this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2025
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I've learned that not wearing pyjamas just soaks the bed with sweat, so might as well wear them and just change them out in the middle of the night as and when needed.

I've learned that sleeping with the window open only does nothing but ensure that I hear the birds at 5 in the morning

I've learned that a decent blindfold works better than any curtain

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 8 hours ago)

I just spent far too long looking for that old tumblr meme of Peter from family guy in his death pose, haphazardly surrounded by jpegs of fans.

Real talk though, get a flat, hard surface to sleep on that won't hold heat.

A wooden table is good but a board of mdf or something placed on top of your bed will work just as well. If you have the space and the right sort of bed, move your mattress off the bed and place the board directly on the slats, air flow under the bed will aid cooling. Board on top of the mattress works too though but it holds a bit more heat and can get a bit wobbly if you're a restless sleeper.

Cover the table/board with a bamboo/linen/cotton flat woven (not fluffy) blanket/sheet, and sleep with a bunch of fans pointed at your body.

A dehumidifier in the room will also really, really help too.

Bamboo and linen fabrics won't hold as much moisture as cotton does but if you're under a bunch of fans and on a hard surface, any sweat should evaporate fairly easily and cotton is easiest and cheapest to find usually.

Also remember that heat rises and buildings trap heat, so if you are living on any floors above ground level, sleeping on the floor will be hotter than sleeping a few feet above it as the room below will have been heating up all day and the floor will be radiating heat.

Having the window open, with one fan pointing at it and one pointing away from it will help circulate air into the room and get some of the heat out. If you have two windows this is easier as you can have a fan at each one, and bonus cooling points if they are on different walls as you can get a draft going.

If you have enough fans going bird song and car noise gets drowned out so it's not as much of a problem. Also a bit of vaseline in your nose will stop it drying out.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 hours ago

blackout blinds have been a godsend for me in this type of weather. cooling blankets help a ton too

[–] [email protected] 5 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago)

Much depends on the house. Traditional UK family housing with 2 plus stories and fron and back windows are far easier then modern subdivided multi flat buildings.

The older building allowed concentrating on air flow by opening highest widows and drawing curtains that face the mid day sun. While opening lower windows on the low sun side. During the night crated a natural flow of air.

Modern housing means the internal divisions and often lack of non concreted areas. Often prevent cooler air being able to flow. Or existing if the concrete hass 0 shading from the days sun,

Single level can still do it. But much less effective as the temp difference is less. But when the internal layout limits airflow from the high sun to low non sun side. Way harder.

Downstairs fans running overnight while sleeping with upstairs top windows open. Can be a huge difference.

Or just remembering the direction goal of fans. iE removing higher air while pulling in from lower.

It's common for folks to place the fan between them and the window blowing at the bed. This is the worst thing as you are preventing hot air from leaving. Assuming you are not on the lowest floor.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 19 hours ago

Blackout blinds and a fan does the job.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 16 hours ago

Open the loft hatch.
Hot air rises - give it somewhere to go.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

If you don't already, wear breathable pyjamas, and cotton bedsheet/duvet cover. And ideally, a non-synthetic duvet.
This will at least reduce the liquid sweat, by allowing it to evaporate better.

Keeping track on when it's hot/not/rainy can help get the house temperature under control.
When it gets cooler at night, you can open the windows to cool the fabric of the house down.
Then close everything up first thing in the morning, including south facing curtains.
The cooler you can get the house overnight, the more heat it can absorb the next day.

So here, I left the window open on one room, (red) and closed on another (dark blue and teal).
When the outside temperature (purple) dropped to 15 overnight, it dragged the orange room down significantly.
(Then I forgot to close the window in the morning, so it kinda got negated 😬)

Other than that, a dehumidifier may help if feeling less muggy, though it will raise the temperature of the room overall slightly, since it's going to use energy to run.
Externally run aircon is, unfortunately, the only real step beyond that. And it's a bit of a chunk of change (£500 for a basic DIY one, £1500+ for one room professionally).

[–] [email protected] 5 points 21 hours ago

For the hot humid nights the only real solution is air conditioning, we’ve had it for the last three years and it‘s bliss!

However… we also:

  • open all the windows early in the morning to replace all air in the house while it’s cool.
  • We have an awning over the downstairs south facing window to keep the room cool, and keep the south facing curtains/blinds closed upstairs
  • have massively insulated the loft and are adding wall insulation this year
  • have fans on to circulate air in the house.

Thanks to all the above we have not needed the AC so far this year.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

While a cheap evaporative cooler doesn't help with the humidity you can boost the cooling effect dramatically by adding cooler blocks to the water and even more by placing more cooler blocks in a plastic under-bed container in front of the fans.
If the sound is disrupting then closing the bedroom door and running it in the evening before bedtime works fine.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago) (2 children)

Cooling yourself with evaporative anything is counterproductive: the extra humidity reduces your body's ability to cool off with sweat.

Essentially, it transforms dry heat into wet heat, which is much worse.

And OP's sweat problem is gonna get much worse.

If you wanna get cool, there ain't too many ways to avoid getting an AC.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 21 hours ago

Essentially, it transforms dry heat into wet heat, which is much worse.

I think this is key, you need to cool the room enough for it to not qualify as heat anymore.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

There is a dehumidifier setting on most ACs that does the job well at about 10% of the cost. We use this in Spain with the temperatures, when they're reasonable but high with humidity.

Most portable units you will need a tube/bucket set up for the runoff.

We use the water accumulated to water our plants...Win-Win.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 11 hours ago (1 children)

I have a dehumidifier at home that does only this and the heat is exhausted indoors instead of outside...

It's not that useful as the room heats up more than the humidity being removed is worth, but I'm considering getting a cheap portable ac unit but I'm worrying about how to install it on my window... And the efficiency being much worse than a properly-installed heat pump where I can close the window when I use it...

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

oh no, the excess heat should be vented outside, usually with a tube connected to something rigged up to close the window.

We've used cardboard cut to fill the gap, with a circle cut out to fit the tube, and the whole thing sealed with duct tape.....ugly but got the job done so you can sleep (and make a better solution)

[–] [email protected] 1 points 2 hours ago

Yeah, I'm aware the heat needs to go outside... But I'm not a fan of isolating things with cardboard. And the dehumidifier is just that and doesn't have an exhaust pipe.