She gets these chills around 6:00 pm, and they last ablut an hour. Sometimes she wakes up around 8:30 pm (in bed by 7:00 pm) shivering she’s so chilled. No amount of blankets help. These don’t happen every night but come and go. Sometimes it can happen over several nights in a row… then no problems for a week. Any ideas or suggestions? Her blood work doesn’t show any problem with thyroid.
I understand how miserable it is to be so freezingly cold that one’s body shakes, and be unable to get warm, because it happens to me. My lips actually puff up, turn blue, and I can barely speak or function. I sympathize with your dear icy-cold mother.
The ONLY thing I’ve found to consistently help — and be safe and user friendly — is to have a couple of heating pads next to my lounge chair.
My (Sunbeam brand) heating pads are on a 2-hour maximum automatic timer, and have 4 different levels of heat, none of which get so hot that the temperature is dangerous (but if you buy your mom a couple of pads, double check the temps yourself since our elders’ skin is so delicate) so even if your mom should fall asleep while using the pads, the pads will automatically turn off.
I use one pad to cover my ice cold feet, and one pad near my waist so my hands can nestle under the warmth. Then covering over the pads and my body with a very lightweight throw, or long shawl, helps keep the heat in perfectly, and I don’t feel trapped by a big heavy blanket.
For my personal taste, the standard size heating pads are perfect. I also bought a king-size pad but it proved way too big so ended up heating mostly air and chair rather than me.
I am only speaking to my own experience, but please note that I also bought at after-Christmas sales, and tried, a number of different “heated throws” but every single one was made of crappy slippery synthetic fiber, and the throws were way too big for me (and therefore I would bet for your mom, too) and slipped right off onto the floor constantly. They were a tripping hazard, useless, and I do not recommend heated slippery throws.
If your mother can be warmed by the heating pads during the day, her body temperature should be sufficiently warm when she goes to bed at night so that just getting under regular covers should keep her warm enough so that she can go right to sleep without struggling with feeling cold.
I hope you can find a solution to help your mom. My suggestion may just be the ticket.
Let us know if you succeed in getting your mother to be comfortably warm! I hope so.
Make sure her iron is normal also.
Medication side effect
Hypoglycemia
Poor diet/malnutrition
Shortly after my first son was born I began experiencing extreme chills down my back intermittently, but it also came with swollen glands. I felt like I had a frozen rod in my spine. I had to take steroids to get the gland swelling go away. I had scads of tests and the cause was never found. Eventually it stopped happening. Just saying they may never find a cause.
When she gets the chills have you looked and felt the effected areas? If they feel cold or cool to you this might be a circulation problem and maybe a gentle massage might help. A massage will stimulate blood flow.
Best of luck.