HOWEVER. SO MUCH CAFFEINE.
Herself has been decaffeinated for nearly a quarter of a century; she gave up caffeine before she turned twenty-one. At the time, scientific studies had pointed to a connection between caffeine consumption and benign breast fibroadenoma. Herself had recently undergone the very unpleasant procedure of the removal of three of such lumps -- first one, the summer after her freshman year of college, and then two more simultaneously, in January of her junior year. Back in that day, the surgery was done under local anesthesia after immobilizing the patient by strapping her arms to boards such that she would resemble the letter "T". She remembers the surgeon was a rather stern and humorless gray-haired man, who chastised Herself when she let him know that she could still feel pain at the site during the operation, and who at one point stated "oops" during the procedure. (She inquired, "oops what?" but never received an answer.) She was determined to eliminate any substances that might contribute to the development of additional fibroadenoma, and so, caffeine was out. She did not miss it.
All these years later, the evidence linking caffeine and fibroadenoma is now under doubt. Furthermore, age, three pregnancies and five cumulative years of nursing the Offspring all contribute to the unlikelihood of Herself developing any further fibroadenoma. So occasionally, Herself indulges in a caffeine-containing soda, and -- as was necessary today -- a caffeine-containing headache remedy.
Still: she is unaccustomed to a large amount of caffeine, and she is very much abuzz from the dose she has had. She wonders how coffee drinkers handle the sensation. Perhaps they become accustomed to it. She cannot imagine. She feels as though she should run in circles right now. How long will this buzz last? And what can she accomplish during that time? We shall see!
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