Heat Exhaustion? Have You Had It?

I've never heard of heat exhaustion, have you?  Heat stroke, yes but not heat exhaustion.  Have you had it?  I learned about it just recently so I'm sharing it with you

Over this past weekend, I took a trip down to Los Angeles to present at a gathering of costumers. When I arrived, I collected my luggage and sat outside in the hot weather while I waited for my shuttle.  Unfortunately, the shuttle representative was not there nor could I even find the shuttle.

 30 min later, the shuttle finally arrived.  Since it was a shared trip, I went out to Thousand Oaks before coming back in to Woodland Hills.  At the hotel, I had to wait a couple of hours before the room was ready but I went over my presentations for the conference.
 Other than being tired, I felt great.

But that night, it struck!  The diarrhea forced me to awake from a dead sleep in order to run to the bathroom in less than 2 seconds.  I didn't feel bad, just had the runs.  Later that day I spoke to a friend and the heat come up in the discussion.  Temperatures have been up but its the higher than normal humidity that is presenting the problem. 

I told her about the stomach flu I had the night before and off she stated "Oh yeah, you've had heat stroke!  I've had it several times in the past couple of weeks because I work outside a lot" I was surprised because I'd always thought that heat stroke left you feeling really bad, draggy, and melted. 

Our discussion got me wondering so I checked it out on the internet.  I didn't see diarrhea listed for heat stroke but it was there for heat exhaustion.  What is heat exhaustion?  It's not as severe as heat stroke but it can be a problem anyway.  It occurs when you are exposed to high temperatures and is sometimes accompanied by dehydration.

Did you know there are two types of heat exhaustion?  One is water depletion while the other is salt depletion.  Symptoms of water depletion can manifest itself as extreme thirst, weakness, headache, or loss of consciousness.   On the other hand symptoms of salt depletion include nausea, vomiting, or diarrhea, muscle cramps, or dizziness. 

Bingo!!!!!!!. I had the salt depletion type of heat exhaustion because in addition to the runs, I also had minor muscle cramps.  I always make sure I have enough liquid but I've never thought about getting enough salt.  So from now on, I'm going to carry packets of a salt/sugar mix I can drop into water to prevent this type of thing from every occurring again.

Now I know why airlines provide lots of liquid and salty snacks.  It keeps people from dehydrating while traveling.

I hope this helps others.  Let me know if this strikes a chord!