How I Replaced (some) of my Coffee With Herbal Tea

For most of my adult life, I was the guy with a coffee mug in his hand. Not figuratively, literally. I picked up the habit during my 20 years in the Army. Coffee wasn’t just a beverage; it was a lifestyle. Early mornings, late nights, patrol briefs, hurry-up-and-wait moments, coffee was the thing that filled the space. It was the background music to everything.

So when I say I drank a lot of coffee, I mean a lot. I’d top off my mug every time it got low. It wasn’t unusual for me to drink coffee all day without thinking about it. And here’s the kicker: I didn’t drink it black. I took it with half-and-half and sugar. Delicious? Absolutely. But silently working against me? Very much so.

Over time, I noticed the scale creeping up. Not dramatically — just a pound here, a pound there. But it adds up. The turning point was when I realized that while I told myself I was “just drinking coffee,” what I was actually doing was pouring in hundreds of extra calories a day through cream and sugar.

That’s when I decided to try something simple: replace coffee with herbal tea — not all at once, not cold turkey, just… swap some of it out and see what happened.

And I’ll tell you, I didn’t expect much. But I ended up losing 7 pounds in just two weeks, without changing anything else.

The Small Change That Made a Big Difference

Let me be clear: Coffee itself isn’t the villain. Coffee and I aren’t on bad terms. It’s what I added to the coffee that was quietly sabotaging me. When you drink coffee all day, and every cup comes with half-and-half and sugar, the calorie count isn’t small, it’s substantial.

Herbal tea offered me a way out of that loop.

Instead of cream and sugar, I now use just one teaspoon of honey in my tea. Not tablespoons. Not a heavy pour. Just enough to take the edge off and keep it enjoyable.

The result?
A warm, flavorful drink that doesn’t overload my system with sugar.

It satisfied the ritual without the calorie baggage.

What Surprised Me the Most

The first thing I noticed when I started to replace coffee was how different my energy felt. With coffee, especially the way I drank it, the pattern looked something like this:

Spike
Buzz
Crash
Repeat

With herbal tea, the energy felt… steady. No jitters. No crashes. No 3:00 p.m. “I need something to pick me up” urgency. Just even, calm alertness.

It also didn’t trigger cravings. Coffee with cream and sugar always made me want a snack, usually something sweet. Herbal tea didn’t do that. It actually reduced my appetite.

Another Unexpected Win: Better Sleep

Even though I didn’t feel like coffee was affecting my sleep, it was.

Once I started scaling back and replacing some of my coffee with tea, I noticed my sleep became deeper and more restorative. I didn’t toss and turn as much. And I didn’t wake up groggy.

It’s quiet, subtle, but real.