Prevent Night Sweating
While treating sleep hyperhidrosis, we should think about how our anatomy naturally disperses heat as we are sleeping.
Two of the methods our bodies use to reduce heat are convection and radiation. This article should help you understand these two mechanisms and better utilize them to decrease night sweating.
Human sweat is a result of a prompt from a part of your brain known as the hypothalamus. It works just like our own built-in temperature regulator. When the hypothalamus thinks your body body needs to be cooled down quickly, it broadcasts commands to your sweat glands to relieve the heat and cool your skin surface.
Our bodies radiate heat somewhat like an electric heater or fireplace. Thus one way our body eliminates heat is through simple radiation.
The radiation of heat requires a transference of heat. If the surfaces or spaces around your body are warmer than your body, it helps make it difficult for your body to maximize its use of radiation. So keeping in the heat your body emits just increases the ambient temperature near your body and thus can increase the temperature on the surface of your skin.
In order to increase your body’s use of radiation to reduce heat, you need to give it plenty of room to breathe for that heat transference to occur. Buy breathable, natural materials for your pajamas and your bedsheets. Wear pajamas that are loose and don’t wrap yourself tightly with your linens.
Just as you may reduce the heat of your meal by circulating air over it, your own body is able to cool itself as air blows over your skin. This method of cooling is called convection. Most of us are probably acquainted with the experience of the way a breeze blowing towards you provides a cooling sensation. This is an example of convection at work. It isn’t necessary air that is cooler than you, but it is enabling your body to cool you using convection.
To leverage convection for night sweating relief you need to provide air movement around you. Using a cross draft may do the job, but a ceiling fan or bed fan may work better.
Thus to stop your hypothalamus from triggering perspiration, try to help it use radiation and convection from the start. By helping your system just do what it needs to do with these helpful mechanisms, you can significantly reduce night sweats.