Night sweats

Most people sweat a little in the night. The NHS draws the line at sweating so much that your night clothes and bedding are soaking wet even though the room is cool. In midlife, menopause is one of the most common reasons for it, and ACOG describes night sweats as hot flashes that happen while you sleep, often enough to wake you and leave you tired and sluggish the next day.

Night sweats that may not be menopause

Sweating at night in your forties or fifties is easy to put down to hormones, and often that is right. The NHS still asks you to see a GP if any of these apply:

• the sweats are regular and they wake you up or worry you
• you also have a high temperature, a cough or diarrhoea
• you are losing weight without trying

Those signs point away from menopause and deserve a proper check. The same NHS page lists other causes of night sweats:

• some medicines, including certain antidepressants, steroids and painkillers
• anxiety
• low blood sugar
• alcohol or drugs
• hyperhidrosis, a harmless condition where you sweat too much

If the sweating began around the time you started a new medicine, tell your doctor. Do not stop a prescribed medicine on your own: a GP can look at whether a different one would suit you better.

What helps at night

The National Institute on Aging suggests noting what seems to set off a hot flash and how much it bothers you, then working on the room and the evening. Its list for nights includes a lower bedroom temperature, a fan, a few sips of cold water before bed, bedding in layers you can push off, and nightwear in layers too. It also suggests cutting back on alcohol, spicy food and caffeine, and quitting smoking. The NHS self-help page adds a cool shower, a cold drink and avoiding hot drinks, and says cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) can help with hot flushes and sleep problems.

Sleep is worth working on in its own right. The NIA notes that waking may itself trigger a hot flash, so a steadier night can mean fewer sweats as well as more rest. Our bedroom checklist lists these steps one line at a time so you can mark what you have already tried. For medical treatment, talk to your doctor: this site does not give treatment advice.

Cooling bedding: features to look for

Neither the NHS nor the NIA names a fabric or a brand, so treat any claim that one sheet ends night sweats with caution. What their advice does point to is a bed you can adjust in the dark:

• a few thin layers instead of one heavy duvet, so you can drop one without waking fully
• a lighter duvet for summer, kept separate from the winter one
• light nightwear, ideally in layers you can take off
• covers and pillowcases that go in the wash easily, since soaked bedding needs changing often
• a spare top sheet or nightshirt within reach, so a damp one can be swapped without stripping the bed

A fan by the bed and a glass of cold water on the nightstand cost little and are both on the NIA list.

Keeping track

A record makes a GP appointment shorter and clearer. Our night diary puts each sweat on the same row as your wakings, which is the pattern a doctor will ask about. The articles here cover sweating in perimenopause and after menopause, what to change in the bedroom, and what to note before an appointment.