Irregular Heather

WARNING: Colourful language in this post.

Fact: My internal thermostat is fucked. I've dealt with hot flashes since the age of 36. But the night sweats? The truly disgusting, sleep-annihilating, life-altering, make-you-feel-like-you-have-malaria... 

Wait. 

Maybe it's not night sweats. Maybe it's malaria.

It's January. In Canada. There are no mosquitos.

Maybe it's COVID... again. 

Cue rapid test.

Not COVID.

I haven't slept through the night - in a really, really... REALLY long time. What's the part of your brain that's responsible for logic? The frontal lobe? My frontal lobe is fucking exhausted.

Seven years ago, I thought I'd kicked them - the night sweats. I exercise regularly. I cut out caffeine. I don't have more than one drink at a time. Or, if I do, at least I KNOW to expect the night sweats and I weigh the pleasure from a second spiced whiskey against the waking multiple times during the night drowning in my own secretions. 

But I have NOT been enjoying extra spiced whiskeys. Number 1, because of the night sweats, but also because, Number 2, Health Canada has now told us that we can only have 2 drinks a week or we will all die of cancer.

What kind of cancer? How much of it? How long will it take to get here? And when it's here, how much shorter will I live because of it? What are we talking? Will it take weeks off my life? Years? How many years?

Cue breathing into a paper bag.

Suffice to say that I haven't been drinking a lot. Which is why I'm so confused as to why now, after years of having thought I'd figured this shit out, havoc has been wreaked upon my body... yet again. Or is this what's supposed to be happening? Maybe seven years ago, when the night sweats got bad, and I figured out how to put them on the back burner (HAH!), that was just the dress rehearsal and at the age of 54 and a half, I have reached opening night for EGG-FREE AND INSANE: THE SCREAMOPERA.

With my mis-firing hormones, I get chilled in the evening, lips almost blue, so I throw on a sweater and woolen work socks. But I know, I know, that when I go to bed that I will be too hot if I wear all that shit, and yet...? I can't go naked. Because if I go naked - like I used to be able to do...

Cue montage of Heather basking in her naked sleeping glory...

Cut back to:

I'll wake up in the middle of the night, having thrown off the blankets because I am the temperature of the sun and all that night sweat... SWEAT... will then dry on my body at which point hypothermia kicks in and my teeth literally begin to chatter, and I have woken David up with all the noise. 

So, every night before bed, I strip down to a t-shirt and panties.  But then my feet are blocks of fucking ice and I pull the woolen work socks back on. And I burrow under our flannel sheets, down-alternative duvet and woven blanket topper. My feet, now encased in woolen work socks, are deliciously toasty. Our cats, Steve and Lola immediately bookend my feet, adding supplementary warmth. All is well with the world.

Until 1:37 a.m. when my feet are on fire and my sternum and scalp are soaked and I want to vomit from the heat. I don't, because cleaning up vomit at 1:37 a.m. is not a thing anyone wants to be doing. So I tear off the woolen work socks and jettison the covers, panic-panting as my heart races and both cats,  look at me like I've completely lost it.

Within three minutes, I'm no longer hysterical as my body temperature plummets. I wring out my t-shirt and crawl back under the covers. Except my feet are cold again. So I grab the socks and put them back on.  And go back to sleep. Until 3:53 a.m. when the cycle repeats itself.

This morning, while I research HRT and cancer risks, I'm enjoying a spiced whiskey.