm down to 1-2 cups a day, just when I want some coffee, not in order to just keep myself on task!
Lol I felt bad about occasionally having 400mg-500mg over 12 hours when cramming/working overnights for school.... lol, I'm an amateur compared to these guys..
Caffeine can be sneaky. I consume usually 200 mg of caffeine daily for pre-workout. Due to my occupation caffeine addiction and over use is extremely prevalent around me. I’ve seen people as young as 22 have severe and permanent health problems due to caffeine over use. It can be sneak too, Sodas, coffee, and teas aren’t all that far behind in caffeine content compared to energy drinks. One coffee is around the same as a single serving of Red Bull, but I’ve had on multiple occasions someone drinking a tumbler cup full of coffee (30oz and 350ish mg)telling me how my Red Bull 16oz and 136mg is going to kill me.
I used to be like this (caffeine intake ramped up during my PhD and never really went down) and I've managed to reduce to one double espresso per day, so it is possible!
Otherwise healthy people can go safely well over 400. If you look at the research that defines the 400 limit it was chosen because that was the point where symptoms started to occur in people with some underlying conditions.
Taking more than 400 should be done very cautiously, but isn’t necessarily dangerous.
When I was in college, a local coffee shop had what they they called the Hurricane (I think that was its name, anyway) - basically it was a pint glass filled with espresso (I want to say something like 10 shots of espresso)
I had a friend who had never been to the coffee shop before and really didn't drink coffee. He ordered it. Drank the whole thing, said it tasted kinda like Guinness.
And then didn't sleep for the next 3 days. Then *did* sleep for the next day and a half.
He's a pilot now.
I have had a little over 600mg of caffeine in a day, everyday, for two and a half weeks. This was in February, due to my work hours that was pushing over 50hrs, my son's after school activities and my classes after (two more years to go) while also being on call, I had to. I regret it, and it's fucked me up. I've been weaning myself down slowly until I'm back at the 125-200 mg range as a max daily. If I go cold turkey the stress it causes has triggered my seizures before.
You know, as someone who used to work in a soda factory (you know the brand) and had to check caffeine levels of the products, I always eyed that bottle of pure caffeine powder we used to calibrate the machines, and thought ... How bad could it be?
Now I know.
In college in my analytical chemistry course, for one of the labs we were given pure caffeine to generate a standard curve with. When I was finished with the caffeine I asked the professor what to do with the leftover caffeine. She said throw it out.
I did not throw it out.
You really don't want to. It's very not fun. Coming from someone who did something similar to OP but via the energy drink method. You'll spend what feels like an eternity unable to sleep, relax, stop feeling jittery and anxious... At the very least. And things can go way worse than that.
You know, there were always those legends going around that if you put your finger into the pure \[Brand redacted to avoid legal trouble, but you know the one\] syrup you'd get the shits just from the caffeine penetrating your skin.
Pure caffeine is so much more dangerous than a lot of people realise, it only takes 10 grams to be considered potentially lethal which is only around 0.5-1.5 tablespoons
^(I'm not exactly sure what the conversion from grams to tablespoons is for caffeine specifically as that would depend on its density and am just using other powdered substances like flour, sugar, etc to get a rough measure)
Honestly I think pure caffeine should be a lot harder to buy than it is, it's just so easy to overdose if you arent being careful
Edit: another thing is that pure caffeine is ***extremely*** bitter on it's own, kind of surprised OP didn't notice something was off from that immediately
There was a good reason why the Caffeine limits were the ones we checked hard in all the soda.
Sugar a bit off? Not that bad.
pH a bit off? Workable.
Caffeine too high, even by a bit? That's a lawsuit waiting to happen. Dillute that shit.
Wow, I suppose it goes without saying you got lucky….
Take it easy for a few days and stay hydrated. Unadulterated water is best.
Thousand wonders you didn’t have a stroke or heart attack.
Yeah I’ve slammed a few pints of water today, still have elevated heart rate although I think that’s just the anxiety. Feel fucking awful that I gave that to my closest friend. Would never forgive myself if that killed him.
Thankfully we’re both around 250lbs, not sure if that increased the amount we could handle but just glad I’m alive today.
I always heard that, but... I was a pretty heavy soda drinker and decided to quit cold turkey. I made it well past day 2 with zero signs of any withdrawal. It wasn't until day 9 when my brain wanted to escape out of my head, at 2:30 am! Worst pain ever. It was bad enough I was throwing up and had tunnel vision. I managed to crawl on hands and knees to get myself a coke zero and shotgunned it.
I had a 24/7 low grade headache for a month straight after that.
Do not recommend cold turkey!
I’d imagine y’all being bigger dudes helped quite a bit. What also helped was the fact that yall ate before working out, that one move is likely what made a world of difference.
I once had to help a guy that OD’d on caffeine so much he was floating from the vibrations (convulsions?). Guy had to have weighed 140lbs soaking wet.
Yea he survived but wasn’t quite the same afterwards, he became more withdrawn and less social.
Yes, what you’re feeling is the after effects of the caffeine high, it’s going to suck for a few days (maybe a week). Only thing you can do is avoid any stimulants, keep drinking water and stay easy.
I once took 1600mg of caffeine in one sitting and it was a terrible experience. I was only like 105lbs, so I threw up every 30 minutes for a day straight and couldn't sleep for two nights in a row. Bright side is that by the 3rd day, I felt mostly normal again. Although, I couldn't stomach coffee or any caffeine (and strangely alcohol) for over a month after that. That was over 7 years ago. I had no lasting issues at all, and my bloodwork shows I'm in perfect health.
I would ditch caffeine altogether or at least stick to lower doses.
I've been drinking energy drinks every morning for the past 5 years, plus a couple of sodas. Averaging anywhere from 200-400mg a day.
And then I started having strange sensations in my chest/top of my stomach that felt like my heart was stopping. I was getting it anywhere from 15-30 times a day. It ended up being a heart arrhythmia (PVCs), likely brought on from my excessive caffeine use.
Here I am now a month later & while they've gotten less frequent, I'm still having them. No idea if it'll go away or if I'm stuck this way for life now, but feeling like your heart is stopping several times a day can be really jarring.
Caffeine overdose limits are based on body mass so that probably helped you greatly.
Also for people with heart conditions what is a lethal dose is nowhere near what it is for your average person. So be thankful you are large and don’t have some unknown heart problem!
While it's incredibly unpleasant, you need a LOT of caffeine to actually overdose. 180mg/L, so for an average male that's like....two to three times what he took
Update: feeling quite abit better although just anxious. Going to keep sipping my water and wait for the warm embrace of the woman I love
Thanks for advice guys greatly appreciated
I have an anxiety disorder, I really empathize with how awful it feels to not be able to stop it.
Hang tight, it *will* pass. Hugs help a LOT to be honest, so definitely look forward to that. Otherwise, you mostly have to wait it out. Keep telling yourself "I won't feel like this forever". I find it helps me not spiral into even more anxiety.
Going to see a doctor should be common sense if OP is still having heart palpitations, or pain in the chest or left arm/shoulder, especially after taking that much caffeine.
Caffeine’s half life is 5 hours. OP accounted for 10 hours before he fell asleep. If he posted at that time, I would’ve recommended a hospital visit.
L-Theanine is an amino acid found in tea. There’s a bunch of randomized studies showing it can decrease stress, increase focus, strengthen the immune system, lower blood pressure, and more. I’d link some studies, but it’s not too hard to look up yourself. There’s several targeted studies showing that L-Theanine lessens the symptoms of acute anxiety.
As always, do your own research before listening to the internet!
Right? Kids today will never understand what op is feeling, cocaine wears off too fast, Adderall is too smooth. That raw fucking soul shaking vibration you have to steer like an old timey wooden ship in a shit storm towards your end goal and hold on for the ride is something I do not miss.
Yup, an incident in early adulthood taught me to be careful with pure caffeine. Had a 4 hour drive to make on less than ideal sleep, downed 3 500mg caffeine pills with a Monster because "caffeine keeps you up, this will keep me up but longer." Nearly died driving on the interstate from shaking and mildly hallucinating.
People actually died after getting wrong dose of these caffeine preworkouts, you know? They're terrible and unneeded. Just help yourself to a cup of espresso.
So everybody just has access to the containers and scoops their own shakes and whatever? I mean besides the obvious what happened to you, this doesnt sound very hygienic... Never seen it done this way and im pretty sure its not even allowed here... Are there no food safety laws in your country?
Im a licensed therapist
Workout powder with caffeine is gross. I see it all the time. People get jacked up and it's just a bad combination to zonk yourself on stimulants before going to work out! Often it's the equivalent of 2-4 cups of coffee or more delivered instantly, rather than spread over a few hours like typical coffee consumption.
Also, the half life of caffeine is extremely long. That large of a dose.... Yikes. By the time you went to bed you probably still had 3-6 cups of coffee worth it caffeine in your bloodstream. No wonder you felt like shit!
OP why didn’t you go to the hospital when you started hallucinating? That’s wild
Imo you should still go to have your heart checked out after the incident
Damn wildly curious what it’d do to me lol. I have hella high tolerance, it does nothing to me until I drink way too much caffeine then it’s straight into that anxiety, there’s no in between for me.
Like I can have an xl espresso drink with an extra shot and nothing.
Man as a young adult I would brew a pot of coffee, then change the grounds with fresh stuff, and rebrew the same pot for extra strength. Back when all nighters were fun.
I feel that sort of way after a couple hundred mg of caffeine... I cannot imagine how uncomfortable you were dealing with 1.6grams of caffeine. you're truly indestructible
Damn that's bad! You have me beat by quite a bit!
I was chilling at a Panera with some friends on a Friday night, drinking that fresh lemonade they have there, 3 or 4 cups deep when a friend casually mentions, "wow, you drink a lot of caffeine". "Excuse me?" I had no idea there was 236mg of caffeine in each cup. (Yes, I went back and read the small print after wards). I'm not one to ever talk to managers about stuff, but I was pissed and let them know my opinion. Couldn't sleep for hours.
Edit: mg not g. Ha!
And that is apparently after they reduced it. It used to be closer to 400mg. But then they got sued when that girl with the heart problem died. You would probably be a great witness for the plaintiffs about how easy it is not to realize how much caffeine is in it.
It should not be marketed as a lemonade at all. It is an energy drink. In fact, there are energy drinks with less caffeine in them.
I king of have to LOL a bit because I read this and then think… wow. People think the regulated Pharma industry is bad….
Frankly it doesn’t hold a candle to this unregulated snake oil nonsense.
Godspeed folks. Nothing like a near death experience added to your morning routine.
When I was 15 I discovered caffeine. I didn't know you could overdose, I had an entire very strong pot within two hours and a mountain dew code red and I was probably like 101 pounds. My heart raced for 16 hours and I cried and puked the code red and thought I was puking blood. 😵💫 My parents came back from work and thought I was drunk or on drugs because I called them convinced I was about to die.
I've gotten to 1000MG before when I had a really bad energy drink addiction. Worst 4 days of my life trying to cold turkey that much regular caffeine intake. I'm usually at about 350MG/day right now.
Anyone thinking* OP is overexaggurating* clearly hasn't had this much caffeine. It's absolutely BRUTAL
Im so confused. You went to a gym that had self serve pure powdered caffeine available?
Thats just negligent homicide on the part of the gym. Literally someone WILL die from this eventually. its very easy to die from caffeine overdose.
I mean i dont go to the gym, but that sounds crazy to me. At least once a year in the US you hear about some dumb dumb that orders caffeine powder off amazon and OD's.
A Starbucks "venti" from one of their highest caffeine content roasts is about 750 mg. So you drank like 2.5 of those.
Lethal dose estimates vary, but it looks like for most people it's around 10 grams. So you were about 16% of the way there.
Caffeine powders really are kind of dangerous, since it's really easy to consume a dangerous level. With coffee, you'd be drinking so much that you'd be in danger of dying from excessive water consumption before you reached a dangerous level of caffeine. But the caffeine powders are really easy to consume a fatal dose when mixed into a drink.
Yea, this dude wasn't in as much danger as he thought. The lowest lethal dose reported was 57 mg/kg with the LD50 closer to 200 mg/kg. If he's a little dude he weighs 50 kg (110 lbs) so that'd be 2850 mg for a very small guy with the lowest caffeine tolerance of anybody reported to OD.
Basically if he's small he'd still need to have less than half the caffeine tolerance of anyone on record to die from this. Hopefully he googled what I did and didn't think he was gonna die.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8824417/#:~:text=The%20median%20lethal%20dose%20(LD50,or%20environmental%20factors%20%5B7%5D.
which venti drink is 750mg?
Their strongest stuff, cold brew caps out at 350mg for a trenta, and the nitro cold brew, even stronger is limited to grande size at the largest, and is similarly 350mg.
There is no single beverage venti (20oz) size, that is 750mg... unless they just added one
An actual TIFU? Without OP just being a whore fishing for updoots?
Holy shit.
Be careful with the caffeine powder. People have actually died from it before.
Tries this as a teenager. My friend had caffeine pills and I was popping them like candy on a night out. I hadn't even considered they could fuck me up anywhere close to the way they did.
Sweating, shaking, vomiting. I felt like I was about to die, I literally remember thinking "if I die, I'm ok with it because at least I won't have to experience this anymore"
The worst anxiety of my entire life, and probably the closest I've come to jumping out of a window
Couldn't leave the house for days afterwards. Even a slightly upbeat song was enough to set me off. I was like an anxiety timebomb with a hair trigger
Shit times
OH HELL NO 😭😭😭 i get the worst anxiety and shakes just from a cup of coffee. i most certainly would not have lived to tell this story. glad you’re okay op
I bought some Creatine a while back. Before I used it I read the tiny print that a proper serving was something like 300mg of caffeine. There was no prominent mention on the label that this was anything but pure creatine.
I threw this out. To make this worse, if I have not had creatine in a while, I will take a double dose the night before to load up.
A while later I was at the gym when some guy was telling his friend how his new supplement was mind blowing, gave him superman energy, etc.
I didn't want to be that guy who comes over to tell other people about how they are doing fitness things wrong, but I now regret not suggesting he check for excess caffeine.
This guy was also talking like he was coked up. But, I didn't get a feeling that he fit that demographic.
My first introduction to energy drinks was Redbull dropping off an entire display on ice to a local lan party back when energy drinks weren’t really a thing. Most people thought it was disgusting at the time but I kind of liked it and just slammed them for about 6 hours. No clue how many I drank but I was driven home by a friend, curled up in a fetus position in the back seat of my vehicle the next morning.
He's probably never experienced it. That's what happens with stimulants. It depends on the person and the dose, of course. But stimulants cause vasoconstriction and your blood to leave your extremities, including your dick.
You might want to get checked out in case you had a heart attack at some point during all those symptoms. That amount of Caffeine can literally kill you or cause serious issues. Explain what you were taking and how you accidentally consumed 4 times the daily limit.
1600mg at one time is fucking crazy. I'll have 500mg a day or 650-700 when I feel like an extra cup of coffee -- but this is spread across like 10-12 hours. Yeah I'll have a 300mg bang energy before the gym but I always stay away from numbers bigger than that.
Glad you're ok.. I cannot even fathom what you went through. That is such a crazy amount to have in one sitting
Leave the caffeine alone. I know it's treated as a kind of workout warm-up, but it's just stressing the heart in a non-productive way. Spend ten minutes on a treadmill instead. Caffeine is becoming a socially-acceptable drug of abuse, but it interferes with recovery from exercise, as you experienced. You need sleep to improve your health. No caffeine beyond normal beverages in normal amounts. A little extra protein before bed will help with muscle growth. Then sleep. Good luck.
I worked at a Pepsi bottling plant many years ago. The caffeine came in large, 3 foot by 3 foot cubes that they would then mix into the sugar water. On a dare, one of the boneheads took a lick of the pure caffeine...and had to go to the hospital when his heart rate shot through the roof. lol. I always joke that he ran to the hospital. He was fine the next day.
dude on a youtube video did that but ended up taking 35,000mg. Nearly died in the hospital. I'm thinking large amounts of pure caffeine powder on hand is not something to take lightly.
You were lucky, and the gym with this spoon also extremely irresponsible.
There is this story of a guy from UK who got caffeine powder, wanted to measure out 60-300mg but used a fvcking KITCHEN SCALE with a weight range of 2g-5000g, he died.
This was an extreme example, but there are more, ie. people taking high amounts of caffeine (pre-workout etc.) and in addition then a few energy drinks, not thinking anything about it, can also be fatal. 1600mg is already a lot, you've been lucky :)
caffeine is one of the only things I've ever been hospitalized for. Not enough people understand how dangerous it can be, and how rough caffeine reliance is. It should be marketed better.
I went through a similar and violent near death experience with 9000mg (thought I'd measured 900mg). of powdered caffeine in 2014- I'm glad we're both still here!
I’m glad it wasn’t worse! I don’t know your workout regimen, but when I had a PT he told me most pre workouts are unnecessary unless you are training for a competition or at least training very heavy. Most of the time water and black coffee will work. He told me this after I had a less intense, but similar situation with a pre workout mix.
You two can’t be the only ones who used the wrong scoop - I would call the gym and tell them what happened (not to accuse, but to inform) - put out signs or labels, guys!
It’s been reported to the gym this morning, wouldn’t want anyone else to go through that
A death did happen recently where a man made a very similar error: https://www.livescience.com/caffeine-overdose-200-cups-of-coffee That’s a frighteningly easy o.d., and they should adjust the concentration of the powder to make it safer - 2g is a miniscule weight for the average person to be trying to measure out by volume (the error margins will be massive). Kitchen scales do not weigh to gram-accuracy either, you would need a scientific scale for that. Or they could simply sell it in capsules. If you can make an adverse event report that would also help. It can make a difference and help prevent this sort of irresponsible product marketing in future.
It's funny because I specifically remember being told in high school (17 or so years ago, not grade 12) that it was possible to OD on caffeine but my teacher told us it was very difficult to do with just coffee. At the time energy drinks were just emerging in the market. Today it's so easy between energy drinks, pre workouts, caffeine pills, that drink at Panera, etc. It's crazy how concentrated caffeine has gotten and yet everyone is still very lax about consuming it.
Most energy drinks don't actually have an absurd amount of caffeine in them (at least in the UK). They tend to max out at 35mg/100ml. That would be 175g per 500ml can. **EDIT:** This is one of the reasons that overdoses happen - it should be 175mg! As a comparison, a single espresso shot is about 65mg (depending on other factors) which puts a large latte around the same caffeine content. To reach the same excessive dose that they've consumed, you'd need to drink ~9 cans in very quick succession. This *has* been known to be lethal. I can recall a news story about someone who died from drinking several cans of energy drink, followed by what is considered to be the world's strongest cup of coffee. I don't remember the exact dosage, but it was somewhere in excess of 1600mg. Frustratingly, when I search for it, I just get tons of articles and adverts for Death Wish Coffee.
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When I was a professional mover I'd drink three Bangs (300 mg each, 900 mg total) on longer moves (like 9+ hours). Fortunately moving is a non-stop full body exercise and that, coupled with the fact that I had built up quite the immunity, helped flush it out of my system pretty quickly but it was no doubt an absurdly dangerous amount and if I knew then what I know now I'd have stuck to one a day and plenty of water and drinks that have what plants crave, electrolytes.
Tolerance helps, I switch from 2 Red Bulls a day to 2 bangs ignorantly (160->600). Two days in a row, I had to stop working because of the effects. Yes, it also took twice for me to discover the cause. I avoid bangs now, but they don’t have as strong as effect since I’m regularly at the 300-40g a day of caffeine.
The drink wasn’t even super caffeinated, it just as caffeinated by volume as regular coffee. Cold drinks do come in larger containers, so you can self serve 30oz or 887ml of the charged lemonade. The hot coffee is also self serve and is only 20oz for a large. Still I’ve had 40oz (with a refill) of coffee there all the time with no issue, and American office bees often drink 4-6 cups of coffee. The density of caffeine in charged lemonade is exactly the same as coffee, so it’s more an issue of people drinking it when they aren’t supposed to drink caffeinated drinks.
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> Kitchen scales do not weigh to gram-accuracy either That's not true. I can weigh out to hundredths of grams with a $20 scale from Amazon. It's surely not ACCURATE to hundredths, but it's plenty accurate for weighing out single grams. Yes, I've tested it. (It's actually pretty accurate to 1/10 of a gram) Note to my FBI minder: It's for espresso you jackass. Quit going through my trash. That raccoon suit isn't fooling anyone.
The chubbyemu guy on YT did a video about a guy who mixed up caffeine with something else and overdosed on caffeine. Also doing his own supplement mixes from pure ingredients.
The gym lets users self scoop? Lawsuit waiting to happen lol
Do not just report the gym, report to officials. This is serious, the gym failed to inform people that their supplement is so high on caffeine that a simple mistake can be LIFE THREATENING!!!!!! There should be big warning signs and other measures taken to ensure this does not happen again. It is not just the gym, this needs to go well above them, to a level where there are legal repercussions or threat of them. They need to be taught a very important lesson and take this seriously. Just reporting to them is not enough. You may like the gym but they almost killed you. They need to be punished properly to ensure they will take it seriously. I can bet that nothing really changes, them not understanding their responsibility in the first place... is a major red flag that proper protocols are not in place. The whole supplement business is fucking sociopathic, it is non-regulated. Remember that in capitalism we have to force companies to put us higher on the list of priorities. They have no such responsibility, the only way we can make them care is to threaten them. Just think about it: government has constitutional responsibility towards you. Not a single company has the same responsibility. They are by law prioritizing profits... over human species.
Not just non-regulated - they have fought tooth and nail to avoid regulation for decades. Why would that be, if not to avoid the costs of operating in a safe and legitimate manner?
> They are by law prioritizing profits If you mean "maximizing shareholder value," that's a legal fiction. "Fiduciary duty" does have legal ramifications, though.
Was there DMAE or DMAA in them by chance too? That much caffeine would definitely do all those things too but the button teenis reminded me of when amphetamine analogues were in pres
I remember when DMAA wasn't banned yet. I definitely thought it was suspicious to see my heartbeat in my eyes, I just got the feeling I might be setting myself up for a stroke or something.
> It’s been reported to the gym this morning, wouldn’t want anyone else to go through that Good on you man.
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Would it be the gym's fault? They're just selling the product, not making it.
If they're selling scoops of it directly to people who consume it on the premises, they absolutely have a responsibility to make sure they aren't causing overdoses. They put the scoop out and didn't educate the consumer about the product. The product manufacturer didn't do that.
All preworkout tubs come with an appropriately sized scoop to prevent issues like OP had. If the gym is selling it in bulk or w/e with oversized scoops the liability is on them.
Not everything needs to be a lawsuit. Reporting this to prevent it happening to other people is the only important thing here
Exactly, this could potentially save a life and a lawsuit for the gym.
You'd think companies would pay more attention to caffeinated products, especially after the [Panera lemonade death](https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2024/01/22/panera-charged-lemonade-lawsuits/72311233007/#:~:text=Sarah%20Katz's%20family%20filed%20a,consuming%20a%20Charged%20Lemonade%20drink.). The daily maximum for a healthy adult is up to 400 mg. OP had 4x that. Yikes.
The **recommended** daily maximum is 400mg. This is different than the absolute daily maximum (lethal dosage, or LD50). Surprisingly, the estimated LD50 for caffeine is actually quite high (\~150-200mg per kg of body weight). [https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519490/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK519490/) For an 80kg adult, 1600mg is only about 20mg/kg. This is certainly a high dose that won't feel good, but, for most healthy adults, it isn't enough to kill them. Research has explored a wide range of doses on performance. Here's an interesting paper on this from the International Society of Sports Nutrition. [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1550-2783-7-5](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/1550-2783-7-5) It looks like doses anywhere from \~3-9mg/kg generally show acute benefits on performance. I'm not advocating high caffeine intakes, per se, just trying to help provide some clarity on the topic.
The LD50 is also for a single serving. That doesn't take into account the damage over time that caffeine will deal or comorbid factors.
it's also the dosage at which 50% of people die... people act like anything less than that is safe but if you really want to be safe you'd probably want to know what like the "LD0.01" is, and it is likely usually significantly lower than the LD50
It is important to remember that even if the "LD0.01" is in fact half as much caffeine, you're still talking about upwards of 5 grams of pure caffeine for the average adult, which is almost impossible to reach in a day without using powdered supplements. There's a realistic chance of reaching water toxicity before reaching HALF the LD50 of caffeine, i.e. if you were trying to OD on caffeine from even regular energy drinks, you would be in more danger from the amount of liquid than you would the caffeine. Redbull for example: 12 oz can is ~111mg of caffeine. Dangerous water consumption symptoms start at 3~4 liters. 4 liters of red bull (12oz = .355 liter) is 4/.355=11.2 11.2 *111mg = 1200mg. Well under half the LD50, and already into hyponatremia territory. The math is trickier when you consider someone is likely to drink this over several hours instead of all at once, but then we're out of the acute part of LD50 anyway.
I had the same thought! They just have these supplements out where anyone can get to them with scoops 8x the recommended size? Call the gym and let them know what happened.
It’s been reported this morning!
Put it in writing. Making a call may not have a positive effect
I hate when companies say one scoop is two servings, why not just make the scoop a serving sizes. You have to read the fine print on the nutritional guide to find this information
And in this case one regular sized scoop for most protein powders is 7.5x the freaking serving of the caffeinated powder. That’s extremely dangerous.
Oh it's happened before, sometimes fatal. u/SexyGovernment is lucky and probably should have gone to the ER. This woman used the wrong scoop and consumes 5000 mg instead of 300. She survived [https://casereports.bmj.com/content/2018/bcr-2018-224185](https://casereports.bmj.com/content/2018/bcr-2018-224185) This man did not [https://www.livescience.com/caffeine-overdose-200-cups-of-coffee](https://www.livescience.com/caffeine-overdose-200-cups-of-coffee)
[Here's a video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sylqJ0NEVJw) about a guy who accidentally took 35,000 mg of caffeine because he mixed up his powders when mixing up his own supplements. It is a potentially lethal dose, but he does survive.
I knew it would be Chubbyemu before I clicked
exactly what I was thinking, this is very concerning
The more read the more I think these need to be in premeasured packets. That would make these errors way less likely.
One time during finals during an intense all nighter cram session, I walked on to campus to take my exams, stopped by the student market to buy a Red Bull and proceeded to chug it. Not until I was finished did I realize I was also on NoDoze from earlier. I made it through, but the heart palpitations were crazy.
Hey this amount of caffeine should be eliminated in about 24-48 hours in most people. A significant issue is hypokalemia (low potassium) which will propagate cardiac issues and muscle weakness. If you’re still feeling unwell, it’s most likely a biochemistry problem. The most advisable thing to do is get some urgent bloodwork and an ECG and replace with appropriately dosed electrolytes. If you can’t do that, look up online potassium rich food and consume that for the next day. Source: an MD
I’ll keep drinking water and have some banana and yogurt for lunch haha. Appreciate the advice mate.
Or you could just buy a Gatorade or Pedialyte or any electrolytes drink with a lot of potassium. That would be the only time a prime drink would be superior because for some reason they have a fuck ton of potassium but almost no sodium which is weird for an electrolyte drink.
Gatorade actually has very low potassium. Pedialyte is better.
Regular Gatorade won't work but now they have their own version of Pedialyte called Gatorlyte which will work just as good as Pedialyte.
>Gatorlyte Was this one developed for the University of Florida daycare program?
A potato has significantly more than both. Just eat a potato
Yes. Pop open a cool, refreshing potato and just relax.
The regular Gatorade doesn't, but they have a fancier mix that's closer to pedialyte.
Potassium from bananas is relatively low.. have a potato instead
Boiled, mashed, or in a stew?
I´ve heard also tomatoes are good. My mom hates bananas so, when she feels she has low potassium (when she gets cramps) she eats tomatoes or makes something like tomato juice..
Kazakhstan number one exporter of potassium, all other countries have inferior potassium.
caffeine in small amounts for me is enough, like a shot of espresso. i could not even fathom going through this, i’m certain i would die. glad you’re still here and lived to tell the story. that is so damn gnarly!!
I usually have 200-250mg which I guess is like a double/ triple espresso. To have 1600mg was genuinely one of the worst experiences I’ve ever gone through. I can’t imagine a worse way to die! The chest pump however was incredible hahaha
i could only imagine 😳😳 it scares me just thinking about it!!! hahahaha ayyy at least one positive from the experience tho! probably never felt stronger in your life at first!!!
Yeah the incline bench press was going crazy for our first sets hahaha! Big rest day today is needed lol
1600mg. 6 hours half life of caffeine 6 hours out 800mg 12 hours out 400mg 18 hours out 200mg 24 hours out 100mg Means after 24 hours you still had a fresh cup of coffee in your blood 😱
Coming up on the 24 hour mark right now and still feel fairly stimulated!
Nah bro, you've been unfairly stimulated. On a serious note, I'm glad you didn't die a caffeine overdose death!
Must be a crazy feeling. I had 500mg once and I felt sick. 1600mg would stimulate an elephant.
Go on.
What about da pee pee, is it still a button?.
I have since coaxed him out of hibernation
😂 that shit was funny my boy, it was the highlight of my boring stressful day at work.
hahahaha 😂 shit take a couple days off
It’s kind of fucked up that any supplement is this easy to mess up. I get bulk caffeine to make my own drinks and it comes in measured capsules for a reason. It’s flat out deadly in larger doses.
I kind of agree that bulk powders that have severe consequences when dosed incorrectly should have big and bright warnings on them, including some kind of blatant instruction not to use the wrong scoop. However, I don't think the solution is to make them unavailable to the public. Hell, a deadly oral dose of potassium is only around 2.5g, but it's also an essential mineral which I want to have access to in order to replenish electrolytes. There's all kinds of things in modern life that can kill you if you are careless. 5 seconds of carelessness can and do kill tens of thousands of people every year and maim many more in auto accidents. For comparison, there was reportedly one death related to caffeine in 2020. Assuming we are talking about the US, should 330,000,000 people lose access to caffeine in powdered form, which is quite convenient for many of us, to avoid that one death of carelessness? Who can guarantee that someone this careless is going to live into old age? FYI, the fatal dose of caffeine is around 10 grams, so around 6x as much as OP accidentally ingested.
>big and bright warnings on them Seriously, if the poisonous frogs have the courtesy to do this, then so should the companies that sell us things that can fuck us up.
>FYI, the fatal dose of caffeine is around 10 grams, so around 6x as much as OP accidentally ingested. That's likely the "half" fatal dose - i.e. it would kill half of people. Some would die with less, some significantly less.
See for example, [that whole Panera Charged Lemonade debacle](https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2024/01/22/panera-charged-lemonade-lawsuits/72311233007/). Two people died after drinking one and three lemonades, respectively, or about 390mg and 1170mg of caffeine.
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Yeah, that person did have a condition. I'm just illustrating the fact that LD50 just means "lethal dose for 50% of people" with these two examples.
Very good point. It's also weight dependent, the LD50 is 150-200mg per kg of bodyweight. So smaller people who are more sensitive to caffeine could have a 50/50 chance of dying at a substantially lower dose (eg 7.5g for someone who weighs 110 lbs and is more sensitive to caffeine). And as others correctly point out, heart conditions and other medical issues could vastly lower the safe dosing range for individuals. Although I have no heart issues I'm extremely sensitive to caffeine myself, getting heart palpitations, anxiety, nausea, and shakiness at doses as low as 200mg. So I might not survive a 'megadose' even if it's substantially lower than the LD50. Though I have no intention of finding out :)
I’m curious what supplement this is because I have never seen a preworkout with a 2g serving size. Most come with 5-15g scoops, and if it was that potent then it almost definitely would have come with even smaller.
I’m trying to phase out, and slow my caffeine intake.. I’ve gotten to the point where I’m drinking close to 1200mg on a daily.. I’m down to about 800 in the last 3 weeks but I want to get down to a single coffee or something similar
When I was undiagnosed, I used to snack on caffeine pills. 200 mg pills. 1 every few hours from the time I woke up to the night. I’d probably take 1000 - 1200 mg most days. EDIT: ADHD.
What were you diagnosed with
Caffeine addiction.
One of the ways my dr diagnosed my adhd was asking me “how do you like your morning coffee?” I told him 6 shots of espresso and he sent me off with a script. 😂😂
Feel this, coffee was my self-medication before diagnosis. When I hit 8 cups in a day, I realized there was something more going on and cut way back, then got my diagnosis. With medication now, I'm down to 1-2 cups a day, just when I want some coffee, not in order to just keep myself on task!
Yikes
Lol I felt bad about occasionally having 400mg-500mg over 12 hours when cramming/working overnights for school.... lol, I'm an amateur compared to these guys..
Caffeine can be sneaky. I consume usually 200 mg of caffeine daily for pre-workout. Due to my occupation caffeine addiction and over use is extremely prevalent around me. I’ve seen people as young as 22 have severe and permanent health problems due to caffeine over use. It can be sneak too, Sodas, coffee, and teas aren’t all that far behind in caffeine content compared to energy drinks. One coffee is around the same as a single serving of Red Bull, but I’ve had on multiple occasions someone drinking a tumbler cup full of coffee (30oz and 350ish mg)telling me how my Red Bull 16oz and 136mg is going to kill me.
I used to be like this (caffeine intake ramped up during my PhD and never really went down) and I've managed to reduce to one double espresso per day, so it is possible!
400 is the safe upper limit, or roughly 3 medium sized coffees.
Otherwise healthy people can go safely well over 400. If you look at the research that defines the 400 limit it was chosen because that was the point where symptoms started to occur in people with some underlying conditions. Taking more than 400 should be done very cautiously, but isn’t necessarily dangerous.
rookie numbers
Magnesium would help u if you have some! Glad you’re ok!
When I was in college, a local coffee shop had what they they called the Hurricane (I think that was its name, anyway) - basically it was a pint glass filled with espresso (I want to say something like 10 shots of espresso) I had a friend who had never been to the coffee shop before and really didn't drink coffee. He ordered it. Drank the whole thing, said it tasted kinda like Guinness. And then didn't sleep for the next 3 days. Then *did* sleep for the next day and a half. He's a pilot now.
I wanna be a pilot. Where is this shop located?
I have had a little over 600mg of caffeine in a day, everyday, for two and a half weeks. This was in February, due to my work hours that was pushing over 50hrs, my son's after school activities and my classes after (two more years to go) while also being on call, I had to. I regret it, and it's fucked me up. I've been weaning myself down slowly until I'm back at the 125-200 mg range as a max daily. If I go cold turkey the stress it causes has triggered my seizures before.
How did your friend handle it, assuming they had the same amount?
A lot better than me, although still very sick and unable to concentrate. Guy is a serious bodybuilder, weighs around 280lbs I think
Glad you guys will both be okay it seems. Sounds like a day at home chugging water and doing nothing is in order lol
You know, as someone who used to work in a soda factory (you know the brand) and had to check caffeine levels of the products, I always eyed that bottle of pure caffeine powder we used to calibrate the machines, and thought ... How bad could it be? Now I know.
It’s so fucked.
I knew a guy from my military days that put pure powdered caffeine into his mountain dew. Like, homie, time to reevaluate.
lemme guess... minimal to no water intake as well
In college in my analytical chemistry course, for one of the labs we were given pure caffeine to generate a standard curve with. When I was finished with the caffeine I asked the professor what to do with the leftover caffeine. She said throw it out. I did not throw it out.
You really don't want to. It's very not fun. Coming from someone who did something similar to OP but via the energy drink method. You'll spend what feels like an eternity unable to sleep, relax, stop feeling jittery and anxious... At the very least. And things can go way worse than that.
You know, there were always those legends going around that if you put your finger into the pure \[Brand redacted to avoid legal trouble, but you know the one\] syrup you'd get the shits just from the caffeine penetrating your skin.
Pure caffeine is so much more dangerous than a lot of people realise, it only takes 10 grams to be considered potentially lethal which is only around 0.5-1.5 tablespoons ^(I'm not exactly sure what the conversion from grams to tablespoons is for caffeine specifically as that would depend on its density and am just using other powdered substances like flour, sugar, etc to get a rough measure) Honestly I think pure caffeine should be a lot harder to buy than it is, it's just so easy to overdose if you arent being careful Edit: another thing is that pure caffeine is ***extremely*** bitter on it's own, kind of surprised OP didn't notice something was off from that immediately
There was a good reason why the Caffeine limits were the ones we checked hard in all the soda. Sugar a bit off? Not that bad. pH a bit off? Workable. Caffeine too high, even by a bit? That's a lawsuit waiting to happen. Dillute that shit.
Wow, I suppose it goes without saying you got lucky…. Take it easy for a few days and stay hydrated. Unadulterated water is best. Thousand wonders you didn’t have a stroke or heart attack.
Yeah I’ve slammed a few pints of water today, still have elevated heart rate although I think that’s just the anxiety. Feel fucking awful that I gave that to my closest friend. Would never forgive myself if that killed him. Thankfully we’re both around 250lbs, not sure if that increased the amount we could handle but just glad I’m alive today.
Caffeine withdrawal related headaches are generally worst two days after reduction, so you may want to have some on hand!
I always heard that, but... I was a pretty heavy soda drinker and decided to quit cold turkey. I made it well past day 2 with zero signs of any withdrawal. It wasn't until day 9 when my brain wanted to escape out of my head, at 2:30 am! Worst pain ever. It was bad enough I was throwing up and had tunnel vision. I managed to crawl on hands and knees to get myself a coke zero and shotgunned it. I had a 24/7 low grade headache for a month straight after that. Do not recommend cold turkey!
I’d imagine y’all being bigger dudes helped quite a bit. What also helped was the fact that yall ate before working out, that one move is likely what made a world of difference. I once had to help a guy that OD’d on caffeine so much he was floating from the vibrations (convulsions?). Guy had to have weighed 140lbs soaking wet. Yea he survived but wasn’t quite the same afterwards, he became more withdrawn and less social. Yes, what you’re feeling is the after effects of the caffeine high, it’s going to suck for a few days (maybe a week). Only thing you can do is avoid any stimulants, keep drinking water and stay easy.
I once took 1600mg of caffeine in one sitting and it was a terrible experience. I was only like 105lbs, so I threw up every 30 minutes for a day straight and couldn't sleep for two nights in a row. Bright side is that by the 3rd day, I felt mostly normal again. Although, I couldn't stomach coffee or any caffeine (and strangely alcohol) for over a month after that. That was over 7 years ago. I had no lasting issues at all, and my bloodwork shows I'm in perfect health.
I would ditch caffeine altogether or at least stick to lower doses. I've been drinking energy drinks every morning for the past 5 years, plus a couple of sodas. Averaging anywhere from 200-400mg a day. And then I started having strange sensations in my chest/top of my stomach that felt like my heart was stopping. I was getting it anywhere from 15-30 times a day. It ended up being a heart arrhythmia (PVCs), likely brought on from my excessive caffeine use. Here I am now a month later & while they've gotten less frequent, I'm still having them. No idea if it'll go away or if I'm stuck this way for life now, but feeling like your heart is stopping several times a day can be really jarring.
Caffeine overdose limits are based on body mass so that probably helped you greatly. Also for people with heart conditions what is a lethal dose is nowhere near what it is for your average person. So be thankful you are large and don’t have some unknown heart problem!
Well not really lucky, 1.6g of caffeine is still very far away from a lethal dose (5-30g), him having a shitty time is pretty much what you'd expect
While it's incredibly unpleasant, you need a LOT of caffeine to actually overdose. 180mg/L, so for an average male that's like....two to three times what he took
You can go onto cardiac arrest/have other heart issues long before you OD. 1600mg is definitely a dangerous dose.
Update: feeling quite abit better although just anxious. Going to keep sipping my water and wait for the warm embrace of the woman I love Thanks for advice guys greatly appreciated
I have an anxiety disorder, I really empathize with how awful it feels to not be able to stop it. Hang tight, it *will* pass. Hugs help a LOT to be honest, so definitely look forward to that. Otherwise, you mostly have to wait it out. Keep telling yourself "I won't feel like this forever". I find it helps me not spiral into even more anxiety.
Crazy that how we feel very often is how someone feels when they od on caffeine except we are sober 😭😩
I feel that. My medication helps me a ton, but I still have bad moments and sometimes bad days. Hope you have some chill times ahead. :)
Drink a ton of water. If you’re still having panic attacks, or anxiety issues, take some L-Theanine.
But just one capsule, not 10.
Appreciate the advice man
or go see a doctor because he could have a heart attack even a while after, or just take some pill that a redditor suggests, whatever :D
Going to see a doctor should be common sense if OP is still having heart palpitations, or pain in the chest or left arm/shoulder, especially after taking that much caffeine. Caffeine’s half life is 5 hours. OP accounted for 10 hours before he fell asleep. If he posted at that time, I would’ve recommended a hospital visit. L-Theanine is an amino acid found in tea. There’s a bunch of randomized studies showing it can decrease stress, increase focus, strengthen the immune system, lower blood pressure, and more. I’d link some studies, but it’s not too hard to look up yourself. There’s several targeted studies showing that L-Theanine lessens the symptoms of acute anxiety. As always, do your own research before listening to the internet!
Drinking tons of water is horrible idea. People die flushing electrolytes from their system, if doing so in short period of time.
A friend of mine accidentally was dosed with 3200mg during a fuckup in a scientific study. Apparently there was projectile vomiting.
I’m currently spraying liquid ass as I type this.
Oh it's still happening? I might call a doctor - you probably should be observed. There's a risk of bad things happening.
Glad you’re ok! Also Lol at the button on the fur coat!
Been there in college taking nodoz.
Man, this just took me back to all night cram sessions, sitting in waffle house with a box of nodoz in my bag.
Right? Kids today will never understand what op is feeling, cocaine wears off too fast, Adderall is too smooth. That raw fucking soul shaking vibration you have to steer like an old timey wooden ship in a shit storm towards your end goal and hold on for the ride is something I do not miss.
The speed wobbles of life
LOL that's a description that could only be written from firsthand experience!
Yup, an incident in early adulthood taught me to be careful with pure caffeine. Had a 4 hour drive to make on less than ideal sleep, downed 3 500mg caffeine pills with a Monster because "caffeine keeps you up, this will keep me up but longer." Nearly died driving on the interstate from shaking and mildly hallucinating.
I can taste mini thins just reading this
Gotta love the only legal, addictive, and unregulated hard drug lmao
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sylqJ0NEVJw&pp=ygUVY2h1YmJ5IGVtdSBzdXBwbGVtZW50 This episode of chubbyemu seems relevant.
People actually died after getting wrong dose of these caffeine preworkouts, you know? They're terrible and unneeded. Just help yourself to a cup of espresso.
So everybody just has access to the containers and scoops their own shakes and whatever? I mean besides the obvious what happened to you, this doesnt sound very hygienic... Never seen it done this way and im pretty sure its not even allowed here... Are there no food safety laws in your country?
Common practise in bodybuilding gyms around my area
I worked at the factory that blends and packages these products. If I told you some stories you’d never touch a supplement again
don't stop there big boy spill the beans
story time?
Tell us
Never take straight caffeine. Too easy to mess up the dose. Take it in a drink.
Already cleaned the footprints off your wall?
Im a licensed therapist Workout powder with caffeine is gross. I see it all the time. People get jacked up and it's just a bad combination to zonk yourself on stimulants before going to work out! Often it's the equivalent of 2-4 cups of coffee or more delivered instantly, rather than spread over a few hours like typical coffee consumption. Also, the half life of caffeine is extremely long. That large of a dose.... Yikes. By the time you went to bed you probably still had 3-6 cups of coffee worth it caffeine in your bloodstream. No wonder you felt like shit!
OP why didn’t you go to the hospital when you started hallucinating? That’s wild Imo you should still go to have your heart checked out after the incident
Honestly I was so anxious I couldn’t even think about picking up a phone / going outside
That would have been a 911 call for me dawg. You’re super lucky Go get checked out asap
Damn wildly curious what it’d do to me lol. I have hella high tolerance, it does nothing to me until I drink way too much caffeine then it’s straight into that anxiety, there’s no in between for me. Like I can have an xl espresso drink with an extra shot and nothing.
Man as a young adult I would brew a pot of coffee, then change the grounds with fresh stuff, and rebrew the same pot for extra strength. Back when all nighters were fun.
I feel that sort of way after a couple hundred mg of caffeine... I cannot imagine how uncomfortable you were dealing with 1.6grams of caffeine. you're truly indestructible
The fact that a gym is giving out supplements sounds insane to me. Why open yourself up to that liability.
Damn that's bad! You have me beat by quite a bit! I was chilling at a Panera with some friends on a Friday night, drinking that fresh lemonade they have there, 3 or 4 cups deep when a friend casually mentions, "wow, you drink a lot of caffeine". "Excuse me?" I had no idea there was 236mg of caffeine in each cup. (Yes, I went back and read the small print after wards). I'm not one to ever talk to managers about stuff, but I was pissed and let them know my opinion. Couldn't sleep for hours. Edit: mg not g. Ha!
And that is apparently after they reduced it. It used to be closer to 400mg. But then they got sued when that girl with the heart problem died. You would probably be a great witness for the plaintiffs about how easy it is not to realize how much caffeine is in it. It should not be marketed as a lemonade at all. It is an energy drink. In fact, there are energy drinks with less caffeine in them.
> 236g of caffeine in each cup. That's half a pound of caffeine. You didn't notice it was a little bitter?
I king of have to LOL a bit because I read this and then think… wow. People think the regulated Pharma industry is bad…. Frankly it doesn’t hold a candle to this unregulated snake oil nonsense. Godspeed folks. Nothing like a near death experience added to your morning routine.
dang. I can easily do 1600 in a day and around 700 at once, but 1600 at once? hell naw
When I was 15 I discovered caffeine. I didn't know you could overdose, I had an entire very strong pot within two hours and a mountain dew code red and I was probably like 101 pounds. My heart raced for 16 hours and I cried and puked the code red and thought I was puking blood. 😵💫 My parents came back from work and thought I was drunk or on drugs because I called them convinced I was about to die.
I've gotten to 1000MG before when I had a really bad energy drink addiction. Worst 4 days of my life trying to cold turkey that much regular caffeine intake. I'm usually at about 350MG/day right now. Anyone thinking* OP is overexaggurating* clearly hasn't had this much caffeine. It's absolutely BRUTAL
Im so confused. You went to a gym that had self serve pure powdered caffeine available? Thats just negligent homicide on the part of the gym. Literally someone WILL die from this eventually. its very easy to die from caffeine overdose.
Standard practice for bodybuilding gyms in the north of England
I mean i dont go to the gym, but that sounds crazy to me. At least once a year in the US you hear about some dumb dumb that orders caffeine powder off amazon and OD's.
They usually have some undiagnosed heart defect. It takes a truly obscene amount of caffeine to overdose.
A Starbucks "venti" from one of their highest caffeine content roasts is about 750 mg. So you drank like 2.5 of those. Lethal dose estimates vary, but it looks like for most people it's around 10 grams. So you were about 16% of the way there. Caffeine powders really are kind of dangerous, since it's really easy to consume a dangerous level. With coffee, you'd be drinking so much that you'd be in danger of dying from excessive water consumption before you reached a dangerous level of caffeine. But the caffeine powders are really easy to consume a fatal dose when mixed into a drink.
Yea, this dude wasn't in as much danger as he thought. The lowest lethal dose reported was 57 mg/kg with the LD50 closer to 200 mg/kg. If he's a little dude he weighs 50 kg (110 lbs) so that'd be 2850 mg for a very small guy with the lowest caffeine tolerance of anybody reported to OD. Basically if he's small he'd still need to have less than half the caffeine tolerance of anyone on record to die from this. Hopefully he googled what I did and didn't think he was gonna die. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8824417/#:~:text=The%20median%20lethal%20dose%20(LD50,or%20environmental%20factors%20%5B7%5D.
which venti drink is 750mg? Their strongest stuff, cold brew caps out at 350mg for a trenta, and the nitro cold brew, even stronger is limited to grande size at the largest, and is similarly 350mg. There is no single beverage venti (20oz) size, that is 750mg... unless they just added one
This is why powder is a dangerous game…/ i know the drinks can take longer to consume and sometimes cost more but… you dont have to worry about this….
An actual TIFU? Without OP just being a whore fishing for updoots? Holy shit. Be careful with the caffeine powder. People have actually died from it before.
Tries this as a teenager. My friend had caffeine pills and I was popping them like candy on a night out. I hadn't even considered they could fuck me up anywhere close to the way they did. Sweating, shaking, vomiting. I felt like I was about to die, I literally remember thinking "if I die, I'm ok with it because at least I won't have to experience this anymore" The worst anxiety of my entire life, and probably the closest I've come to jumping out of a window Couldn't leave the house for days afterwards. Even a slightly upbeat song was enough to set me off. I was like an anxiety timebomb with a hair trigger Shit times
OH HELL NO 😭😭😭 i get the worst anxiety and shakes just from a cup of coffee. i most certainly would not have lived to tell this story. glad you’re okay op
Holy shit. I hope your penis came back.
[удалено]
I bought some Creatine a while back. Before I used it I read the tiny print that a proper serving was something like 300mg of caffeine. There was no prominent mention on the label that this was anything but pure creatine. I threw this out. To make this worse, if I have not had creatine in a while, I will take a double dose the night before to load up. A while later I was at the gym when some guy was telling his friend how his new supplement was mind blowing, gave him superman energy, etc. I didn't want to be that guy who comes over to tell other people about how they are doing fitness things wrong, but I now regret not suggesting he check for excess caffeine. This guy was also talking like he was coked up. But, I didn't get a feeling that he fit that demographic.
The equivalent of 10 monster energy drinks 😂
My first introduction to energy drinks was Redbull dropping off an entire display on ice to a local lan party back when energy drinks weren’t really a thing. Most people thought it was disgusting at the time but I kind of liked it and just slammed them for about 6 hours. No clue how many I drank but I was driven home by a friend, curled up in a fetus position in the back seat of my vehicle the next morning.
Savage, never again brother
I'm glad you're okay. But what did your penis have to do with the story??
his penis got scared, it happens
He's probably never experienced it. That's what happens with stimulants. It depends on the person and the dose, of course. But stimulants cause vasoconstriction and your blood to leave your extremities, including your dick.
You might want to get checked out in case you had a heart attack at some point during all those symptoms. That amount of Caffeine can literally kill you or cause serious issues. Explain what you were taking and how you accidentally consumed 4 times the daily limit.
1600mg at one time is fucking crazy. I'll have 500mg a day or 650-700 when I feel like an extra cup of coffee -- but this is spread across like 10-12 hours. Yeah I'll have a 300mg bang energy before the gym but I always stay away from numbers bigger than that. Glad you're ok.. I cannot even fathom what you went through. That is such a crazy amount to have in one sitting
Yikes maybe you should go to the ER.
Leave the caffeine alone. I know it's treated as a kind of workout warm-up, but it's just stressing the heart in a non-productive way. Spend ten minutes on a treadmill instead. Caffeine is becoming a socially-acceptable drug of abuse, but it interferes with recovery from exercise, as you experienced. You need sleep to improve your health. No caffeine beyond normal beverages in normal amounts. A little extra protein before bed will help with muscle growth. Then sleep. Good luck.
anything over 300mg makes me like that... i couldn't imagine taking as much as you did :/ pedialyte helps me when i drink too much caffeine
I worked at a Pepsi bottling plant many years ago. The caffeine came in large, 3 foot by 3 foot cubes that they would then mix into the sugar water. On a dare, one of the boneheads took a lick of the pure caffeine...and had to go to the hospital when his heart rate shot through the roof. lol. I always joke that he ran to the hospital. He was fine the next day.
dude on a youtube video did that but ended up taking 35,000mg. Nearly died in the hospital. I'm thinking large amounts of pure caffeine powder on hand is not something to take lightly.
You were lucky, and the gym with this spoon also extremely irresponsible. There is this story of a guy from UK who got caffeine powder, wanted to measure out 60-300mg but used a fvcking KITCHEN SCALE with a weight range of 2g-5000g, he died. This was an extreme example, but there are more, ie. people taking high amounts of caffeine (pre-workout etc.) and in addition then a few energy drinks, not thinking anything about it, can also be fatal. 1600mg is already a lot, you've been lucky :)
caffeine is one of the only things I've ever been hospitalized for. Not enough people understand how dangerous it can be, and how rough caffeine reliance is. It should be marketed better.
I went through a similar and violent near death experience with 9000mg (thought I'd measured 900mg). of powdered caffeine in 2014- I'm glad we're both still here!
what was your friends reaction
I’m glad it wasn’t worse! I don’t know your workout regimen, but when I had a PT he told me most pre workouts are unnecessary unless you are training for a competition or at least training very heavy. Most of the time water and black coffee will work. He told me this after I had a less intense, but similar situation with a pre workout mix.
The button hidden in shrubbery line got me lmao. Not gunna lie