Too Darn Hot

I’m just going to break rank and say it, something that us Brits are known to do which is to complain about the weather, here goes……..It’s too darn hot!

Now for those of you who experience really hot temperatures in the USA or Australia for example must be laughing your heads off, as our heat wave temperatures are nothing compared to yours. Most temperatures in the last 6 days have been above 30 degrees celsius (86 fahrenheit), this is a rare (ish) event in the UK with average June temperatures normally being around 21-24 degrees celsius (69.8-75.2 fahrenheit). It’s also all about what we are used to and we Brits are not used to this at all.

I have been suffering since last Thursday as my blood pressure decided the best thing to do when faced with this heat was crash. When I eventually bothered to measure it, the first three times my blood pressure monitor read error, which means it’s too low to read. When I did get a pressure (probably because I was getting stressed from it not measuring it) it read 83/50. No wonder my heart was going like the clappers every time I moved let alone went from sitting to standing. I ended up spending one day in bed, whilst I waited for my medication to kick in. I had to re-start taking midodrine, a medication I don’t like taking because of the awful side effects I get with it but nothing on the side effect front compares with not being able to stand without fainting. At the moment it’s a case of the lesser of two evils.

It’s not just me that is struggling with the heat at the moment, my poor pooches are miserable with it. On Monday afternoon I was very concerned about Frankie, as although we had been inside all day he started to seem quite agitated, he started pacing and panting very heavily. Thankfully there had been lots of information shared on social media and I suspected he may be starting to suffer with heat stroke. I immediately started wiping a wet cloth over his belly, Weimaraners are pretty much hairless there and then I poured cool water over his back. He stood there and let me do it, which is most unusual as unless it’s a really muddy, yucky puddle on a walk he won’t go anywhere near water.

On Tuesday I decided from around 11am onwards that I would cover him in a wet tea towel

And that worked a treat he was much happier. The girls however were a nightmare and point-blank refused to have anything put on them. As soon as I put a wet tea towel on them they would stand up and shake it off. So I decided to make a bandana type thing for them out of wet tea towels. As they have quite big necks it took a couple of attempts to get enough slack in the tea towel so I could tie it safely around their neck.

So the above photos show you how I folded the tea towel to accommodate their neck size.

They will tolerate these, it's great as you can just take them off and get then get them wet again whenever you need to. Plus they can wear them when out on their walks and it helps to keep them cool.

The wet tea towel bandana dog fashion as modelled by

Mollie

Frankie

Willow