This 32-year-old woman has a warning for everyone: do not become addicted to energy drinks because your health may suffer.
She learned this the hard way from her own experience with a serious health issue due to drinking a large amount of energy drinks on a daily basis.
Samantha Sharpe, now 33, from Leicester, UK, is a working mother of three children and in order to keep up with her work and family chores, she started consuming energy drinks.
The amount soon reached up to 6 energy drinks per day.
Energy Drinks can Damage the Health
The sugar and caffeine from these beverages started to take a toll on her health. Though it may have boosted her energy short-term, the blood sugar crash caused a heart racing. Then, she would feel exhausted and therefore, she reached for another beverage to get back the energy.
She explains that the drinks made her heart beat faster and trigger palpitations. She also experienced headaches, felt grumpy, and constantly needed these drinks to keep a balance between her job and caring for her family.
She worked evenings and needed the drinks to get her through the day. When the unpleasant symptoms started, she did not pay too much attention as she was unaware of the damage these drinks were doing to her body.
She could not fall asleep and had shakes when she did not have an energy drinks. She explains that ‘I feel like an addict to the stuff’.
In 2014, she was consuming up to five or six cans of this drink and this habit continued for four more years. But, once the blackouts started, she knew she had to go to the doctor’s office.
Samantha’s Health Was Diminishing
Even though her family warned her about the negative effects of consuming such a huge amount of these drinks, she did not listen. Her sister, a nurse, told her that being addicted to these drinks is worse than that of being hooked to heroin.
When she consulted her doctor in 2018 due to the blackouts, she was diagnosed with a first-degree heart blockage which had extended to the second degree.
She needed to have a pacemaker fitted that year and she explains that this is when she realized how close she was to losing her life. This was a scary experience for her because her children saw her going in and out of the hospital.
To make things worse, Samantha also had kidney stones and pre-diabetes type 2 because of the enormous amount of sugar from the energy drinks. The doctors could not pinpoint the main cause; however, they noted that consuming these drinks has not been helpful at all.
What Is Happening with Samantha Now?
Since being fitted with a pacemaker in 2018, the mother-of-three claims to have gotten a new lease on life. She works at a pub in the evenings and the blackouts have stopped. But, she needs to go to regular consultations with her doctor every six months and will need to replace the pacemaker every 10 years.
She believes that the effects of consuming these beverages need to be advertised better and to teach everyone they are not good for the health. And, that we need to learn more about why they are harming our health.
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