The weather is making me ill.

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I wasn't sure if I should have posted this in the health section, still trying to get a feel for this site, but really I just want to whine for a bit, so this forum seemed more appropriate.

I have a lot of sensory sensitivities, and one of them is being very temperature sensitive. I tend to overheat very easily. My ideal temperature range is is probably 68-72 degrees Fahrenheit, but I can usually tolerate up to 74 degrees. Above that I start to feel overheated and uncomfortable. Then if it's up to 77 degrees or higher I can start feeling really sick, especially if it's humid. I'll get dizzy, sick to my stomach, and have difficulty breathing. Sometimes it will feel like my skin is burning. These days it's fairly easy for my temperature to get high enough to be considered a fever just from my environment being too hot. I also get anxious and I don't know if the heat is directly causing that or if it's more that I'm overwhelmed by feeling so sh***y and that's why I'm anxious. Either way, it can result in me breaking down in tears or feeling like I want to jump out of my skin similar to how I feel if I've missed a dose of some of my meds.

Both yesterday and today have been in the 90s with humidity. I'm very grateful for the fact that I purchased a portable AC unit for my bedroom since the central air doesn't seem to work in my bedroom and it gets unbearably hot and stuffy for a large portion of the year. But now it seems something is wrong with the central air and it's only doing a half-assed job. When running constantly it's only getting the temperature down to 77-78 degrees and we don't usually have this problem even in very hot weather. Yes that's better than it being 90 degrees in the house, but it's still past the threshold that I can tolerate.

So now I can't seem to step outside my bedroom for more than a few minutes without starting to feel very ill. If the dehumidifier isn't running than I have a lot of trouble breathing and I could barely catch my breath when emptying the dishwasher this morning. The bathroom is like a sauna and I can't exactly avoid using it. I feel like I'm mostly trapped in my bedroom and I can't really do things that I need to do in other parts of the house like my laundry or cleaning my parrot's cage.

What really sucks is that I don't sleep in my room. I sleep on the couch downstairs because my bed hurts me too much and I haven't been able to get a new one. Last night it was feeling cooler so I tried to sleep downstairs even though the thermostat said 76(I usually can't get to sleep unless it's 73 degrees or lower). While I did manage to fall asleep, I woke up feeling overheated and very sick. So now I'm afraid to even try to sleep down there tonight. I might have to try to sleep in the recliner chair in my bedroom, but I can usually only sleep comfortably there for a few hours.

There's a lot of hot weather in the forcast for this week and I'd really like the AC fixed sooner rather than later, but unfortunately that's probably not going to happen. We were supposed to have someone come to service the AC and ducts and stuff, but had to put it off because they said the basement was too cluttered to get to stuff. 3 out of 4 members of the household including me are too disabled to really do anything about it and the one person that's not disable isn't here a lot because she works and actually has a social life. There was someone from the electric company that came to test our house to see how energy efficient it was, and even though he said things were pretty good, my sister told me he said something about dry rot causing damage to the seal on one of the ducts in the basement. I don't really know much about HVAC stuff, but I'm guessing that could possibly be causing the issue with the AC not cooling the house nearly as much as it should be.

I just hate this so much. Feeling ill from hot humid weather is awful and I would literally rather have the flu. At least then someone might have pity on me and take care of me, but no, with this I have to pretty much fend for myself no matter how awful I feel. The most I get is my sister emptying the dehumidifier so it can run again so my breathing isn't quite so labored when I leave my bedroom.

I'm dreading having to leave the house tomorrow for my dental checkup. The paratransit buses that take me to my appointments don't always have AC that works very well and I'm praying that I get one with good AC or I might end up having a serious asthma attack, throwing up, or both. Also there's a good chance that they're going to get me there too early and the office will be locked for lunch. And they don't care that I'd be locked outside in the heat. I know I can just go sit in the blood draw lab two doors down and they wouldn't kick me out despite not being there for bloodwork(had to do it once before), but it still feels awkward.

Here's to cursing climate change and praying for rain.

Edit: I left my room long enough to get some snacks, and by the time I made my way back upstairs, I was feeling short of breath and very light-headed. If I didn't know this was caused by the weather, I'd probably ask someone to take me to urgent care, but I doubt there's anything they could do for me. If I actually pass out, I guess I'll be hooked up to an IV in the ER. I am trying to drink a lot of water, but it just seems to go through me very quickly.

It's sunny here, but there is a killer wind that is making me feel tired and headachy. I know how you feel when you say the weather is making you feel sick.

I can't stand humidity, either. On a hot day, the misery factor ratchets up through the roof. I hope you feel better soon.

Thanks, though it just seems to be getting worse. I had to go downstairs to get myself some dinner which ended up being cereal just like the last two meals because I can't handle anything hot right now and there's no salad in the house. In the time it took me to get my dinner pills and the bowl of cereal, I was starting to feel really ill again. It was strange almost like an unbearable pressure was building up inside me all over. By the time I got back upstairs I was out of breath and light-headed again and a bit shaky.

My sister said she went down to the basement to try to seal up the duct with the dry rot with duct tape, but it's not doing any good so far. The thermostat says it's 79 down there. I guess I'm going to be forced to try to sleep in my bedroom recliner tonight. Hopefully I'll figure out some arrangement of pillows that will make it more comfortable than the last time I tried that. At this point I'm almost wishing I could just pass out and be taken to the hospital. At least they'd have more consistent AC there. If I didn't have my bedroom AC unit, I probably would be there already.

By Wednesday it's supposed to be back down in the 80s again, which is still too hot for me, but maybe low enough that the central air will work better. I hope you feel better soon, too.

Ugh, I hate heat. Last summer I lived in a big city by the sea, and the inner neighbourhoods were just concrete jungle, a veritable furnace. I felt like a German sausage - like my skin was going to just burst and spill my stuffing everywhere from the pressure of the heat. I'm very heat-sensitive too and can't regulate properly.
Maybe you can do low-tech things reminiscent of eco cities built in desert areas - get the proper airflow going if you can open the windows (I was under a flight path - nada on the windows) make sure the blinds are drawn to keep light out, put fans or air conditioning on if you can fix it? Otherwise, keeping fluids up, wearing as little clothing as possible, and staying out of the direct sun helps. I also considered buying one of those doggy cooling mats and sleeping on it.
Can you take a breather and get out to a pool, or beach? At least some swimming might cool you off.

For my own personal bedroom, I have one of those portable AC units where the hose vents out the window. I also supplement that with a fan and have blackout curtains that keep most of the light out.

As for the rest of the house. Opening the windows is not an option. They need to stay closed to keep out both allergens and noise. In this weather it would probably just make the house hotter and more humid that it already is. I would personally love it if the rest of the house had dark curtains covering all the windows to keep out the light, but my mother doesn't want it that way. Some of the windows do have blinds that are always closed, but a ton of light still shines though them. We don't really have any fans we can set up around rest of the house, but even if we did, I know from experience that without a working AC, all they're going to do is push hot humid air around and really wouldn't help at all.

I haven't been swimming in probably something like 15 years. I'm mostly homebound and really only get out for medical appointments or the occasional shopping trip. Though, even if I was able to transport myself to a pool or beach, there are several reasons why swimming really isn't an option. I won't bore you with the details, but suffice it to say that the last time a physical therapist wanted me to do pool exercises, even they agreed that it wasn't an option.

Usually I'll try to cool off by putting ice packs in my pockets, splashing water on my shirt, or even taking a shower if need be. Unfortunately, even if these methods are sufficient in cooling me off, I still can't breath the hot and/or humid air outside of my bedroom for very long.

My sister did inform me that the HVAC people would be called tomorrow, but no idea how soon they can get here. At least I do have my bedroom as a sanctuary even if it's not ideal. I just hope that it can be fixed before my next mobile therapy appointment, otherwise I might have to postpone it since I'm not at all comfortable having the therapy session in my bedroom, and there's no place for a second person to sit anyway.