Welcome And The Heat Reality

SPEAKER_01 0:09

Hi guys, welcome back to Preview Alliance Podcast. This is Sarah, and I've got our favorite maternal mental health therapist, Whitney. Hello, my friend. Hey friends. Okay, Whitney, it's hot. It's so hot. It's not even, I think hot is a bad statement. And if you're not in the south, you may be like, really? It's like, no, you walk outside, it is and soup out there. And your every part of your body sweats. Oh yeah. And it's almost that miserable. And you know how there is, you know, we've talked before like seasonal depression, right? And we usually think it's like gloomy and it's dark. But on the flip, I don't think people talk about this, but summer in heat really takes a toll on your mental health.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

It really does. Because you want to talk about a sensory overload. Oh my gosh. Like you walk outside and you're sticky and you're sweaty and your temperature just went from normal to 5,000.

SPEAKER_01 1:10

It's so much. And I don't think you automatically realize this, but if you think back and say, look, it's if it's not hot where you are right now, think about maybe we know a vacation with your kids or with family or whatever, even your partner, right? And you get that hotness, and you're like, wait, I was a little bit more irritable. I was a little bit more quick-tempered. I was a little bit more overwhelmed. I needed a nap when I don't usually nap. Right. But you can notice that there was probably a moment where you're like, okay, why am I acting this way? Yeah. Why are you making

Why Heat Lowers Emotional Control

SPEAKER_01 1:45

me change? We're here to tell you it's not just you. Okay. It's not just you. It's your body working over time. So did some fun research for this topic because I found it fascinating. So when our bodies, which are amazing, right? But they're feeling this heat, they're going to start working over time to cool us, right? So we're seeing like blood vessels are dilating, our hydration needs to be increased, we sweat more, heart rate goes up, right? Your body actually kind of starts working over time before you even like wake up once it feels that heat. Now, when that happens, what we're doing is like we have less ability to regulate those emotions. So it's like if normally I can regulate 80%. Let's give myself grace here. Right. Now I'm in a heat wave. Maybe my regulation and emotional ability, what I can withstand, goes down to 60%. Then let's say now my skin is that, you know, like sweat stick that's like on you, and you just like start, and then like you feel your hair on the back of your neck, and you just or you're you like you feel your thighs rubbed together, and you're just like, ah, or my favorite is when my leg sticks to the car seat.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Oh, and you have to pill it up and oh or when your kid who is also sweaty hot but also sticky fingered because we're eating all the sticky things in summer, and then they touch you, and that's the straw that breaks the camel's back, or just like one on you, and you're just like, I don't even want my clothes on my body right now, but not and then a human body, right? Yeah, I mean, we're not speaking for personal experience or anything.

SPEAKER_01 3:31

No, never. I mean, and that's also when your kid's gonna need to be probably carried out of a location.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

Quite literally had to do that this weekend. My kid forgot her shoes, and guess who had to carry her across the driveway?

SPEAKER_01 3:44

Uh-huh. Because so you're already like, you know, you're in a Sahara and you're carrying your

Sleep Loss And Rising Risk

SPEAKER_01 3:50

child for whatever reason. And, you know, what was interesting too in this research was so crime rates go up in the summers and heat.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

People be acting cray cray.

SPEAKER_01 4:02

They do. And if you think it in domestic violence went up, it was um irritability, anxiety, depression, right? But and psychiatric events occur more during heat. So, what is also interesting that all makes sense which we're talking about it, right? Is that irritability, that inability to really kind of calm ourself, control ourselves. If you do not have resources such as AC or a place to get cool, yeah, that is a 24-7 thing, right? For you to feel overwhelmed. Sleep decreases, right? Because who sleeps well when they're hot? Gosh, no. Right? So you're not sleeping, which we know just from newborn days, what sleep deprivation does to you.

SPEAKER_00 4:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 4:49

The brain fog, you cannot manage your emotions in the rage. And so the same thing is also happening like with our kids and our partners and people we encounter, right? So they they saw road rage incidents are hired in the summer. Yes, that absolutely makes sense, which is wild, but it's true, right? And then you have your more vulnerable at-risk populations, right? The pregnant, like our pregnant moms, our new babies, right?

SPEAKER_00 5:15

When elderly they can't get out of elderly else.

SPEAKER_01 5:19

You're worried about the hydration, you're worried about keeping cool. So why summer has its all sorts of trials and tribulations, just when it comes to childcare, or what do I do with my kid, or just being hot. There is a whole layer that people are experiencing, but truly they're showing worsening depression, anxiety, ER visits for psychiatric events, and higher suicide during um this time. But the heat's not causing it, right? But it's definitely lighting that fire to those underlying things that we're all dealing with.

SPEAKER_00 5:56

Right. And it's funny because years ago, we're talking like COVID times. There was a doctor that I would listen to his podcast on, and when COVID really started

Indoor Summer And Vitamin D

SPEAKER_00 6:05

spreading in the south, it was during summertime. And everybody was like, I thought heat killed COVID. And he had a really good, I guess, theory for lack of a better way to call it, was that summer is actually kind of wintertime for southerners because it is so hot and humid that we honestly can't tolerate it unless we're actively swimming at the splash pad, whatever. So we all retreat indoors. So when you think about it, we're all probably very deficient in like vitamin D because we can't tolerate being outside for long. So we're not getting that sun exposure that we'd need, but in a much more controlled way than what the summertime gives us. And so when we don't have good vitamin D, our depression is going to get worse. That brain fog can get so much worse. When you throw just those two factors in the mix, naturally we can't regulate.

SPEAKER_01 6:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

But then you throw in all the oversensory stuff. And again, like you mentioned, the at-risk populations. Like if you already have someone who is struggling with severe depression, severe anxiety, maybe some OCD going on, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, things like that that already kind of have like the high highs and the low lows, this is going to throw them for a loop. People who are on the autism spectrum, you want to talk about like their sensories, it's off.

SPEAKER_01 7:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:30

And they already struggle to regulate as is, and that's not a slander, it's just kind of how their brains work. Well, then you put them in literally 100-degree weather. Oh my goodness, it's so much worse.

SPEAKER_01 7:43

Well, and it feels relentless, the heat when it's every single day, and then you're looking at the forecast, and you're like, oh my gosh. And say if you're in a newborn stage and you're just like, I can't bring my baby out. So then you feel trapped in your house, and that whole groundhog day really feels harder because you're trapped to these four walls, and except for like super early or super late, which sometimes, you know, with babies in that witch an hour, that doesn't align. And you again, it's that loss of like, I can't function. So that's really hard. So one thing I thought would be interesting to hear your perspective as a therapist in the summertime. Do you notice anything with your clients that you're like, you know, yeah, maybe mother-in-law is irritating her more than normal? Or yeah, she's I see more of her saying I'm short-tempered. Or is there anything if you look back from your clients in this season versus winter, what would be a difference?

SPEAKER_00 8:38

I would say everyone comes in and the all more often than not, the first thing out of their mouth is, oh my God, it's so hot. Why does it have to be so hot right now? So it's not even that we can't regulate

Dehydration Signs Moms Miss

SPEAKER_00 8:50

or I'm so temperamental. It's, I mean, I walk outside and exhausted because of the heat. Yes. You know, it just it taps us out in rewinding five years ago, where I ended up in the OBED because I thought I was in preterm labor with my second one at 33, 34 weeks for contractions. And the doctor comes in and he goes, I know you're going to think I'm crazy. He goes, I know that you drink water, your urine is nearly clear. He goes, but you're dehydrated, and that's why you're cramping or contracting the way that you are. And I was like, What on earth? What else can I do? I'm drinking Power Aid and water with electrolytes around the clock, but it's because the humidity, specifically here in the south, it tanks us. Whatever reserves we thought we had, they're gone. Yeah. And you know, when we think about winter time, even in our early summer, before that humidity kicks in, our heat is more of a dry heat. It's a lot more tolerable because it just doesn't feel so sticky and soupy, and just, you know, like you walked into a heat cloud, basically. When you step outside, it's a lot more tolerable because we've even had Christmases at 80 degrees outside. But it's not sweltering hot, it's a very different type of heat. And so when we look at these really tough months for the southern states, so July, August, maybe the first half of September, we walk outside and it's like we just get bombarded by this humidity cloud, and it's going to drain us. And dehydration can lead to a lot of problems because you're talking about your electrolytes getting out of balance. Your brain can't function normally if we're deficient in electrolytes.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:37

Again, we look at a vitamin D deficiency, and that would be when I would encourage our listeners: hey, whenever you see your PCP, your OB, whatever doctor you go to more often than not, ask them just to see if you can do an over-the-counter vitamin D supplement. I don't want to be the one to give that just broad medical advice. More often than not, doctors are okay with it because it's not going to harm you to take a once-a-day over-the-counter supplement to help offset that deficiency. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 11:08

And you know, go back to in the middle of the day if you can, right? Like the middle of the day is a pause day, the the when it's the highest, which honestly, here it feels like past nine o'clock, it's really hard to be outside. But it, you know, especially during those high, high heat times to go inside. If you and it's so hard when you have little kids, you got to get them out in the morning, put them back in, and put them back out. But even when you're in the pool, right, sometimes it's so hot, the pool water's hot and it's not refreshing. And then you're dealing with the whole thing of swim diapers

Practical Cooling Tips And Grace

SPEAKER_01 11:40

or the kids, and it feels a lot, but it is so much to know going in is you know, sometimes I think we kind of blame ourselves in the summer. We're just like, why am I so irritable? I feel like a bad mom. I was harsh today, I feel like I can't think straight. When really it's your body and your brain is already working harder the moment they get up than on the regular. You got to give yourself a little bit of grace. And I think it would be just the check-in and be like, okay, am I staying hydrated the best I can? Am I taking those breaks in the middle of the day if I can? Am I not exercising if you want to go outside and walk at the heat of the day?

SPEAKER_00 12:22

Am I, you know, all my running is on the treadmill with a clip-bone fan at this point. I just can't.

SPEAKER_01 12:28

It's not working. No, it's not. And that's but I think it's to like give yourself grace. And you know, if you're driving, you're like, wow, they're correct. Road rage is worse in the summer. Yeah, it is. It probably is. So just take a pause and say, okay, it's not just me. I'm not failing. We have external forces here going on, and the sprinkler is your friend with your kids. Oh my god. If you have to, you know, get the inflatable pool, get the $10 plastic pool from the dollar. Popsicles, water balloons, water balloons, early and late. But for you to give yourself grace during the time, because it's hot and we're all feeling a little miserable.

SPEAKER_00 13:07

It's awful right now. So give yourself some grace. And I don't know if y'all remember this from back in the 90s, early 2000s, the cartoons where everyone would go in for the siesta at noon.

SPEAKER_01 13:18

They knew what they're doing. They knew what they're doing. They had too many interpersonal disagreements, and they said, We're taking siesta at this time, people.

SPEAKER_00 13:29

And you know, right now, I think it would be a great plan if everybody adopted that.

SPEAKER_01 13:33

I'm here for it.

SPEAKER_00 13:34

Everybody in the summertime is siesta time. Uh-huh. We're shutting down. We are we're shutting it down so that we can all recoup and regulate.

SPEAKER_01 13:42

Uh-huh. So, this is your permission, listeners. If you're feeling it, Whitney and Sarah give you permission for siesta. But, Whitney, thank you for this wonderful episode. Listeners, hang in there. We don't have much longer of this wild

Closing And You’re Not Alone

SPEAKER_01 13:55

heat, but we're in there with you. We'll swell to him with you. But we'll be back next week. Maternal mental health is as important as physical health. The Preview Alliance podcast was created for and by moms dealing with postpartum depression and all its variables, like anxiety, anger, and even apathy. Hosted by CEO, founder Sarah Parkers, and licensed clinical social worker Whitney Gay, each episode focuses on specific issues relevant to pregnancy and postpartum. Join us and hear how other moms have overcome mental health challenges as well as access tips and suggestions when dealing with your own challenges as moms. You can also browse our podcast library and listen to previous episodes at any time. Please know you're not alone on this journey. We're here to help.