Pickle juice
This happened to me when we were working at our farm one hot July during a drought - still not sure if it was heat stroke or heat exhaustion.
Sweat POURED out of the top of my head and then abruptly stopped. I had uncontrollable, projectile vomiting and when we arrived at the ER, I started shivering so hard my teeth were chattering. My body temp dropped to 94 and they had to put heated blankets on me. (The outside temp was over 100 degrees.) I was so weakened and unable to do anything for a couple of weeks.
Since then, my body thermostat doesn’t seem to work anymore, I don’t perspire at all and have to plan every single thing around the outside temps. I can’t even go to the beach now in the summer. 😠I always have to have moving air and use the ceiling fans all year, even during snow.
Thank you for this very important article
Most of us in So Cal have central air - but utilities are so expensive here now that I know of a lot of people who either aren’t running their a/c’s or have them set high. We pay ≈ 60% + more for electricity than other states due to idiotic “Climate Policies” and high taxes.
Average bills in my neighborhood in the summer are ≈ $500 - $750 during the hottest months of July- September, sometimes through October as well.
I expect there to be a lot more heat related deaths and injuries due to the cost of a/c.
Love my State. Hate its Government.
I’m one who doesn’t drink enough water. I do drink a ton of coffee and Gatorade when I’m out working in the heat in the summer. This weekend I built a trough for me to fill with protein pellets for the herd of deer I hunt. Went from being able to fill 200# to now 400# at a time. Then put up a deer stand in a new field. All this with a 105-110 heat index. I sweated like crazy but no lightheadedness or cramping thankfully.
Gosh, I never would have guessed that.
Heat exhaustion used to be called heat prostration, but I remember an old timer in my home town calling it heat prostitution
Anytime the heat index exceeds body temperature I pack it in. At that point you just can’t sweat enough to keep yourself cool. Yup, I’m an old wimp. I am also in the market for an air conditioned lawn mowing tractor instead of waiting until evening to mow the yard and finishing at 2200 hrs.
My neighbor had a heat stroke last year and spent about a week in the hospital. This summer he is more sensitive to heat than before. We have been hot, very hot before in our time but now that we are older we don’t tolerate heat so well. Leave throwing hay at 105 degrees to much younger folks. Our skin is thinner now and we have fewer micro arteries and vessels in our skin for heat exchange. The heat being harder on us as we age is a real thing.
Do as much for your animals that live outdoors as you can this time of year. Provide them plenty of cool and clean water, wet down the dirt beneath the shrubs, provide them a fan on the porch. They get heat stroke as well, particularly cats since they don’t sweat anywhere but between their toes and don’t usually pant unless they are in distress.
Fortunately, I found my old tomcat under some bushes out in the corner of the yard three weeks ago, he was lifeless. I had no idea what had happened and suspected hemoplasmosis or bobcat fever, it was heat stroke. Over four days of near continuous care and IV fluids I nursed him back to health. I thought he had gone blind but it was temporary but very pitiful to see him staggering and bumping into things. Much better now and sassy again but living in the shop until the weather cools and I can get him neutered. He will not survive his considerable wanderings and I hope to curb his zeal for that.
Years ago, a Muslim doctor in Omaha who had made the pilgrimage to Mecca and when they suspect someone of heat stroke, they wet them down with tepid water and fan them to recreate the body sweating and the evaporation pulling the heat out of the body. There was a high school football player they brought in with a helicopter and they poured water on the kid while underneath the helicopter blades. American doctors will put a person in shock by submersing them in ice when the body just needs help mimicking its natural process.
There is a powder called “Liquid IV” that my 400M running daughter’s coach swears by, as does my daughter, both sugar-containing and sugar free.
So I’ve bought it.
It works well; I think better than other sports drinks. Not sure why.
https://www.eatthis.com/is-liquid-iv-good-for-you/