Scared of Night sweats

[SighNoMore]

Totally agree! Concrete answers would be nice!

[sassparella]

It seems that as far as health goes concrete answers are not always forthcoming It's very hard to accept a doctor's word that you're OK when he doesn't really know why you're getting a symptom. I would love to just put it down to hormones and get on with my life but I can't. If it were the onset of menopause it would have shown up in my hormone blood test and I would be getting hot flashes during the day as well and I'm not. It's getting overwhelming at the moment I'm so sure I'm dying of something and by the time the doctors acknowledge it it will be too late.

[SighNoMore]

I agree with you yet again! It is hard to trust when you have been lead astray before. I don't get day hot flashes either and still sweat at night. So I have no idea either!

[LindaRK]

Have any of you gals had blood testing to check your hormones or tsh levels?

Also - wanted to mention - I'm menopausal, but have had night sweats even before peri-menopausal.  When I had blood tests done, levels were within "normal" ranges so the word "normal" is obviously very subjective here. lol  If the night sweats are making you lose sleep, I think it's important to do something about it - take an over the counter or prescription med to help level out your hormones.  See if that helps.  Couldn't hurt at this point, right?

[SighNoMore]

Linda my hormones were normal as well, and I think Sass has been told the same. Thyroid was fine as well. I am preg now so I can't really take anything. The sweats started long before I was preg.

[sassparella]

Linda, I had my hormones tested and my thyroid they were all normal.

[SighNoMore]

Sass, my night sweats seemed to dissipate for a couple of days and now they are back with a vengeance. My legs and chest were dripping with sweat. I am so scared! I just don't know what to think anymore. I am going crazy.

[sassparella]

Tell me about it I feel the same. I just hate going to bed now and the first thing I check when I wake is whether I've been sweating and I wake several times a night usually sweaty.

[SighNoMore]

I am starting to be totally exhausted because I wake MANY times a night to check if I am sweaty. I am so exhausted the next morning. I just don't know what to do.

[sassparella]

Another bad night, I'm getting this every single night, no breaks from it at all. It's not hormones as my tests were all clear, so it has to be something bad hiding in there somewhere, I don't know how much longer I can take this without going crazy and my doctor has no answers. I feel for you too SighNoMore if this is making you feel anywhere near as bad as it's making me feel.

[SighNoMore]

Sass I am so sorry! I know how miserable this can be

[sassparella]

Sass I am so sorry! I know how miserable this can be

Thanks :) and yes it sure can be miserable.

[gcalex]

Sass, my night sweats seemed to dissipate for a couple of days and now they are back with a vengeance. My legs and chest were dripping with sweat. I am so scared! I just don't know what to think anymore. I am going crazy.

If they went away for a couple of days doesn't that suggest to you that it is extremely unlikely there is a catastrophic cause?  Cancer wouldn't take a vacation, would it? 

[SighNoMore]

Gcalex that is what I keep telling myself...I still am feeling overwhelmed with fear though. Trying your technique of so what.

[gcalex]

From my reading in the vast vast majority of cases these are benign.  And you would have other symptoms if it were catastrophic.  If I were a betting man, I would bet it was a hormonal thing even if your hormones "test" normal, or just something idiopathic -- no real cause at all.  As the saying goes, if you hear hoofbeats, think horses, not zebras. 

[SighNoMore]

Funny, my PA told me the same thing last week about the hoofbeats.

[gcalex]

Well we just might be on to something.  Just try on, for size, the notion that you are actually OK and that you have a benign nuisance symptom.  In your state it's going to feel strange and inauthentic, but try to stay with it for a while.  Try to imagine, just for a minute or two, what it would be like to feel confident and calm and unafraid.

[SighNoMore]

It would truly feel amazing to feel ok and to thing this is benign. I am sure Sass would agree. My fear or hang up is that if I let this fear go another will take its place. Trying to not go there. Trying to visualize that I really am ok, and it is ok to feel that way and be happy.

[gcalex]

Just take this one on -- if you can beat it you will have tools to use if another one arises.  This is all a process.  Sweat is just water and salt, it doesn't have to mean anything, I am betting countless thousands of women at a certain stage sweat at night.  Give yourself permission to be calm again and just to take it in stride and let it go where it goes.  It stopped for two nights, you said.  That, plus your doctor's assessment, are all the FACTS you need to know.  The rest is up to you.  You will feel so relieved once you give yourself permission to realize that you are, in all likelihood, fine. 

[SighNoMore]

Thank you. Giving myself permission. I like that idea. I think I have allowed myself to feel fear and anxiety for so long that I have forgotten that it is ok and acceptable to feel good and happy.

[gcalex]

Right, it becomes the new norm, and Newton's laws say it won't change by itself.  Once we're locked down into being a certain way, it takes courage and faith to make a change.  Robert Frost talked about the "courage to be new" in one of his poems.  When we're stuck in a bad place, it's worth summoning up one's courage and taking that first step out.  You can do this.  Give yourself permission.

[SighNoMore]

Thank you. Seriously....your words mean a great deal to me. I am taking a step away from the darkness and walking the road less traveled with Frost and Dickinson at my side I an conquer this. It won't be easy, but I have nothing to lose v choosing to be happy and believing that I am ok. I can't let the what ifs try and ruin the facts.

[gcalex]

i would rephrase that in a more positive light-- you have everything to GAIN.  Work on that positive thinking -- it's contagious -- if you aren't careful you might even smile.  Look, life is uncertain, but it doesn't mean you have to spend your life paralyzed by fear.  To the contrary, we have to learn not to reluctantly accept uncertainty, but to embrace it and to defy it.  As another saying goes, you can't stop the waves, but you can learn to surf.  I think there is a poster of this with a Buddhist monk surfing, if memory serves. 

[SighNoMore]

You are right. I d have everything to gain. The days I do have will be lived much more fully than I have been, and I am worthy of living a life that is full and enjoyable. Positivity is my new mantra.

[sassparella]

My problem is I get no nights off from these sweats at all and have only had them for a few months. I fear that the doctors have missed something as it can be an early sign of cancer and I worry that all this time that I'm trying to convince myself that I'm OK cancer is growing inside me to the point that it'll be incurable when it's discovered.