How can I stop my mother from sweating at night?

What's her body temperature? Are you sure she's not running a fever?

I have our air conditioner set at 79 degrees and my mom is often cold, her hands and legs sometimes feel like ice, but sometimes her body feels warm and she still complains of it being cold. A little bit of a rub to help the circulation shows you are trying to take it seriously, but sometimes I just have to remind her that the house is warm enough and that she will just have to snuggle in and bear it until she can fall asleep. Also, modern electric blankets will turn off after a couple of hours or a hot water bottle tucked against her belly or at her feet will warm her up and cool off slowly.

I know this sounds odd, but do you think she is really cold or her mind is saying that she is cold due to dementia? It could be a delusion. Apparently, her body is hot and that is why she is sweating, unless there is an underlying medical condition.

I'd have her doctor check for the cause of the sweating and feeling cold. It can be a symptom of a medical condition like thyroid problem.

Oh, I might also examine her diet. I know that once when I was eating very little food and losing weight, I stayed cold too. Along with having doctor run tests, I'd ask about increasing her calories, if she isn't overweight.

When she says she's cold, have you felt her skin? If not, next time she complains of being cold, feel to check it out for yourself - if this is real or a delusion as Sunnygirl suggested. Especially feel her feet. If in fact her feet feel cold she could have a circulation problem which may be related to a heart condition- unless she already has been diagnosed with one? Regardless, it does seem worthwhile to schedule a dr appointment given all the disruption this is causing. I imagine you are doing laundry non-stop, not to mention sleep deprivation!

The secret, wear socks to bed if one is cold. Otherwise, too many bed clothing and too many blankets would make someone sweat during the night.

Sometimes for me, I have found if I am laying down for the night, I will develop acid reflex which will make me feel like I am having a hot flash. Tums help, plus sleeping on two pillows.

My mother had similar symptoms but they didn't last. The doctor said if they persisted to come in --could be an endocrine problem that could be addressed with medicine.

Ensure or Boost before bedtime. Orobably even though your mom is not diabetic, her sugar level plummets due to noy having appetite to eat enough carbs, etc.

Your mother needs to see her doctor to evaluate her medications if she is on any.
How old is she? Could she be going through menopause?

Did the doctor recently change your mother from a pain drug to another one without slowly reducing the previous medication? It is more than likely her medications

I am a normal 80 yr old who has always been on feeling cold side. If i go to bed feeling cool my body just gets colder so i either take a warm bath & stay in to realy warm body or turn on heating pad for feet. During the nite my body heats up mattress so i then am too hot & throw off covers. We have a temper pedic mattress you do not want in Phoenix. I lived in Yuma as a kid. We are cold at fan blowing 79. My guess is 82 w fan or 79 no fan is her best temp. I really suggest hot bath not shower as its not body warming for we cold folks before bed even in Phoenix as you have air cond on.

You could just take her outside in hot air & warm her up for short while in Phoenix. Oh yes when i get cold my teeth & nose get cold.
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Maddycat hits the nail on the head. You did not metion your mothers age but I am 56 and healthy and I am experiencing the same symptoms. It is the hot flashes and night sweats of menopause.

I had the same problem with my husband..he would wear a coat or sleep with the blankets on when it was 90 degrees. I tried to explain the reason he felt cold was the sweat was trying to cool off the body but he felt cold because of it.
I have learned many things in this journey but the first is NEVER argue with someone with dementia. You will not "win" and you both end up frustrated.
There are sheets and PJ's that wick away moisture that might help.
Hand warmers and foot warmers might make her feel warmer.
A little stocking cap at night might also help.
Try to get her to drink plenty of fluids, dehydration can also make you feel chilly and if she is sweating a lot she needs to replenish the fluids. Might even want to do a Sports Drink once a day. (if it is something she can have)
All in all if her body temp is alright change the sheets, the clothes and don't worry about it. Next time you bring her to the Dr. you might want to discuss it.
But you probably will not be able to get her to stop bundling up until she declines a bit more and you have more control of clothing, bedding and the like.
I have found with each problem, sometimes the solution comes with a decline and that brings another problem. So I have learned to be thankful for the little problems as larger ones come.

We are having this issue also. My husband feels warm to the touch, but he says he feels cold. What I have been doing is hugging him for a bit or until he falls asleep and he seems to stay warm the rest of the night. He does say he gets too warm in the middle of the night, but I haven't found a solution for that. He doesn't want to remove any of his covers for fear of getting too cold. Still looking for solutions. The other daily issue we have is that he feels he has severe headaches....pretty much all day long. I have noticed that when I get him out of the house he doesn't mention the headaches. I really feel it could be the dementia. Looking for answers there. Dementia is certainly a challenge at times.

When one's feet are cold it is difficult to fall asleep. Use a heating pad on low and once her feet warm up, you can remove it.

I have a thermostat issue myself, mine happens to be my auto nervous system. Has your love one been exposed to excessive heat when they were younger? Some examples would be working outside in the hot sun, hot baths/showers or other hot conditions. This damages your auto nervous system eventually if not addressed.

Another thing you'll probably need to check is physical activity level if she's not running a fever. When you don't exercise, you can feel cold when you're inactive for too long. I'm heat intolerant myself, and I can get very sick from overheating.

I forgot to mention how to keep her cool when she starts sweating sometime at night:

You can get a hold of one of those hot water bottles and instead of heating it up, freeze it flat in your freezer. Get one of the ones that doesn't sweat that much but still put a towel around it. Put it in the bed with her and have her lay on her back and put it against her side when she notices she's sweating. You can also get those other kinds of reusable cold packs that stay cold for many hours. You can look for them on eBay, which is where I found some really good ones. You can get certain sizes that'll fit in those thermal lunch bags and take back to bed with you at night. You can also keep somewhat washcloths in the lunch bag with the reusable cold pack, they'll stay cold as long as the reusable copack does. I highly recommend the cold packs that are hard when they're frozen, these are the ones that stay cold the longest from what I've noticed. There's a real good one I have right now called 'black blizzard'. This one can stay cold in the right kind of cooler for about two days. That is also such a thing as a reusable dry ice, they come in a sheet. You cut it to the size you need and I personally would use bottled water to soak thecloth cotton side, and when it's full, stick it in a Ziploc freezer bag to keep it moist. When you refreeze it, make sure reabsorbs all of the water it lost while using. After it reabsorbs the water then lay plastic side down back in the freezer.

Even after menopause has long ended, night sweats can continue for years. I recently talked to my gynecologist about this and this is what she told me. My suggestion is to put your mother in wicking-type pajamas or nightgown. Use a ceiling fan or very light fan on low in the room (not blowing directly on her). Provide a throw over the covers for her when she goes to bed but remove two or three hours later. Night sweats generally occur in the wee hours of the morning - like 3am and later. Let her know she may have to fold the covers back if she gets too warm or put her leg(s) or arm(s) out to cool down, then pull the covers back over herself as the wave of heat passes. I am 62 and have been dealing with this issue since I was 49. I am through menopause but still have the waves of heat at night - some nights worse than others - and very occasionally a wave of heat during the day. During the day, I dress in layers so I can remove a sweater or jacket to unobtrusively cool down. Often, I wake up in the morning with socks and my robe on the floor (which I started out wearing when I went to bed the night before).

I have also noticed that alcohol in the evening (beer, wine, mixed drinks) seems to make the waves of heat at night worse. Also spicy food. I have been trying to notice what I eat and drink and how it affects me so I can reduce the heat waves because it is very disrupting to my sleep. I am a small business owner and cannot afford to sleep in or nap during the day.

My Mom goes through the exact same thing. She is very healthy at 91 and takes no medications. She has had this off and on since menopause. I have read that it could actually be hot flashes as a lot of women can still get them into your 90s. My Mom keeps her house at 75 year round and her hands are cold but the rest of her is warm.
I started taking my Mom to a massage therapist every 2 weeks to get a full body massage. It really seems to help plus my Mom loves it. This is something she and I do together. I take her shopping on the weekends and part of our shopping includes the massages and or manicures, pedicures and even facials. Mom is on a fixed income but I have been able to fit the little extras into her budget.
I believe too that the massages have helped to keep her healthy.

I know when I used the plastic chucks my mom would be wet with sweat. I started using the material washable ones and it was much better

Have her thyroid checked. My Mom was always cold and anything she touched was ice cold. An adjustment was made in her medication and now she is fine. Also alcohol will make you sweat and if she is imbibing late at night she will sweat in her sleep.

but seriously ,
that s*it is going to blow your heart up .
POOF !!

happens all the time ..

You object to his cautioning *against* the ingestion of dangerous and illegal drugs?

The mattress top is probably wet too. When she goes back to bed, more sweat seeps into the mattress. The mattress cover may seep away some of the moisture - to the mattress surface. This may cause a mold problem.
My husband started sweating and then getting cold and by morning had usually gone through 2 t-shirts. His feet were getting cold so he tried a heated foot pad but then his feet sweat and got cold again. He didn't move around much at night - so more sweat would pool in one spot, seep through the mattress cover, and onto the mattress. You could hardly see any signs of sweat on the mattress cover as it was so good at pulling away the moisture. At the back/torso area and where he positioned his feet, the mattress would turn gold - as if he had wet the bed. Whether the room was hot or cold he still sweat. He tried more or less blankets but that made little difference. Maybe a better balance with medications is helping as he's at the snf. I just wonder if the medication changes may have helped in this respect. His room is kept at 75 now that weather is hot and humid. While still cold outside he had the room temperature set at 78. How are you managing to hold up through this?

Smschaff34,

Thanks for bringing up the point about the alcohol. I don't drink and I can tell you my parents dead. I'm not sure whether or not they ever sweated from it, I was always kept at a distance from them through their own choice to not bond with me, which makes me wonder why they didn't just give me up for adoption because they were constantly drunk. However, I knew of a neighbor who since moved in he was always drinking. Again, I don't know whether or not he always sweated from it, but I can tell you he said something about always being in physical pain. Apparently he was in some pain, which is why he drank more. I guess the more he hurt the more he drank, probably not knowing the alcohol was leaching calcium from his bones and causing osteoporosis on top of arthritis. Yes, it sounds like alcohol can do more nasty things then we know about, it destroys many things, including the human body.

Any number of things can cause night sweats, this can be checked into by a doctor and eliminations can be made until the cause is found. With me though, my auto nervous system is damaged because my drunken mother repeatedly made me soak in scalding hot bath water throughout my childhood. My problem actually started in my feet at a young age, making my feet feel like they were burning. This went on until it went dormant only to reappear later in life and went dormant again in my early adult life. I recall many times having to get up from bed at night to step into the shower and run the cold water for a few minutes, relieving the burning feeling in my feet. I then started having heavy sweats that worsened and then I started having episodes where I just didn't feel right when I overheated. My doctor diagnosed this condition as a rare condition because he's never really dealt with it, but I've since gained his support and understanding, and the support seems to be slowly coming more and more.

Besides the cold pack tricks I know to use for my condition, you can also look into cooling vests. There are actually only two affordable kinds, evaporative that you soak in cold water and the ones with the pockets where you can put certain sizes of reusable cold packs. There's also one more kind that takes the ice sheets, I have all three. Be very wary though of the evaporator have one, after about the first or second use it'll soak your clothes. The ones that take the reusable cold packs are actually better. You can fold them a certain way and keep them in the freezer so that when you need them you can pull them out and put them on. I leave mine on just long enough to cool me down so I don't get frost injury.

Another product you can consider keeping on hand is anything frozen to help the patient in the night. About the most comfortable thing if you can't stand external cooling is internal cooling. You can even go as far as getting a nice thermal mug that holds about a half gallon to right around the gallon. Keep some ice trays handy and make the patient ice water for by the bedside. When the patient gets hot at night, she can get up and drink some of the ice water. The more ice you put in the water, the longer it tends to stay cold with the right thermal jug, I use foam insulated jugs and I actually have a piece of hose that's a remote straw. I cook them long enough from where the jug is setting to where I needed to go. The only thing you must be careful love is when you put down the remote straw, don't the water siphon out of the jug, first raise up the end of the straw pretty high until the water reaches back into the jug before laying down the remote straw.

Now when dealing with the bed, you can do one of two things with sheets. You can put one either on top of the top sheet or even underneath of it. If you can check your local fabric stores, you may even be able to have some terry cloth where you can make your own custom cut terry cloth top cover for your beds and such. I found some terry cloth by accident in the craft section at local Walmart. When I get some money built up again, I'll consider getting some of this since I need protective sweaty covering myself. You can make many things out of terry cloth material can make many things out of terry cloth material. This is about as good as sleeping with a towel, which is what I find myself doing since this is summer and I've been waking up sweating myself. This is why I suggested trying the reusable cold pack tricks, they really do help. If the patient's bed is against the wall or they happen to have the right side rails with blankets over them, you can put an extra blanket up along the side rail and put a frozen hot water bottle up against the rail wrapped in a towel. The patient can lay with her back up against the cold pack, or you can even take the cold pack as I previously suggested, and have her lay on her back and put it up against her side, but go as closely they armpit as comfortably possible.

Continuation since I ran out of room:

If you have a fan with remote control, you can give the patient one of those to control as they need it, make sure it's pointed toward the bed so the air hits them when they need it. If you have a room AC in the area, you can keep it at a comfortable temperature and give the patient the remote if the AC is in her room.

I can't express enough how vital it is to ice water and other drinks handy, specifically sport drinks and not pop. When you sweat, you also lose salt besides just water. Have you ever noticed that getting sweat in your eyes tends to burn? This is the salt in your sweat. This is why there's sport drinks on the market. You can even get popsicle sleeves and make popsicles out of your sport drinks. There was a time I found sports drink popsicles at a local store, and I was upset when I couldn't find them anymore because I desperately need them pretty bad. I then found popsicle molds online, which gave me an idea to start making my own. This really helps with internal cooling. I then started finding giant popsicles at a friend's convenient store. They are in a special sleeve you can refreeze if the Popsicles thaw out. Sometimes Popsicles that are in special sleeves may come unfrozen, and all you have to do is freeze them. You could keep frozen stuff handy for the patient or anyone else in the household, especially during summer when everyone needs something cold.

If you like to travel at night, sometimes you can find slushy drinks at local gas stations. When the patient wakes up hot, you can stop by a local convenience store that has slushy drinks and pick one up if you happen to be going that way.

There are a number of ways you can relieve sweating and overheating, I can go on and on and on because I have this condition myself. Sometimes when money is tight and community centers are open, it's sometimes away from home where we need the help. We have a community center here in our town, and I'm pushing for them to share cold and frozen snacks with more than just the children's program because everyone needs it besides the kids. There are more Popsicles there than those kids will ever eat, (and you know the staff are very likely back there eating the popsicles and frozen snacks themselves)! Putting the heat on by speaking up and raising awareness will start making people more aware of what's going on because sometime someone will put a stop to it. Anyway, I hope you're able to find a working strategy for the sweating and overheating problem, there are so many strategies I can't count. The final idea I thought of for summer is keeping a shallow pool handy for a quick cool-down. You can keep these in the backyard or if you have room indoors, you can keep them indoors. Cooling down in a shallow pool works wonders. You can also take the patient to the shower and run a cool shower for them. While they're in the shower you can change their bed and bring clean dry clothes for them to slip into. I hope I was able to share something that was helpful since there are so many strategies out there to help with sweating and overheating

freqflyer: Wearing socks to bed is a good way to get a fungus infection. I would advise against it.

Notmycuz: I don't know how YOU stand it at 83 degrees! Phew! Must be hot as blazes!

My 90+ mother was always cold until we gave her something alled "VitaPulse". Not sure why that worked but it did (has CoQ10, NAC and PQQ in it). Choline helps with mental clarity. We always kept socks on her. Maybe gloves and a hat would work better than more blankets. Every person is different.