As some of the most loyal Sporting Chic readers may have seen on our YouTube Channel, I recently got my wisdom teeth out right before Christmas. Things went very smoothly with minimal pain and complications. Or in other words, it was a living hell I wouldn't even wish on Kristie, when she asks me to go out in the cold after a two hour workout to take pictures of her duck-facing against an abandoned brick wall. Where do I start?

Waking up every three hours feeling like someone is slapping you in the side of the face with a set of nunchucks? Having to eat dumpy bowls of mush the days leading up to Christmas while my mother rattled off dozens of gourmet meals a day for the boys because she's obsessed with them? Or the fact that my little brother who was home from college and had his barbaric, inbred friends over every night to "pregame," so I'd have to listen to them yell 'WHATS UP STEPH HOWS SOCCAHH GOING' every 30 minutes I went to the freezer to get my ice packs.

NONE of these misfortunes came close to what I quickly realized would be the most catastrophic of them all: not being able to have coffee for three days. I've never had surgery before, so I didn't know that with anesthesia you couldn't eat or drink anything after midnight the night before. I panicked for three straight days in between my pre-op and surgery appointments about what I would do to resolve this, seeing as I tried going without coffee randomly one morning six months ago and didn't make it past noon because of the shaking, sweating and paranoia.

At 6 a.m. on surgery day, when my mom walked in on me in the kitchen staring at a caffeine tablet, pondering on how I could dissolve it in my mouth without any food or water, I officially concluded I had a problem. I vowed to use the situation as a springboard to ween myself off the black water, not for good, but just to relinquish its complete control of my morning happiness, mood, or in other words life. Sound familiar?

During my detox I was able to compile a list of signs that coffee may be ruling your life like it did mine. I would say if you can relate to over 75% of these, your guilty.

1) Coffee is your favorite hobby, not just your favorite drink. Do you make up that you have "work" just to go to a coffee shop? Is it your go-to activity to ask a friend to join you on? Do Sunday morning premier league games become 20 x better with a cup? Yup, #addict.

2) You recently had to find an apartment in an urban area, and not having a coffee shop in a 2 block radius was a deal breaker. Two points if you'd be willing to pay $100 a month extra just for this luxury.

3) You can't remember the last time you passed on ordering a coffee when you went to Starbucks with a friend who needed one, even if you've had one in the last half hour.

4) You always order a large coffee with a small straw to give it a chance of lasting longer than five minutes.

5) Coffee is your favorite ice cream and frozen yogurt flavor.

6) You've paid Door Dash or grub hub 2-3x the amount of the coffee itself to have it delivered on a cold/rainy weekend morning.

7) You have no idea what people are talking about and accuse them of mental weakness when they whine, "if I have coffee after 3 pm I'll be up all night."

8) You know the first names of a minimum of three Baristas at your most frequented Starbucks. They also address you by your first name, and they say something trendy and annoying like "ahh mixin' it up today I see" when you deviate from your go-to order.

9) You've manipulated yourself into thinking that showing up anywhere with an iced coffee makes you cooler than you are.

10) You have a hard time trusting people who drink decaf, or WORSE, a frappuccino, before noon.

11) You own a "But first, coffee" or any other kind of coffee clothing paraphernalia because you think it may make a coddled, preppy, suburban girl seem more edgy

12) This post pisses you off because you think people who brag about caffeine detoxes are self-righteous.

What's your score? Stay tuned for part 2, where I get into the deep, dark, treacherous phases I suffered through during my caffeine detox!

Featured