Marcus started like most ambitious professionals: one cup of coffee to jumpstart busy mornings. "When I got promoted to VP, the workload tripled overnight," he explains. "Coffee wasn't optional—it was survival."
But what began as morning fuel quickly escalated into an all-day dependency. By year two, Marcus was consuming 4-5 cups of coffee daily, plus 2-3 energy drinks to power through marathon strategy sessions and late-night client calls.
"At first, it felt like a superpower," Marcus recalls. "Instant focus, sustained energy, the ability to outwork anyone. I thought I'd found the secret to executive success."
The pattern Marcus describes is disturbingly familiar to Dr. Patricia Huang, who specializes in executive health at the Stanford Executive Medicine Center. "We're seeing unprecedented numbers of high-performing professionals who've become physiologically dependent on caffeine just to function normally," she says.