Why does the human body sweat? Human sweat is secreted by sweat glands. In addition to the apocrine glands distributed in the armpit, there are 2-5 million eccrine glands all over the body. When the temperature rises or strenuous exercise, the human body will excrete water through these sweat glands to achieve the effect of evaporation and heat dissipation. This type is called overt sweating, and the average sweating amount per hour is about 1000-3000ml.
Moreover, everyone will have hidden sweating every day. Every day, about 500-700 ml of water in the body will evaporate, plus sweating caused by some external factors, such as exercise, fright and eating irritating food. This is why people drink six glasses of water every day, but they don't urinate much. Sweat is basically 90% water, so it is colorless and transparent.
Eating spicy food will also stimulate the peripheral nerves on the oral mucosa and tongue, leading to sweat and heat dissipation in sweat glands, and under the influence of emotions such as fright or fear, it will lead to trans-nerve excitement and spread nerve impulses to the exocrine glands of palms and armpits. At this time, adrenaline will rise, resulting in mental sweating.
There is also sweating caused by diseases, such as night sweats, which means sweating when sleeping and stopping sweating when waking up. Most of them are caused by yin deficiency and yang hyperactivity, which is common in pulmonary tuberculosis patients. Sometimes people sweat even if they are not in a high temperature environment, but the human body often feels cold. This is a cold sweat, usually caused by fright or yang deficiency and qi deficiency. Moreover, from the color and smell of sweat, we can also see the signs of disease. For example, the sweat of patients with liver cirrhosis will smell like liver.
Sweating is a special way for the body to regulate body temperature. When the weather is hot in summer, the pores will open and sweat a lot, which can not only detoxify but also dissipate heat. When it is cold in winter, the pores will shrink and it is not easy to sweat, thus protecting the body temperature from being distributed. Sweating can accelerate human metabolism. If a person does not sweat, the toxins in the body will transfer to the kidneys and liver.
What constitution is easy to sweat? People who sweat easily are qi deficiency, yang deficiency or damp heat constitution. People with qi deficiency have weak resistance and are easily afraid of cold and cold. They can mainly eat some foods that invigorate qi and strengthen the body, such as lotus seeds, chicken, mushrooms, ginseng and so on. People with yang deficiency are prone to irritability, insomnia, constipation and other symptoms. Generally, night sweats are serious, so eat some foods that reduce fire and nourish yin, such as tremella, honey and adenophora.
People in damp heat constitution are prone to sweating on their heads, hands and feet, often accompanied by greasy skin, dry mouth, bad breath and sticky stools. Therefore, we should avoid spicy food, eat more foods that reduce fire and remove dampness, such as barley, melon, watermelon, etc., and eat more light and digestible foods.
People who don't sweat easily are likely to catch a cold. This is because there are too many yin in the body, which leads to yin-yang imbalance. For example, eating cold drinks often, or staying up late every day, irregular life, and not paying attention to nutrition in diet are easy to cause cold constitution. This kind of people should eat more foods such as coriander, which can dissipate cold or fragrance, and also eat spicy or acidic foods in moderation.
Sweating is just a normal physiological phenomenon of human body, but as mentioned in How Human Urine is Formed, urine and sweat can reflect human health, so we should always pay attention to it.