What's the Deal With Sweat Wicking Sleepwear?
I've covered hot flushes and night sweats over here on the blog before so taking it one step further with a peek into the science behind sweat wicking sleepwear. Because it can be tough to figure out whether to part with your hard-earned cash for specialty pyjamas or to just jump into the sack au naturale, right?
Before I get onto the sleepwear side of things, it's important to first understand what effects sweat has on your bod.
The Science behind Sweat
Your body already has a built in mechanism to cool you down when you become too hot – it’s called sweating. So, how does that work?
Whenever your environment becomes too hot, your brain tells your body to start sweating. Tiny water droplets are pushed to the surface of your skin, covering your body with a thin layer of sweat. As these water droplets evaporate, turning from a liquid to a gas, they carry energy (i.e. heat) away from your body. By removing excess heat from the surface of your skin, your body is able to cool itself naturally.
So, what happens when you sleep in pyjamas not made of a sweat wicking fabric?
When you start sweating in traditional pyjamas / man made fabrics, the fabric absorbs all of your sweat and traps the moisture in the material. Since your environment is already saturated with water, your sweat has nowhere to go and can’t evaporate properly. Ergo, your body can’t naturally cool itself like it’s supposed to.
Even worse, all this trapped moisture reflects your body heat back to you, as the heat that radiates from your body rises to the fabric covering you, making you even warmer. You continue to become hotter and hotter until eventually you overheat, wake-up, and a restful sleep is no more.
How are bamboo pyjamas different?
Bamboo has the phenomenal ability to wick heat and moisture away from you. In fact, bamboo wicks away twice as fast as cotton, reducing the humidity in your bed by an incredible 50%! As soon as you become too hot at night and begin to sweat, bamboo fabric pulls the moisture away from you into the fibers of your pyjamas. Rather than becoming trapped like in other fabrics, this moisture rises to the surface of your organic bamboo sleepwear and evaporates, cooling you off exactly the same way your body does when you sweat.
That's why I insist all Nightire products are made with 100% bamboo - this fabric, spun from fibers of the hearty plant, feels soft and silky on the skin. It’s a natural moisture-wicker (as I've mentioned), so it keeps you at a comfortable temperature. Plus, it’s hypoallergenic and has anti-bacterial properties that are beneficial for allergy sufferers. Last, but not least, it’s 100% biodegradable—a great bonus if you’re eco-friendly.
*It's important to quickly note that while hot flashes are common, true drenching night sweats happen less often. Night sweats that have you up changing the sheets at night may still be due to menopause or a thermostat that is set too high but are sometimes an early warning sign of something more ominous. So make sure to keep a close eye on it.
Written by Nina Clark, founder.
