Night Sweating

[jenwic]

I went to see my cardiologist yesterday and mentioned that I frequently wake up sweating at night. He said it is an autonomic nervous system thing and it is due to POTS ( that's not the way he explained it, but I forget his exact words). He said it is sort of like the startle reflex or something.

Does anyone else have this?

[Bella127]

I have this too. As your doctor said, I have always been told the same - "it's just a POTS thing". I don't know if it's because we're lying flat and our bodies are adjusting (although you would think that just being upright would make you symptomatic, not necessarily lying down), or if it has to do with body temperature, etc.

I have found that it helps to have, along with the top sheet, some cotton blankets on the bed in case I get cold (which will happen during the night- especially my FEET!). The cotton blankets "breathe" and I don't find myself sweating as much as I used to if I were to use a thicker blanket made of some non-breathable material.

Do you also have any kind of feather topper, etc. on your mattress? I was doing this for a few months because my bed seemed to hard and could get uncomfortable - but I think this ended up making me sweat more, because it was made of polyester. I took it off of my bed and we'll see how I do.

I do keep a fan on during the night, and also have an A/C unit in my window in addition to central air in the house.

I know most of us can't handle warm temps - but what does your doctor say about the night sweats - any specifics as to why this is attributed to POTS?

Chrissy

[Ernie]

Hi,

I have the same problem.

[Guest Sandy Sims]

I too have sweats--ususally at night--between 3 and 4 hours after I go to sleep. I am soon going to an Id doc appt 'cause this feels infectious to me. Will post if it amts to anything. But my tempwhen I have these is below normal at 97 degrees--also my pulse is over 125 --BP very low --when this happens. Past this I have no clue--but sleeping meds do not stop it--then I just wake up drugged and sweaty.

Also I have constant drainage frommy sinus to the back of my throat--and other symptoms that "feel" allergic but might be infectious.

Who knows?

XOXOXOXOX

Sandy

[willows]

I live in a pool of water all night and have done so for over 10 years now , but mine doesn't stop there and I get the sweats 24/7 all day and night ..........lucky old me

Food is just something I don't enjoy anymore as the sight , smell and even noise of food makes me sweat and you try eating when its running off your face like someones pointed a hose at it and said 'let her have it guys' not nice at all , in the end I've just given up and eat hardly anything that's on my plate now .........except ice-cream or ice lollies!

I'm up now ( its 4:15 am in the UK) because I started to sweat and I just get hotter and hotter when this happens and cannot get back to any normal sort of sleep again , not that I've had normal sleep for over 15 years on and off. UnfortunatelyI do have horrible pain in my legs, hips and lower back as well ever night with it , but the main thing is the sweats , I just cannot sleep like this and so I sleep when I can day time .

I really hate having this awful condition and just wish someone somewhere would find help for all of us who already have it and for those who may get it later on in there lives . Ami

[Gracefulprincess]

i get night sweats too......i had one last night

[carinara]

I used to get them night sweats as well. I used to wake up and my chest and shirt was very wet plus my heart would be really fasr. This was before i got diagnosed with POTS. During a hospital stay i had the opportunatety to have a long conversation with a very good cardiologist, he eyplained to me, that the sweating and the tachy in during the night comes from laying flat. Then he went into an explanation about the bloodflow to the heart whilest laying down and so on. He told me to elevate the head side of my bed and try to sleep that way to release my heart. Since then (its over 4 years ago now). I have never slept or layed totally flat on my back again. My head and chest are always positioned higher than my legs when i lay down, and i found out that i feel better the more my my back is elevated. So i sleep more sitting then laying. I got diagnosed with POTS 3 years later! Since i sleep like that my nightssweats are more or less gone. A few times a year they still occur but these are often the times when i find my self waking up in a flat position (because in during my sleep i moved to much and didnt notice it), but before i used to get them on a very regular bases.

It also seems to work with a lot of other people as well.

Maybe you should try it also.

All the best

[yogini]

Sweating is an autonomic issue. But do you take an SSRI? I didn't have night sweats until I started Paxil. It is worth it, though, because it makes me feel much better!

[jenwic]

My doctor didn't really explain it any more than I mentioned above.

Caranara, did your dr. explain what was wrong with the blood flow to your heart while lying down that caused the sweating?

[carinara]

jenwic,

Well, the doctor told me back then, that my blood volume was to high (the hospital i stayed at had some special medical machines that can meassure that). He scanned my heart whilest my legs were liftet higher then my head and showed me what happened. He said that whilest laying flat, my heart cant handle the increased blood flow to my heart and that this causes a stress situation to my body and sweats an tachy starts.

Back then (like i wrote before this was long before i got diagnosed with pots) i took the pill for Many month without a break because my gyn?kologist thought that my health problems are due to hormone problems. So it made sense to me as well because i didnt have a period in a long time which made my blood volume higher. The doctor also told me to give a little bit of blood everytime i can feel the symptoms (like higher BP or tachy) get worse. Now that i know i have POTS and that in theorie more and not less bloodvolume should help. I did stop the giving blood thing. But i startet it again because it does make a difference to me. Its only 50 ml a month ( not even a cup full). Elevating the bed plus this giving blood thing are both ment to decrease the big bloodflow to the heart in during the night. It seems to work with many people here who have heart and BP problems. There was a tv show with my doctor about it here in germany a while back. They showed how you can get the highest effect with as less medication as possible. This syndrom is called (Herzinnendrucksyndrom) which you would translate in heart inner pressure syndrom.

Since i dont know anybody else in germany with pots i do not know if iam the only one in Germany.

But i remeber reading on many pots sites that elevating the head end of the bed is a good thing to do anyway. So why not try it?

Hope that helps you a little

[Rachel]

I have this symptom at times. It isn't a nightly thing for me, but it does happen.

Rachel

[yogini]

Carinara,

I must say that I have never heard of a person with dysautonomia and too much blood volume. If you have high BP (which could be a symptom of dysautonomia), it might help you to cut back on salt or stop your birth control pills, which increase BP. I would not cut back on fluids And actually, raising the head of the BP is said to increase blood volume over a period of time. I think there is a description of the study on the Dinet info page.

By the way, I have my bed tilted and still get night sweats!

[carinara]

rqt9191,Like i said, this was many years before i got diagnosed with POTS. Nobody had a clue what was wrong with me back then and i was glad that somebody at least found something that wasnt right. My POTS Dr. said as well, that dysautonomia and too much blood volume doesnt go together, but he is also suprised that it does help me for some reason. By the way, i stopped the pill a few years ago and it was a good idea because i did feel much better afterwards.

[corina]

i've always thought that my (very frequent) night sweats have an hormonal cause. i remember waking up one night, dreaming i was in the swimming pool, which turned out to be my bed

i have tried to figure out what was going and saw an endocrinologist but to do any research i had to stop all my meds for about half a year. as that would mean i would be in bed all the time i didn't think that was an option at that time (i'm married, two children and the manager of our household ). i do think the night sweats are a dysautonomia thing, not sure what could cause it though.

corina

[ajw4790]

I have it every once and awhile. For me I think it is a thermoregulation issue.

[Guest Sandy Sims]

A question?

I mentioned these night sweats to my doc last week. He asked me a question. Do I sweat all over?

Haven't thought about it? I know my face and all around my neck are sweaty.

Is this an odd question?

Since I've noticed I don't seem to sweat on the lower halfof my body as much as the upper part--even tho the lower is better covered when I sleep???

Sandy

I have it every once and awhile. For me I think it is a thermoregulation issue.

[corina]

i do sweat all over. for me, especially the sweat on my legs makes me feel dirty as it really comes down in streams. i always wear pyjamas to avoid the yuckie feeling. before this started i didn?t even know that my legs could sweat like that!

corina

[carinara]

on my chest!

[seb10]

I sweat everywhere! Although now that we've started to get my meds figured out it seems to have gotten better. I'll have to ask my Doc about why this is the next time I go in.

Before we knew I had POTS my poor husband would come to bed and find me just drenched! He was always like, "what. is. going. on?!"

SO happy that we finally have an answer.

OK, enough of my babble. Be well you all!

-S

[gertie]

I sweat off & on 24/7. The only way I get any rest at night is to sleep under a ceiling fan. With the fan on I, & the bed, stay dry. If my feet get cool I cover with a sheet. It's like some sort of weird marathon with me at night. I turn on the fan, then I get cool, then I turn off the fan, then I'm sweating etc. Between that & getting up to go to the bathroom I feel like I've been working out all night. No wonder I stay so tired.

[Kadje]

Jenwic,

Oh my, I had such dreadful night sweats for many years! Often I had to sleep in a cotton terry robe on top of beach towels on the sheets and try to just let them soak up the sweat so I could get a little more sleep. Every time I drifted off to sleep I was jarred awake by a sweating incident. I thought it was hormonal because I was close to 40 when they started. I used natural progesterone cream for years. That helped some.

Then, in April of 2006, I had to have a pacemaker implanted. After that my night sweats stopped. Completely. Now I believe that the night sweats may have been keeping me alive. When I was in the hospital, the night before my PM was implanted, my heart rate was going down into the 20s!

Since then, I have had hot flashes during the day. I am now 53. But I am so thankful that I don't have those night sweats any more. What a luxury to sleep through the night and wake up dry!

(I am new here, so I don't know your history. Since you have a cardiologist, I guess you've worn a holter monitor so you would know whether your pulse is too low at night. But, maybe my story will help someone, anyway.)

[jjpots]

I too have night sweats but I was assuming it was due to the mestinon that I am taking. I have had it a handful of times since I started the med. in Dec.

JJH

[EarthMother]

I also get night sweats. Chest only. 2-3 hours after falling asleep. Worse during the "off week" of my period.

[Darlene]

It comes and goes for me, I will wake up in the night sweating, and I even have the air conditioner on in my room, or it will just hit me in the day, I always joke about moving to the North Pole.

[lmbutare]

I have superbad night sweats every once in a while. They are worst around my period, but can occur other times too. It's hard b/c I sweat like crazy but then I get cold from the sweat so I get the chills and it cycles all night. Very unpleasant! I sometimes use quick drying exercise shirts to sleep in to reduce the wetness. It's so weird to have this b/c I was always the person who only sweated minimally so it's very strange to have night sweats.

Same thing with if I have hot or cold beverages/foods...hot makes me overheat and sweat, cold makes me freezing. Man it stinks to not have any thermoregulation abilities!!