I learned a new word recently, it’s thermodysregulation. It’s a medical term that refers to a symptom, or really a group of symptoms, that come with my husband’s diagnosis of Parkinson’s Disease. I started looking into this when I noticed that no matter how hard he worked out, my husband didn’t sweat. I was assuming that he wasn’t working hard enough because I was working out right alongside him and I was sweating like crazy. Instead of continuing to push him to work harder, I decided to see if there might be another reason.

It turns out that one of the challenges of Parkinson’s Disease is thermodysregulation. His body loses the ability to regulate internal temperatures which is what keeps my husband from sweating. His autoimmune nervous system in not functioning properly to activate his sweat glands. The funny thing about this disfunction is that while it keeps my husband from sweating, it can also cause other People with PD to sweat profusely by overstimulating those same glands. It can under or overstimulate the system depending on the person and their physical makeup.

Thermodysregulation is also why he is intolerant to hot weather, again because his sweat glands and other internal regulators aren’t acting like they should so he easily overheats. Inversely, he is very sensitive to cold weather as his body doesn’t work to conserve heat or warm him either. He’s the one putting on sweaters when it’s 70 degrees out and bumping up the thermostat in the house. At least he can’t blame that on me anymore.

See PD Can Result In Heat Intolerance – Parkinson’s News Today (parkinsonsnewstoday.com) for more.