First you start out with just one cup of coffee every so often, then it turns into every week, every day, and then multiple times a day. While coffee has clear health benefits, it’s important not to overindulge. This is where tea comes in. Not ready to give up your cup of joe quite yet? How about coffee in the morning and tea in the afternoon or before bed? Here’s why you need to introduce this ancient drink into your modern daily ritual.
1. Good For Your Teeth
Tea has fluoride in it, which is the thing that makes your teeth resistant to decay (aka cavities). However, if you drink too much of it, you run the risk of getting too much fluoride which can be a bad thing. But that’s if you drink a lot of tea. So as long as you keep your intake moderate, you’re going to be just fine. On the opposite end of the spectrum, we have coffee which is notorious for causing teeth discoloration and yellowing. Plus it gives you bad breath. So if you want to protect those pearly whites all while keeping your breath smelling good, tea is the way to go!
2. Less Caffeine (and yes, that’s a good thing)
Yes, less caffeine, in this case is a good thing. With coffee, our bodies become physically dependent upon the mass amounts of caffeine we take in when drinking it. This means that when you don’t have your cup in the morning, you can feel its absence effect your alertness and performance. This is because coffee has a depressing effect which reduces energy levels. So, while you may feel great at first, eventually you will come down from your caffeinated rush. On the flip side tea, specifically green tea, works as an anti-depressant, meaning it helps boost your mood and overall energy levels so it will keep you going through the day without any side effects getting in the way. And the great thing about tea is, while it does have less caffeine per serving compared to coffee, all you have to do is add more tea leaves to get more caffeine!
3. Hydrates Your Body
Coffee has been known to dehydrate you. The great thing about tea is it is straight H2O with added tea flavor. You are helping hydrate yourself while getting a yummy caffeine fix. Drinking tea instead of coffee can even help improve your skin because you will notice that it looks and feels more hydrated after a few weeks.
4. Easier to Make
Okay, so this point isn’t as valid anymore thanks to our friends over at Keurig. But, it can still be argued that heating up some water and placing a tea bag in it is one of the easier things you have to do as a part of your morning routine. For the average coffee drinker, it requires sugar, cream and flavoring to get the perfect cup of jo in the morning. But if you find the right tea, it’s just as simple as putting the bag in water and letting it sit for a few minutes.
5. Strengthens Your Immune System
Studies have found that tea boosts the body’s defenses against infection. An experiment done on tea and coffee drinkers showed that immune system blood cells from tea drinkers responded five times faster to germs than did the blood cells of coffee drinkers. So tea can help keep the doctor away! While it won’t help your sickness magically disappear if you’re already down with something, it will help prime your immune system for next time it’s threatened.
