An insider's peek into a hot flash

I would be the insider... the hot flash, my own. I'm just lucky that way, thanks.
If you've been fortunate enough to never have experienced a hot flash ( I hate you!), then this will be informative. If you have, well, welcome. You know what I'm going to say.

Here's the medical book definition of a hot flash: sudden feelings of warmth, which are usually most intense over the face, neck and chest. Your skin may redden, as if you're blushing. Hot flashes can also cause profuse sweating and may leave you chilled.

Yeah, yeah. That's what it's supposed to feel like. Want the reality? Take your hand, put it in a 550 degree oven, leave it there for an hour or so and see what happens.  Really...this is how it feels, only on your entire body not just your hand.

Some of my favorite descriptions of hot flashes that I've read are:

• someone put a frying pan on my face. And it was still filled with hot crisco
• your body deciding to spontaneously combust while taking you on a ride through hell
• Real women don't have hot flashes, they have power surges.
• I don't have hot flashes: I have little vacations to the tropics every hour or so...every day...all day.

But seriously. They come any time of the day or night, no amount of powder, deodorant, air conditioning or ice-imbibing can stop them, and no matter what you think - you are never prepared for when they hit.

The first time I experienced one I actually thought I was having a heart attack. I was sitting at an outdoor cafe, reading a book and enjoying a solitary salad when a sudden, intense, over the top heat flashed ( hence the name) like  wild fire on dry prairie grass up my chest, over my cheeks, through my hair and then down my back. I was instantly wet from sweat...everywhere! The ends of my hair were dripping like I'd jumped into a hot tub; my bra was stuck to my skin as if it had been seared against it; my thighs were chaffing from the now moisture-rubbing fat slipping against one another. 

Everyone noticed, and I mean everyone,  even some strangers who were just walking by. Two men stopped to ask me if I was okay and did I need an ambulance. A teenage girl took one look at me and started to laugh. She pulled out her phone and took a picture. All I could think was there is a snapshot of me somewhere in the cyber-verse with the hashtag "gross sweaty old lady" attached to it.

My breath was coming in spurts and my body - amazingly - only got hotter. As a Catholic I have a terrified vision of Hell stuck in my mind and soul. Well, right then and there I was being given a close-up, first person view of it and let me tell you, I swore if I lived through it, I would be a better person, Christian, human being, whatever,  just so I'd never have to go through the fires of Hades again. Once was more than enough. More. Than. Enough.

The furnace continued to blaze. Salvation came in the form of another gal who looked to be about my age. With a woman's ( and fellow sufferer's) instinct, she grabbed several table napkins,  a glass of water from a nearby unoccupied table and shoved them into my wet, sticky hands saying, "It's okay, Sweetie. It'll pass in a few minutes. Drink this and just breathe." I gasped that I was having a heart attack, and she waved a hand at me, pulled her lips into a wry line and replied, "Nah. It's not ya heart. You're flashing. Trust me. It'll pass."

Damn it, she was right. To this day I almost wish it had been a heart attack so that it would have been over and done with. 

When my body morphed back into some semblance of normalcy again - albeit drenched - a few minutes later, my savior smiled smugly and said, "See? Done. That was your first time, wasn't it?"

I replied yes, and said I hoped it would be my last, knowing how ridiculous that sounded. I mean, I'm a nurse. Of course I knew it wasn't going to be my last hot flash. Salvation Sally chuckled and dropped a ten minute lecture about flashes on me.  I didn't stop to tell her I knew all about them - just had never experienced one up close and sweatingly personal before today. She'd been the one kind human in a sea of horrified and uncaring people, that I let her have her say, thanking her about a half dozen times.

Now that I knew what they actually felt like I was prepared for the next one.

Yeah. NOT! Like I said before, no amount or preparation actually prepares you for the fire-in-the-hole heat that suffices through your system in the time it takes to bat an eyelash. They're sneaky. They show up all hours of the day and night, no rhyme or reason to the timing, and no let-up in intensity. Despite what some women may delude themselves about, their flashes are not stronger during some times than others. They are always strong, intense, and horrible.
Always. ALWAYS.

So, now you know...