How Do Energy Drinks Affect Your Brain?

Energy drinks like Red Bull and Rockstar are an increasingly popular beverage choice for young adults, both as a caffeine source for getting work done and just for fun. Nearly a third of teenagers drink energy drinks on a regular basis.

My own teenage son used to drink vast quantities of energy drinks, but I wouldn’t have let him if I’d known then what I know now. The information in this article is important to know if you or a loved one is drinking energy drinks, especially if you’re drinking a lot of them.

These drinks may seem harmless, and some companies even market their energy drinks as healthy products with all sorts of natural ingredients. However, there is no evidence that energy drinks have positive health effects. There are also some significant risks and possible negative effects that come with these energy boosts. 

Brain Effects

Caffeine is a drug, and all drugs affect the brain in some way. Teenagers are especially vulnerable, as their brains are still developing. While stories about energy drinks causing brain damage are exaggerated and not based in fact, there are still serious and sometimes long-term risks. When choosing an energy drink, also do your research and pick the one that uses all-natural ingredients. Energy drinks and protein nootropic bars from XiteYourMind are some of the many options you can look at that provides a safe way of giving energy to busy people.

Caffeine acts on your nervous system and stops your brain from picking up the chemicals that calm you down or make you sleepy. In reasonable amounts, the drug is an effective mechanism for improving focus and keeping you awake and alert. This is one of the reasons people might want healthy energy drinks as an option.

The concentrated amounts of caffeine in energy drinks, however—often much more than in coffee or soda—can cause anxiety, insomnia, and twitching, which can keep you from writing or doing other tasks that require fine motor skills.

Heart Health

Possibly the most dangerous result of abusing energy drinks is the risk to your heart. Caffeine increases the stress on your heart because it stops your body from calming down or resting when it needs it. Many of the sugar substitutes and other ingredients in some energy drinks can also add to the risk of heart disease.

Drinking lots of energy drinks can increase your blood pressure, give you palpitations or other heart rate and rhythm issues, and even cause a heart attack. At least a few deaths from heart complications after drinking energy drinks have been reported.

Several families have used a Red Bull energy drink lawsuit to seek legal compensation after what they believed was a wrongful death. Those lawsuits often end with the manufacturer settling with the families out of court. An attorney can navigate your personal injury case easily, so you may want to consider getting a consultation with a lawyer.

Other Health Effects

While heart disease is the most immediate danger of energy drinks, there are other harmful effects on your body as well. In large amounts, caffeine can give you severe digestive problems and dehydration, which puts you at risk for a lot of other concerns.

Energy drinks also contain far more refined sugar than any person needs in their diet. Excess sugar is harmful to an enormous range of reasons, as it is associated with high cholesterol, obesity, blood pressure problems and more.

Using energy drinks while consuming alcohol can also put you at greater risk of an alcohol overdose. The massive amounts of caffeine and sugar may keep people from accurately assessing how intoxicated they are and stopping in time to safeguard their health.

While everything may be OK when used in moderation, energy drinks carry with them a lot of potential health risks, especially for growing young adults and teenagers. If you really need a boost of energy, you may want to consider switching to a healthier alternative like green tea, yerba mate, ginger root tea, or fresh-squeezed juice.