You’re probably too busy gazing over your smartphone in the morning to think about the lifespan of the straw in your trendy iced coffee.

While you devour your drink during class, the straw you use will spend the next 300 years decomposing, according to 4ocean, an online campaign that promotes recycling.

That’s more than your lifetime, the lives of your future children and even your grandchildren. Recently, news outlets like BuzzFeed, Vice and Vox have been posting content about the harm straws are imposing on landfills, oceans and sea animals encouraging viewers to completely ditch the straw or buy reusable ones.

Americans use 500 million straws every day, according to Eco-cycle, which is enough to fill 127 school buses a day with just straws.

When these straws end up in the ocean, they harm sea animals like turtles, fishes and seagulls; we’ve all seen the video of the turtle struggling to breathe with a plastic straw up its nose.

But little of us think about the fish who try to slowly eat the straw. That piece of tilapia you ate at the dining hall more than likely consumed plastic throughout its lifetime and now you’re consuming bits of it as well.

Despite these online campaigns, not many changes are going on in the consumerism world to stop the use of plastic straws. Yet, maybe one day, a reusable straw will be just as trendy as a reusable Trader Joe’s or TJ Maxx bag.

One of the most problematic straw places is restaurants. Most times when you go out to eat, the waiter will bring your drink with a straw already in it. In my personal experience as a waitress, it’s second nature to me to put a straw in your drink unless you asked not to have one. A large number of times, instead of asking me to not bring a straw, customers will just take the straw out or leave it to the side.

The problem with this is, due to sanitary reasons, I can’t just reuse that straw for another customer; I am forced to throw it away, leaving the straw to inevitably continue its 300 year-long journey. So, the next time you’re in a restaurant, tell your waiter you don’t need a straw.

Bigger companies like Starbucks are planning to go ‘straw-less’ by remodeling their new cold cups to a design that doesn’t require a straw. Starbucks hopes to be globally strawless by 2020, hopefully, this trend will encourage other companies to make their drink straw-less as well.

In terms of the changes you can start making to reduce the straw waste in the world, bringing a reusable cup with a reusable straw to your coffee shop next time is incredibly efficient. Starbucks offers their customers a 10-cent discount for using a reusable cup, as well as low-cost re-usable cups for less than $5. According to their website, if your low-cost cups becomes stained or overused, you can trade it in for free.

If you feel you just can’t live without a straw, you can also buy reusable stainless steel or rubber straws online ranging from $5 to $15 on Amazon. The Final Straw, a reusable straw company, sells retractable key chain stainless steel straws from with a special pipe for cleaning. Although these are on the expensive side at $20 they make a great item to add to your birthday or Christmas list.