How To Sleep In Hot Weather

After a long, cold winter and a lacklustre spring, there’s nothing like the feeling of finally stepping outside into a warm summer’s day. We can look forward to another season of picnics, Pimm’s, family get-togethers and leisurely days on the beach. But there’s one aspect that we may not be quite as used to, and that’s the unseasonably warm nights – leaving many of us to ponder a question we rarely have to worry about, which is how to sleep in hot weather?

Most of us enjoy and even relish the hot days as we take advantage of the extra light and the energy boost for getting odd jobs finished. It’s a different matter when warmer temperatures keep us from getting our much-needed rest at night. With average temperatures rising each year, sleeping in summer in the UK is becoming more of a problem.

So, what can we do when it’s too hot to sleep? Fortunately, there are plenty of options, which don’t all use electricity or let bugs in.

1. How to prepare your room for summer?
2. Best setup for your bed when it’s too hot to sleep?
3. How to keep cool at night?
4. Beds for the less mobile

How to prepare your room for summer?

The key to getting a good night’s sleep in any season is creating a suitable environment. Figuring out how to sleep in summer means ensuring your room remains at a cool enough temperature to prevent you from overheating or excess sweating – ideally, between 16 and 18^oC. If, like most people, you don’t have an air condition unit, some measures you can take include:

Keep the sun out. Close curtains when the sun is at its peak and open them again when it’s cooling down. You could install some light blocking curtains, especially if you have a south facing room or are woken up by the early sunrises. Insulating curtains also help keep heat in during winter, making them a practical investment.

Open windows. If there’s a cool breeze, particularly in the evenings, open as many windows as you can to create a cross breeze, and use magnetic fly screens to keep the bugs out. Alternatively, consider a bedside fan. This uses power, but creates airflow and some people find its white noise soothing.

Try a sunrise/sunset imitating lamp. Our body’s sleep patterns are regulated by the hormone melatonin, which is triggered by light. In summer, when the days are long, this can interfere with our body clock and cause a kind of seasonal jet lag – especially if you live in the north or are an early-to-bed kind of person. Exposing your body to natural light early in the day or watching the light decrease at sunset can help regulate body clock. Alternatively, try a special lamp that mimics this change and tricks your body into believing it’s time for bed.

Best setup for your bed when it’s too hot to sleep?

As well as regulating the temperature of your room, there are many ways to ensure your bed remains comfortable and conducive to sleeping in hot weather:

Use lighter bed linen. Natural materials such as cotton, linen, silk or bamboo tend to be more breathable than synthetics, and have natural moisture-wicking properties.

Change to a summer duvet. A duvet’s tog rating measures how much heat it absorbs, so in summer it’s best to go for a rating of 4.5 or lower. Remember that a natural filling such as down, wool or bamboo, allows some air flow and helps prevent you from overheating. A bamboo or latex pillow can also keep your face and head cool at night.

Choose a mattress with cooling features. Mattresses are great at trapping and storing heat so it may be worth investing in one with temperature regulating and moisture wicking properties. At the Mobility Furniture Company our extensive range of high-quality mattresses includes several models developed with cooling technologies. These include the latex-topped pocket sprung Venus which has all the cushioning features of memory foam without the heat retention. For a little more luxury, our Eros and Solaris mattresses are topped with ultra-cushioning GelAir, a thermal gel which as well as relieving pressure on your joints and back helps to promote air circulation. Or for people who enjoy the cocooning qualities of memory foam in winter but don’t want to overheat in summer, our Mercury mattress is upholstered with breathable Coolmax fabric.

How to keep cool at night?

As everyone sleeps differently, learning how to sleep in hot weather can also be a case of trying different setups and bedtime routines and seeing what works for you. Some other methods for keeping cool at night include:

• Don’t exercise in the evening, as this can increase your body temperature. Instead, exercise earlier in the day before the sun reaches its peak.
• Have a hot bath or shower a couple of hours before bedtime. This may sound counter-intuitive, but the drop in temperature when you leave the water can help cool you down and feel more relaxed.
• Choose breathable fabrics for your pyjamas. Bamboo, cotton, silk and linen are best, and even wool has moisture wicking properties.
• Sleep alone. If you usually sleep with a partner or even a pet, heat may radiate back and forth and keep you both awake. If you don’t have a large enough bed to spread out on, it may be worth taking turns in the spare room on the nights when it’s too hot to share. A double adjustable bed is a clever way to sleep together without keeping each other awake as their two mattresses operate independently.
• Sleep downstairs. Hot air rises, and sometimes the coolest room in the house is on the ground floor. If you don’t have a spare room downstairs, consider getting a sofa bed that you can easily convert between a bed and a couch. If you have an attic, you could also try opening the hatch to let some heat escape.

Beds for the less mobile

The question of how to sleep in hot weather is particularly concerning for the elderly, and if you spend a lot of time in a bed or chair it may become uncomfortable in the warmer months. Fortunately, our mattresses with cooling properties are flexible enough to be suitable for an adjustable bed, so if you enjoy sitting up in bed you can choose a latex, GelAir or Coolmax model.

If you have a favourite recliner chair that you prefer to lounge or nap in during warm afternoons, you can customise the cushion with a material that’s highly supportive as well as temperature regulating. For example, a Liquiform cushion has a liquid gel filling which helps dissipate heat. Celliform limits heat absorption, and Coolform is made from an odourless silicone gel which promotes air flow.

The bottom line

There’s plenty to look forward to in summer – long days spent in the garden, exploring with grandchildren in the countryside or even just a reprieve from our usual aches and pains. But it’s much harder to enjoy all these activities if it’s too hot to get a good night’s sleep.

Fortunately, there is plenty we can do to encourage optimal sleep in summer, even as the nights become warmer. Knowing how to sleep in hot weather is mainly a question of setting up the correct sleeping environment – and that starts with the right bed, mattress and sheets. If you’d like to know more about our supportive and cooling mattress options, talk to the team at the Mobility Furniture Company about an in-home demonstration today.