Excessive Perspiration
Following a spicy dinner at your favorite restaurant, you realize that your back and chest are damp. At the end of a very important interview, you reach out to shake hands and notice that your palm is wet. After narrowly missing a collision with a car that has run a red light, you wipe the moisture from your brow.
What’s going on here? In a word, it’s sweat. Sweat is the byproduct of the body’s diligent internal thermostat and air-conditioning system, which sometimes responds to spicy foods, anxiety, and danger in the same way that it does to excessive heat. But before you conclude that you would be more comfortable and self-confident without such sensitive reactions, remember that the system keeps you alive.
There’s nothing complicated about the mechanics of sweat (or perspiration, as it is often referred to by those who would rather think they don’t do it). The human body contains more than two million sweat glands (women may have more, according to some studies) of two types, eccrine glands and apocrine glands. The eccrines are located almost everywhere on the body’s surface about 400 to the square inch of skin, except in places like the palms of the hands, where as many as 3,000 may be concentrated. The eccrines are the smaller of the two types and originate deep within the skin, with narrow ducts threading to the skin’s surface. The task for these glands is primarily temperature control.When things get too hot, the sweat glands go into high gear, drawing fluid from the blood to produce sweat and transporting it through the pores to the skin surface. Once on the surface, sweat evaporates, cooling the skin. This, in turn, cools the blood, which has also been rushed to the surface by temperature-control cells in the brain. The cooled blood then returns to the internal organs and muscles, cooling them.
Apocrine glands are larger, fewer in number, and attached to hair follicles in the genital area and armpits. The apocrines become active after puberty and are exquisitely sensitive to emotional stress and sexual stimulation.
Even the most inactive person sweats as much as a quart a day. Marathon runners, on the other hand, may produce up to two gallons during the course of a race. Such extreme sweat production is still considered quite normal under the circumstances; one would hardly grant it a passing thought except for the fact that it can make its presence known in most embarrassing ways. On the other hand, if you have a body that beads up like a cold seltzer can on a hot day-even when you’re sitting perfectly still in the shade-you have what is known, in medical terms, as hyperhidrosis. Here’s what you can do about it.
Stay out of the midday SUD. When the sun is at its highest and hottest, your body will quickly become overheated, sending your thermoregulatory response into high gear. “One of the most logical ways to avoid excessive sweating is to avoid excessive overheating,” says Allan L. Lorincz, M.D., professor of dermatology at the University of Chicago Medical Center. A warm, humid day is even worse. “With high humidity, the percentage of water suspended in the air rises, reducing the amount of sweat that can be taken up by the air from the skin,” adds Lorincz.
Dress right. Most synthetic materials appear to increase sweating because they do not absorb moisture. “Try wearing natural fibers such as cotton in summer months and wool during the winter,” advises Donald Rudikoff, M.D., assistant clinical professor of dermatology at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York.
Stay “dry.” Since alcohol stimulates blood flow to the skin, alcoholic beverages can cause increased’ sweating-even before you begin to feel any other effects on your body. “Stick to nonalcoholic beverages on hot, humid days,” advises Rudikoff. Cold (but not ice-cold) water is best in terms of quenching your thirst and replacing fluids lost during excessive sweating.
Cut the caffeine. Caffeine is a stimulant that speeds up the heart, making it behave as it would in response to overheating. “Reduce your intake of caffeine-coffee, tea, cola drinks-it will benefit your heart as well as your peace of mind,” says Rudikoff.
Watch what you eat. Eating hot, spicy foods can trigger perspiration, so it may be wise to avoid them at times when staying dry is a priority.
Slim down. If you are overweight, even the most moderate activities make your heart strain harder to pump blood around your body. “Reaching and maintaining your desirable body weight may go a long way toward easing a problem of excessive sweating,” notes Lorincz.
Cool it. Increased anxiety-even if it is temporary-can cause excessive sweating. In anxiety-prone people, even the merest stress-or none at all-can bring on an anxiety attack with accompanying sweating. “If you frequently become anxious, try to divert the symptoms with physical activity, such as jogging, walking, or swimming, or relaxation exercises such as deep breathing,” suggests Alan R. Shalita, M.D., chairman of the Department of Dermatology at State university of New York Health Science Center at Brooklyn.
Spray, stroke, dab. To add an extra layer of confidence, you can use an antiperspirant under your arms and even on the palms of your hands’ and soles of your feet (if they are trouble areas). “Antiperspirants inhibit production of eccrine perspiration,” says Rudikoff. Most of these products contain an aluminum salt, which is thought to work by causing a slight swelling around the sweat-gland ducts that decreases the outflow of perspiration. Aluminum chloro-hydrate is the mildest of the salts, aluminum chloride and aluminum sulfate are even more effective but are also more acidic and, when mixed with perspiration, tend to irritate the skin and stain clothing, particularly linen and cotton.
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