Living With Hyperhidrosis

Hyperhidrosis is excessive sweating but carries a heavy, invisible burden—it’s not just damp patches and deodorants

- Daniel Reast

LIKE MANY CHILDREN, I dreaded the weekly PE lessons at school. That hour of rushed dressing and undressing with aggressive, often much fitter classmates was never something to look forward to. It was made worse by my sweating. Although I wasn’t officially diagnosed with hyperhidrosis at the time, the signs were painfully obvious. Indeed, school laid foundations for a crippling low self-worth that persists to this day.

But I’m not alone. It’s estimated that at least one to three per cent of the UK population suffer with some form of hyperhidrosis, a condition that causes excessive, sometimes uncontrollable sweating. The majority of people with the condition experience localised hyperhidrosis, finding it in specific areas such as their hands, armpits and feet. Others, like me, find there’s not a place on their body that goes unaffected. This is known as generalised hyperhidrosis and is much harder to treat—if possible at all.

Both varieties of the condition can cause considerable embarrassment, even shame for some. Aidan from Liverpool, who developed heavy sweating at age 13 and is now in his early twenties told me, “It makes me anxious that it’s noticeable, and selfconscious that people are looking or talking about it.”

The physical effects are obvious, but it’s how damp patches and clammy handshakes affect the mental health of hyperhidrosis patients which needs more attention.