You’ve probably had night sweats if you’ve ever woken up with your clothes and linens saturated in perspiration. Night sweats are among the most typical symptoms women experience in the period preceding menopause, despite the fact that they might have a variety of causes: According to study, 74 percent of women going through menopause report having them.
Not only may night sweats be uncomfortable, but they can also negatively impact the quality of your sleep and, consequently, your general health. Find out how to stop night sweats below, along with when to discuss your symptoms with your doctor.
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Night sweats: what are they?
Hot flashes, sometimes referred to as vasomotor symptoms, or VMS, that happen while you’re asleep are referred to as “night sweats.” “We don’t really know why some people experience them at night and for other people, they only happen during the day,” explains UCLA Health’s Comprehensive Menopause Care program director Rajita Patil, MD, an OB/GYN.
As night sweats can last anywhere from one to ten minutes and cause flushing and face and upper body perspiration, we do know that they can arrive quickly and leave us feeling chilled when the hot flashes subside, according to OB/GYN Women’s health expert Sherry Ross, MD, is the author of the books She-ology and The She-quel. Additionally, you can get palpitations in your heart.
While night sweats are prevalent during the transition to menopause, some women experience them more often than others: According to the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG), some perimenopausal women may only have hot flashes a few times per month, while others may have them many times per day.
Years or even a decade may pass while these symptoms persist. The average length of time for vasomotor symptoms in a long-term study of women going through the menopause was 7.4 years, as reported in a 2015 article in JAMA Internal Medicine. However, the average length of symptoms was shorter (three and a half years) for women whose first hot flash occurred after their menstrual cycles ended, compared to those whose symptoms began before (up to nine or ten years).
What is the reason of menopausal night sweats?
Everybody’s body has an ideal range of temperature. Extreme cold causes your body to shudder in an attempt to warm itself; hot temperatures induce your body to sweat, which aids in cooling off the environment. This range gets more constrained as women get closer to menopause. Menopause, according to Dr. Patil, “narrows the more neutral zone (neither shivering or sweating) that our bodies reside inside.”
We still don’t know a lot about the causes of this. However, estrogen is considered to be a plausible reason, similar to most alterations that occur throughout perimenopause and menopause. One idea suggests that a reduction in estrogen leads to a disturbance in the brain’s regulation of body temperature.
According to Dr. Ross, “lower estrogen levels associated with menopause negatively impact the hypothalamus, the body’s temperature regulator, resulting in hot flashes and nocturnal sweats.” “The thermostat in the brain is entirely off, which leads to fluctuations in body temperature and irregular nocturnal sweats.”
Additional reasons why people get night sweats
Menopause symptoms aren’t the only factor, of course, that can cause night sweats. Other environmental and internal variables that can cause night sweats include:
1. Room temperature
The temperature of your surroundings or room has a significant impact on your body’s capacity to control its own temperature, claims Michael Breus, PhD, also known as The Sleep Doctor. It’s normal for your body to begin sweating to help cool down if the room is too hot. (Sleeping comfortably in a room that is between 60 and 67 degrees Fahrenheit depends on the individual.)
“In actuality, your body must drop to a specific temperature in order for it to generate [the hormone] melatonin—which functions as a type of ignition key for sleep,” continues Dr. Breus. “Therefore, avoid melatonin and sleep while you’re hot.”
2. Heavy bedding or sleepwear
In the fall and winter, you may enjoy curling up with thick quilts, incredibly fluffy comforters, fluffy socks, and sweatpants, but in the spring and summer, they can be overly heated. Night sweats, please.
3. Bed-sharing
According to sleep specialist and Sleepless in NOLA founder Nilong Vyas, MD, sharing a bed can frequently lead to overheating. Consider this: If your body has problems controlling its temperature on its own, just picture what occurs when you share a bed with people (and dogs) who are fighting the same battle.
4. Alcohol consumption too close to bed
Sleep experts almost unanimously advise against drinking alcohol for a good reason: It is well known for disturbing sleep. According to Dr. Vyas, alcohol can also cause nocturnal sweats. There is some complexity to the mechanism.
However, alcohol opens your blood arteries and serves as a vasodilator, according to the American Addiction Centers. Greater blood artery width allows blood to circulate more quickly throughout your body, dispersing heat and causing flushing. As your liver breaks down the alcohol, it also produces heat. You may get warm and start to perspire as a result of this.
5. Medications
Because some medications can interfere with your body’s capacity to regulate temperature, they may produce night sweats as a side effect. According to Abhinav Singh, MD, medical director of the Indiana Sleep Center, the main medication categories most likely to induce night sweats include steroids, hormone treatments, and antidepressants.
There are several reasons why taking a prescription could make you sweat at night. For instance, a common class of antidepressant drugs called selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) may block a specific type of brain receptor that controls body temperature and heart rate, which may result in excessive perspiration. (In actuality, almost 20% of antidepressant users report having excessive perspiration.)
6. Infection
Night sweats could be a blatant sign that your body is trying to fight off an illness, says Dr. Singh. Fever from infections might naturally contribute to feeling very hot (or getting cold sweats) at night. Fever, chills, and cold sweats are documented side effects of the flu and common colds.
Along with other symptoms like fever, aches in the muscles, and swollen lymph nodes, your night sweats may be the cause of them. “Night sweats are related with infections including HIV, TB, and endocarditis, which occurs when germs enter the heart valve through the bloodstream,” he continues.
7. Hyperhidrosis
According to Breus, hyperhidrosis is another possible reason for nocturnal sweats. According to the Cleveland Clinic, hyperhidrosis, the medical word for profuse (i.e., dripping) sweating, can be brought on by a number of diseases, drugs, or underlying genetic conditions.
Hyperhidrosis typically manifests as redness on the hands, feet, cheeks, and underarms. To assess the severity of this condition and find out whether there are any other underlying causes for your excessive sweating, lab and/or sweat tests are used in the diagnosis process.
8. Stress and anxiety
According to Dr. Singh, persistent worry and anxiety may cause night sweats in certain individuals. Night sweats and other sleep difficulties are also common in people with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
This makes sense because nervousness can result from stress and worry, and uneasiness can also promote sweating when engaging in awake activities. In fact, compared to the general population, researchers discovered that individuals with hyperhidrosis experience higher rates of anxiety and sadness.
9. Sleep apnea
According to Dr. Singh, there may be a connection between sleep apnea, a dangerous sleep disease in which breathing ceases and resumes while you’re asleep, and night sweats. This occurs because blood oxygen levels drop in a person with sleep apnea when they stop breathing, which causes the body to begin sweating.
Loud snoring, feeling drowsy or having difficulty focusing during the day, elevated blood pressure, and waking up in the morning with a sore throat, dry mouth, or headache are other possible symptoms of sleep apnea.
10. Thyroid problems
Breus and Dr. Singh agree that another possible cause of night sweats is an overactive thyroid, which is the gland that releases hormones to control your metabolism among other things. People with hyperthyroidism, in which the thyroid gland overproduces thyroid hormone, are prone to night sweats and excessive perspiration overall.
They can also become extremely sensitive to heat. In addition to weight loss (despite an increase in hunger), jitteriness or irritability, frequent bowel movements, shaky hands, and/or muscle weakness are further signs of hyperthyroidism.
Ways to avoid having night sweats
1. Practice healthy sleep habits
According to specialists, maintaining proper sleep hygiene is the first line of defense against night sweats. To maintain the coolest possible body temperature during night, try the following habits:
- Keep your room cold and dark. If you don’t already have blackout shades, get some and set your thermostat to a low setting or turn on a fan to assist lower your body temperature. Taniqua Miller, MD, a midlife and menopause health specialist, empowerment coach, and obstetrician-gynecologist, advises that a comfortable temperature is closer to 65 to 68 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Consider your bedding. Dr. Miller suggests using cooling technologies or breathing-friendly pajamas and bedding. 100% cotton and bamboo fabrics are ideal at controlling moisture, and cooling gel-infused pillows and mattresses may also assist control body temperature. The Cleveland Clinic suggests flipping your pillow after placing a cool pack underneath it if you’d rather not to spend a lot of money on new bedding.
- Think layers. That includes your bedding (having both a blanket and a sheet to allow you to shed a layer if you’re growing warm) and your pajamas (look for loose garments in lightweight fabrics).
2. Inquire with your physician about hormone replacement treatment (HRT)
Although perimenopausal women can manage their night sweats with lifestyle changes, many find that drugs help with their symptoms. Furthermore, the North American Menopause Society and ACOG, two of the foremost professional organizations, claim that hormone replacement therapy, or HRT, is currently the most successful course of treatment.
According to Dr. Ross, “HRT is ultimately the greatest strategy to address disturbing night sweats.”
Experts emphasize that while there is a prevalent misperception that hormone replacement therapy is dangerous, it is not. Hormone replacement therapy (HRT) is a kind of drug that restores lost estrogen and possibly progestin. For many women going through menopause, HRT can be a safe approach to lessen hot flashes and enhance general quality of life.
3. Or enquire about other prescriptions
Not everyone is a good candidate for hormone replacement treatment; this includes people who have a strong family history of endometrial, breast, or ovarian cancer. Some women might even just want to stay away from hormone therapies.
If so, there are additional drugs that have also been demonstrated to reduce hot flashes. These consist of certain antidepressants, gabapentin, an antiseizure medication, clonidine, a blood pressure medication, and selective estrogen receptor modulators, also known as SERMs. For moderate-to-severe hot flashes, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration also approved Veozah (fezolinetant), a novel oral medicine, in 2023.
“There are evidence-based treatments for [menopause] symptoms that include hormonal, non-hormonal, and mindfulness approaches,” states Dr. Miller. “Talking about your needs and what can work best for you with your doctor is a terrific beginning step.”
4. Take into account cognitive behavioral treatment
According to Dr. Patil, women who have hot flashes have found cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, to be “very helpful.” The North American Menopause Society supports CBT as an effective nonhormone treatment for menopause. Studies back up its advantages: CBT may help reduce menopause-related depressive symptoms in addition to hot flashes. Through the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies, you can look for a CBT therapist.
5. Try stress-reducing habits
Some women find it beneficial to use stress-reduction techniques including mindfulness meditation, acupuncture, and hypnosis; however, additional study on alternative therapies is required, according to the Mayo Clinic. Specifically helpful may be hypnosis: The North American Menopause Society suggests clinical hypnosis as an additional nonhormone treatment for hot flashes, as research suggests it may lessen their frequency and intensity.
6. Schedule time for movement
Banafsheh Bayati, MD, an OB/GYN and the medical co-founder of Perelel, adds, “At this point, exercise is crucial.” She continues, “the major goal should be to simply focus on making time for regular daily activity.” Maintaining muscular mass, balance, and strength are all vital.
In a small 2016 study, women with hot flashes who underwent 16 weeks of supervised exercise showed improved cardiorespiratory fitness and reduced hot flash frequency as compared to the control group.
7. Eat a healthy diet
Consuming less sugar, consuming less alcohol and caffeine, increasing your intake of protein and fiber, and quitting smoking all contribute to bettering your general health, which may lessen the symptoms of menopause. After a long day, be especially mindful of what you consume. According to Dr. Ross, “Avoid alcohol, smoke, hot and spicy foods, and caffeinated beverages before bedtime.”
When should I consult a doctor for night sweats?
Although hot flashes and night sweats are prevalent throughout the menopause, they don’t have to be tolerated. Many women believe they must endure their night sweats in the hopes that their symptoms would get better while they adjust their lifestyle. According to a 2023 online survey done in the UK and published in BMC Women’s Health, 39% of participants said they didn’t seek medical attention from a professional for assistance in managing menopause symptoms like night sweats, in part because they believed their symptoms would need to be severe in order to require attention.
According to Dr. Patil, this shouldn’t be the case and you should make an appointment with your doctor as soon as you notice hot flashes. “Coming in doesn’t require you to have tried everything.”
That’s crucial, and not just because having night sweats is uncomfortable while they’re happening. They may negatively impact your quality of life by interfering with your daytime energy, mood, and sleep. According to study, having severe night sweats may potentially raise your risk of cardiovascular disease.
The final word
Dr. Patil states, “We don’t want to have to wait to deal with them.”
If you believe that your night sweats could be an indication of some underlying medical condition, like hyperthyroidism or sleep apnea, you should also consult your doctor. You may put an end to your night sweats and start down the path to better health overall by getting a good diagnosis and treatment plan.