Yes, Virginia, You Can Get Heatstroke in the Winter

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus.

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus.. While he is not a physical.person, but an ideology of a sort, he still exists as the Spirit or intention of Christmas.. And oddly enough so does heatstroke in the winter, the day after Christmas. Neither is a myth.

On Boxing Day (December 26th here in Canada) I was dropping off presents to friends. Did I stay,? Yes, but only for short, outdoor, social distanced, safe visits with masks handy. I knew I would be outside for a little bit, so I dressed for the weather.. It was just below freezing, so I was wearing a nice snuggly sweater & with my coat on I was nice & cozy outside..

After I got home, after a long day, and a long day on Christmas Day aswell, I was just exhausted. I took off my jeans and lay down for a nap.

I woke 1½hr later, nauseous & with a headache. Normally this is just my body telling me that I’m hungry because I haven’t eaten a lot during the day. Had a snack but halfway through, realized I was feeling flushed & warm.. A peek in the mirror told me what was going on.. My face was bright red..

I was still wearing my sweater! In my defense, it was a brand new sweater that I had never worn before and was not aware of how deceptively warm it is.. So I yanked off the sweater & my skin underneath was pink from the warmth..

Went to hop in the shower to warm up. My regular ‘hot’ setting I use for showers wasn’t the hot hot it normally felt like, but cooler. Since I wasn’t feeling temperatures like I should be, I set the water a smidge cooler before I hopped in… Bit by bit I turned the dial slowly down to cooler temperatures to slowly cool my body down. It took 20-30 minutes to start feeling like I was a normal temperature.. My colour was almost back to normal when the time I was all dried off.. After my shower, I simply crawled into bed to sleep it off…

I woke up a few hours later, without the nausea. So I ended up finally taking my nighttime meds because I didn’t want to risk taking them earlier and just chucking them up which is what I figured would happen..

The headache finally abetited a few hours later with some Excedrin…

Note: You can also get heatstroke from wearing too many layers outside & not taking them off as you warm up like when skiing..

Yes Virginia, You Can get Heatstroke in Winter

So, yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus, it’s not a myth . & Yes, Virginia, You can get Heatstroke in the Winter. Be careful

Tags: Clothing, Cold, Cooling down, Heat, Heat Exhaustion, Heat Stroke, Heatstroke, Heatstroke in the Winter, Hot, Layers, Myth, Not a myth, Winter