NEED TO KNOW
- Hallie Walker ate six squares of chocolate in the back of her Uber, not thinking anything of it
- She realized after eating the chocolate that each contained 66 mg of caffeine
- She recounts the experience to PEOPLE after a video she took following the incident went viral on TikTok
Hallie Walker was sitting in the backseat of a dark Uber, in desperate need of something sweet. So, despite it being 11 p.m., the 27-year-old actress and content creator tore open a package of chocolate and quickly downed six squares before arriving home.
Eventually, the New York City local made it back to her apartment and went to bed. But just 30 minutes later, she woke up drenched in sweat.
“I felt nauseous and super panicked,” Walker tells PEOPLE exclusively. “My heart was racing like crazy, and my entire body was violently shaking for hours. I thought I was having a panic attack that just wouldn’t end.”
“I was dry heaving over the toilet for hours, crying and telling my husband I was dying,” she adds.
Around 6 a.m., Walker finally managed to fall asleep for a couple of hours. But when she woke up, she still felt terrible.
It wasn’t until later that morning that she realized what had actually happened: she hadn’t read the label on the chocolate. She had accidentally eaten Alice Focus & Energy Mushroom Chocolate — with each square containing 66 mg of caffeine.
“I am not a caffeine person at all,” she says. “I literally don’t drink it because it always makes me feel weird. Every so often, I’ll have a chai latte to fit in, and even that makes me jittery almost immediately.”
Walker, who makes comedy videos on TikTok, says that even in the middle of the chaos, a small part of her brain knew it would make great content. So, she filmed a video about the experience and posted it to her account.
Not long after, the video went viral — racking up over 1.8 million views and 3,200 comments. Since many of her TikTok videos are satire, a lot of people assumed it was just another bit she made up.
“That’s the equivalent of five Red Bulls 😭,” one user commented.
“As a former hugeeee caffeine consumer, y’all are not taking this more seriously. Heart attack/cardiac arrest in these scenarios are real real,” another wrote.
“So glad you are alright, sounds horrid,” added someone else.
“The comments turned into the caffeine Olympics,” Walker says. “Everyone was fighting over caffeine science and flexing how much they drink every day.”
Looking back, she admits the chocolate worked exactly as advertised — the only issue was user error.
“I just don’t know how to read, apparently,” she jokes. “The brand actually sent me a really sweet care package after seeing the video — it was full of products to help with sleep!”
“If I had taken five seconds to read the label before shoveling it down my throat… lol,” she jokes.
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