If you are getting ready to enter your forties, allow me to tell you what apparently is a secret to most of us, until it happens. One night you are going to wake up in a puddle of water, better known as sweat. Yep, you will be sticking to the sheets like you were in a wet t-shirt contest and you are the only contestant. It happened to me shortly after I turned 40. I’ll never forget it. It was the craziest sleep of my life. I just could not get comfortable.
I remember it was a regular night, but for me irregular was more like it. I just could not get comfortable for one. It was like my bed, my big Cali King was not the place to be. It was so hot. I tossed and turned. Then I had a brilliant idea. In my closet there was a mattress that the kids use when they would come in my room to hang out or watch a movie. I pulled it out the closet in the middle of the night and laid it on the floor, in a spot I declared to be the coolest in the room under the window. I was so annoyed because even thought I was tossing and turning trying to escape this unexpected wave of heat that kept attacking me, my husband laid sound asleep and totally unbothered by my squirming.
I hated my pajama gown, it started to cling to me, strangling my last attempts at comfort. I snatched it off and threw it across the room In frustration. I laid there and finally 2 hours before time for me to rise I finally dozed off. Only to awake shortly after feeling like a beached whale drenched in salt water.
With doing some research and talking with my doctor I learned that hormonally it was not abnormal to go through what I had been going through. Especially since the bouts with my tossing and turning were happening about a week or so before my period. Thankfully now that I understand my body a little more, I do not need to find a cool spot under the window anymore. I can use my blue pads for the nights I wake up wet and clammy. I also can sleep comfortable now because I found that right type of pillow to keep me aligned and feeling perfectly cradled to prevent all of my tossing and turning. The hormones are still going to show up, but at least now I can get comfortable when they do.
By
D.C. Beckner