Are you constantly asking yourself, ‘why am I a hot sleeper and what can I do about it? Hot sleepers often find they can’t get a comfortable night’s rest.
Unfortunately, this can lead to negative effects in your everyday life, such as low daytime energy and excessive sleepiness.
Hot sleep tends to be multi-causal. Many environmental and psychological factors can contribute to a person being a hot sleeper, such as cheap bedding and unsuitable pajamas.
The problem is, that when you can’t cool your room and body, it’s harder to fall asleep and you’ll find you wake up continuously throughout the night.
Read on to learn why you’re a hot sleeper and what to do about it.
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What’s the Problem with Being a Hot Sleeper?
Hot sleepers have a temperature regulation issue. As a result, many of those afflicted experience elevated temperatures and tend to wake up due to night sweats and hot flashes, affecting their quality of sleep.
The core body temperature regulates not only body heat but also melatonin production. When your body temperature drops, it signals melatonin production, encouraging your body to sleep.
If your internal body temperature doesn’t go down, melatonin won’t be produced. You’ll find it harder to drift off and you’ll keep waking up throughout the night.
While a few hot nights may only lead to tiredness the next day, continuous temperature issues can cause sleep disorders.
If your overheating problem wakes you up at night, try the Aricove Cooling Gravity Blanket to lower your body temperature and keep you consistently cool.
Why Am I a Hot Sleeper? 8 Reasons.
Hot sleepers often have trouble falling asleep because of their elevated core temperature. Here are some of the main reasons you may have trouble finding the perfect temperature to sleep.
1. Bad bedding and blankets
Bedsheets and blankets could be the reason behind your night sweats.
Depending on the types of sheets, bad bedding can trap heat as your skin temperature rises, especially in the summer months.
The best way to avoid an increase in body temperature is to find breathable bedding with natural materials such as wool, cotton, or bamboo bedsheets.
2. Humid bedroom environment
Another reason you can’t get a restful night could be due to a humid bedroom.
When your bedroom temperature rises, especially during hot weather, proper airflow becomes essential. If air doesn’t circulate well, your room will get humid, increasing the temperature and making it harder to sleep. This will interrupt your night of sleep and decrease sleep quality.
The NineSky Dehumidifier will help with the high humidity in your bedroom and give you a better night sleep.
3. Non-breathable sleepwear
Pajamas made with synthetic materials, such as nylon flannel pajamas, aren’t breathable.
Contrarily, cotton, wool, or silk pajamas are made with natural materials, creating breathable fabric that cools you down in warmer months and heats you during winter. This provides the perfect temperature for a comfortable sleep.
4. You sleep with your pets
Your pet is a source of extra body heat that boosts your internal temperature.
While cuddling your pet may bring you comfort, it may also be disrupting your deep sleep. Sleeping by yourself could make you a few degrees cooler during the night.
5. You’re on medication
Some medical conditions require you to take medication that may be affecting your sleep by heating your body.
Be aware of the effects of medications such as anticholinergics and beta-lactam antibiotics, including penicillin and cephalosporins, diabetes medication, hormone therapy medications, painkillers such as acetaminophen (Tylenol) or aspirin, SSRI or tricyclic antidepressants, or steroids such as cortisone or prednisone.
6. Hormonal fluctuations and hormone disorders
Hormone levels fluctuate during your menstrual cycle, as well as during menopause and pregnancy.
When hormone production fluctuates as part of your natural cycle, you often experience temperature changes which can affect sleep. You might experience hormone-related hot flashes and true night sweats.
7. Your partner is heating you up
If you and your partner are sleeping in a bed that’s too small, then body heat accumulates.
A king-size bed could be the answer to your sleep issues, providing comfortable sleep rather than wakeful hot nights.
8. You’re ill
Several medical conditions affect your body temperature, such as the flu, strep throat, pneumonia, tuberculosis, colds, and other bacterial infections.
Other health conditions that can make you feel hot at night include cancer, coronary heart disease, hyperthyroidism, and chronic stress.
Remember, poor mental and physical health can also lead to hormone-related hot flashes.
Take care of your physical and mental health if you want to sleep better.
9. Menopause symptoms are getting the better of you
Many midlife women going through menopause experience hot flashes as their levels of estrogen fluctuate.
Hot flushes brought on by menopausal transition can wake you up to all-over irritation and they can increase the prevalence of night sweats.
Hot flash symptoms cause heat to rise in the body, particularly to the face and cheeks. While this is one of the most common symptoms of menopause, it’s still very uncomfortable and can wake you up at night.
Other menopause symptoms that may cause problems to your sleep include vaginal dryness, chills, bloating, and inflammation.
How to Keep Yourself Cool at Night — 11 Hot Sleeper Solutions
There are several simple solutions to make your bedroom better for sleeping and help you attain deeper sleep without overheating.
1. Try a cooling weighted blanket
Classic Cooling Gravity Blanket is a cooling weighted blanket, specifically made for hot sleepers. Its moisture-wicking fabric is highly breathable, enabling good airflow to prevent heat from building up.
Not only does this blanket keep you cool, but it also uses deep pressure stimulation to increase serotonin and melatonin, providing a calming effect and better quality sleep.
2. Invest in breathable bedding and cool sheets
Comfortable sheets made from natural materials will keep you cooler than those made from synthetic fibers. Try using cotton sheets, wool bedding, bamboo sheets.
Breathable sheets made from natural fabrics will cool you in two ways:
- It will improve airflow
- It will wick moisture away
Synthetic fabrics of poor quality will trap heat between the bed linens, causing heat retention that warms your body. This results in you sweating. If you’re looking for sheets for night sweats, it’s smart to steer clear of cheap synthetic fabrics, in favor of breathable material and quality fabric.
Think wool bedding, eucalyptus fiber, top-shelf cotton, and bamboo linen instead of cheap, nasty polyester. Natural, breathable sheets will encourage airflow and wick moisture.
Try the Lane Linen Egyptian Cotton Sheet Set. These Egyptian cotton bed sheets are made with natural fibers that are highly wicking, so they’ll keep you cool by drawing moisture away from your body.
Alternatively, try Layla Bamboo Sheets. Awarded the ‘Best Cooling Sheets’ by Shape magazine, you’ll get a comfortable night without sweating through.
3. Buy a breathable mattress
The wrong mattress material can result in a high body temperature. Take your memory foam mattress, for example. Traditional memory foam mattresses tend to warm you up since they’re dense and don’t allow air to circulate.
The same issue goes for mattress toppers — the wrong material prevents good airflow, heating your body throughout the night.
The iDealBed G4 Nova Luxury Memory Foam Mattress is a great solution for hot sleepers who need a cooler mattress, it is currently voted the best mattress for hot sleepers in the USA. Its copper-infused memory foam transfers heat away from the body quickly, for cooler sleep with better airflow.
4. Get a good dehumidifier
Humidity plays a huge part in your body’s temperature. If your room is too humid, you’ll feel hot and sweaty, making it harder to drift off and stay asleep.
By removing the moisture from the air and improving airflow, a dehumidifier provides a comfortable temperature in your room. This lightweight unit has a full range of controls so you can set it and forget it for a cooler night every night.
5. Use a fan or air conditioner
If you’re sleeping in an overheated environment, common sense tells you to open your bedroom window. However, this isn’t always the solution. The summer heat flowing through your bedroom window makes it hard to keep your bedroom cool.
If you don’t have the room or the budget for air conditioning, a ceiling fan or standalone fan can help to move the air around the room to try and keep it a little cooler. However, in very hot weather, you’ll find that a fan just blows hot air.
Alternatively, try the Portable Air Conditioner Fan as it offers the best of both worlds. It offers the portability of a fan, yet blows cool air just like an air conditioner.
6. Wear breathable sleepwear
Synthetic materials retain heat and increase your body temperature. This is why synthetic flannel pajamas or pajamas made from nylon are a bad idea.
Natural fibers such as silk, wool, and cotton fabrics are breathable enough to allow air to cool your body. They’ll also keep you warm in the winter. If you’d like better temperature control, try switching out your cheap pajamas for a crisp set of cotton sleepwear.
7. Use plants to create a cooler sleep environment
Plants create a cooler bedroom environment by removing carbon dioxide or CO2. Plants have an indirect cooling effect when they consume CO2 during photosynthesis, providing perfect ambient temperatures for sleeping.
8. Drink water
Staying hydrated allows you to sweat, which cools the body temperature. Remember, you’re better off drinking ambient temperature water as ice cold water doesn’t cool the body.
9. Turn off electronics
Electronics give off residual heat due to the current running through them. This is true even when they’re in sleep mode. If your bedroom is too hot, try switching all your electronics off and making sure nothing is on standby.
10. Find an effective treatment for menopause-related hot flashes
There are lots of treatments for menopause-relate night sweats and hot flashes in women.
Estrogen replacement therapy is one of the most common ways to treat menopause symptoms.
However, some women complain of negative effects from drug therapy. If you’re looking for alternative therapies and treatments for night sweats caused by menopause, there are a few options.
A recent study proved that black cohosh is very effective at reducing vasomotor symptoms — otherwise known as hot flashes.
It’s also wise to lower your body temperature for sleep by taking a hot bath or improving your bedding design. Try natural bedding products like bamboo linens or wool bedding to help dissipate heat at night.
11. Take a hot shower or bath
Including a warm shower before bed in your bedtime routine can greatly improve your sleep quality.
It sounds counter-intuitive. You’d think that a cold shower would cool your body down. It’s the opposite, in fact.
A cool shower or bath encourages the body to produce heat to warm itself up. That’s why we don’t advise a cold shower before bed.
By taking a warm shower or bath before bed at night, the hot water encourages your body to cool itself down, so your body temperature drops. This drop in temperature signals the production of melatonin, making it easier to fall asleep.
12. Pop an ice pack on your forehead
If you wake up in the night and you want to cool yourself quickly, try grabbing an ice pack from the freezer or popping cool washcloths on your forehead.
This helps to dissipate excessive heat from the human body, encouraging a cooler temperature all over.
In Short
Instead of constantly asking yourself, ‘why am I a hot sleeper?’, start trying to find solutions to help you and your room reach the ideal temperature for restful sleep.
If you’re struggling to reduce your body and room temperature in the evenings, you’ll find it hard to get to sleep and stay asleep.
While there are plenty of ways to lower your temperature, one of the quickest ways is with the Classic Cooling Gravity Blanket. By lowering your body temperature, you’ll initiate melatonin production, helping you to quickly drift into a peaceful sleep.
Want more sleep tips on how to drift off quicker and easier? Download our FREE sleep guide now.
Welcome to Snoozerville! I’m Dr. Alex Hartley, your guide to the world of restful sleep. With a Ph.D. in Sleep Science and years of experience as a sleep therapist, I’ve dedicated my life to understanding and improving sleep quality. My passion lies in uncovering the mysteries of sleep and sharing practical, science-backed advice to help you achieve the best rest possible. Beyond my academic pursuits, I’m an advocate for mindfulness and relaxation techniques, which I incorporate into my daily routine. At Snoozerville, I aim to transform your nights, combining the latest research with easy-to-implement tips. Whether you’re a chronic insomniac or just looking to improve your sleep hygiene, join me on this journey towards peaceful, rejuvenating sleep.