Your two best things in life are in a love-hate relationship – coffee + sleep. International Coffee Month is all about glorifying those golden beans and everything they do for us, but this week we’re getting a wake-up call in light of Sleep Awareness Week (1-7 October) about improving our caffeine habits to get a better night’s sleep.

In some countries, coffee reading is certainly a very popular ritual, a practice used to interpret coffee grounds at the bottom of the cup to predict the future. Well, stop reading your coffee beans, because now the tables have turned and researchers have found that reading your DNA (not the mess at the bottom of the cup)  can uncover your relationship with your favourite cup – and more importantly let you know if you’ll be getting a good night sleep or not.

It’s not you- it’s me. A conversation we may need to have with our coffee after a new DNA test identifies how long it takes the body to process caffeine and how it can affect your nerve cell activity more than others when it comes to the quality of sleep.

The study found:

  • One-third of Australians are reliant on caffeine
  • 74% of caffeine drinkers report not sleeping well
  • 1 in 4 never feel rested upon waking up in the morning

They say the most dangerous drinking game you can play is skipping your morning cuppa, however, if you’re in a love-hate relationship with coffee, you can send through a swab to myDNA and they can help you to establish a better routine for your body so you can still have your coffee and drink it too.