I started the Mayo Clinic Diet on Feb 15. The diet allows for a cup of coffee, black, with each meal. It says not to exceed 3 cups a day, or weight loss will stall. It also says that caffeinated soft drinks are off the list.

I wanted to give the diet an honest attempt so I followed it to the letter. I don't usually drink coffee past the morning the morning though, so it wasn't that big of an issue with me. I have drank coffee every morning with cream for 30 years! I use half & half in my coffee. I usually drink about 2 mugs with breakfast, or 18-20 ounces.

The first week of the diet, I drank one cup of black coffee with breakfast. I did not drink any other caffeinated beverage during the day. I noticed that I craved the cream in the coffee. It just didn't taste the same. I didn't give in though.

My diet allows for 2 days every 2 weeks that you eat as you please, then get back on the diet for the other 12 days. On day 13 and 14 I of course had my coffee with cream (since it was allowed). I found that it did not taste that good to me! I was really surprised. My husband suggested that we cut the coffee altogether. Reluctant to do this, I switched to 1/2 the caffeine coffee for our 1 cup with breakfast.

I ran out of the 1/2 caffeine stuff last week, and have been just making decaf coffee. We're drinking it black. No caffeine soda either. We never had any withdrawl symptoms. Not really missing the caffeine either.

So, the switch was gradual. We are drinking decaf, black every morning. After 30 years, not missing it. I really don't notice alot of difference in how I feel, except I don't feel jittery (that I used to feel sometimes). I'm wondering why I waited so long to stop the caffeine.

I've dropped 6 pounds since Feb 15, and my husband has dropped 14.