And I don’t remember falling asleep there. It took me a minute to figure out what had happened.
I usually take showers, but my heater isn’t working very well and I was freezing cold, so I took a really hot bath instead. When I was done, I stood up and got out of the tub, started getting vertigo and (apparently) passed out. I don’t think I was out for more than a few seconds because my arm was still kind of stinging from hitting something on the way down. My head seems fine.
Ok, so I do occasionally get vertigo if I stand up really fast after lying down for a long time. I’m pretty tall (6’-3" = ~191cm), so I understand that all the blood suddenly pooling down to my legs can leave my brain a little shy on oxygen until my heart catches up, but I’ve never actually passed out from it.
Could the temperature of the water, or maybe the difference between the water temperature and the air temperature have contributed to this? I’d kind of like to not have this happen again.
I get this sometimes when emerging from the Mercotan family hot tub. (An occurrence which, sadly, is all too rare now that I don’t live with my parents.) I’ve never passed out, but I’ve gotten pretty dizzy. When I was younger and had problems with dizziness when I just stood up too fast, it happened a lot more often in the hot tub. I’m not really sure HOW hot baths make the whole “blood pressure drop when standing” thing worse, but it seems that that’s what they’re doing. All that worked for me was making sure to stand up slowly.
I’m not sure what causes this, but sometimes I get lightheaded when I get out of a hot bath. I’ve never passed out, but that’s probably because I know it can happen, and I stand up slowly.
A hot bath dilates your vascular system, and thus increases the chances that you’ll have an episode of orthostatic hypotension when you stand up.
If you feel yourself start to get dizzy, or start to see flashes in your visual field, SIT DOWN.
Here’s the Merck Manual’s piece on orthostatic hypotension. The article doesn’t mention heat, or tubs, but these are known risk factors.
Probably obvious to everyone else, but if the bathtub still has water in it, I wouldn’t sit down there. Try to make it to the toilet or at least lower yourself to the floor.
-Lil
But you had no other injuries like a bruise or a bite on your tongue? Just want to make sure that you didn’t pass out and bang your head.
Was the water still warm you when you remembered where you were? If it was, you probably didn’t have a seizure, which is a good thing. A seizure would have knocked you out, or wiped out your memory for a much longer time.
If it happens again, I would go to a doctor to get checked out.
I doubt it was a seizure from the description even though it was a little limited. Still it very well could have been even if he was only missing a few moments of time. I have epilepsy, and I’m very rarely out of it for more than a minute or two after a seizure.
-Lil
I’m not a doctor, but I’d keep some tabs on whether that happens again or not. I’ve gotten sick feeling and dizzy from the tub, but have never passed out, and thirty minutes seems to me like a really long time to have passed out. Do you remember what happened immediately prior to passing out, i.e., did you get a funny taste in your mouth, see spots or find your vision going grey? Some people who have seizures get these symptoms that are known as an aura just immediately before a seizure. Then again, some people see spots and get grey vision just before passing out regularly. Either way, I’d worry if it happens again, plus I’d see a doctor.
I have a seizure disorder, and while I’m usually only out of it for about 3-4 minutes, when I come to it takes me a while to remember my name, the alphabet, who other people are, etc. Also, I’m usually very sore from the convulsions and generally bite my tongue. I normally have an aura, so I usually have some warning of an impending seizure, but if I don’t, I normally bump something on my way down. Like BobT said, every seizure disorder is somewhat different.
Thanks for the concern. I didn’t bite my tongue or anything that might indicate a seizure, and there’s no sign of injury to my head. I had started draining the tub before it happened, and when I came to, the water level hadn’t noticbly dropped, so I don’t see how it could have been more than a few seconds. I was disoriented for a minute because it felt like I was just waking up from having been asleep, and that didn’t make much sense. Once I saw the tub I figured out that I had passed out.
I’m fairly sure I kind of went down to my knees and leaned against the door frame before I actually passed out. What happened just prior was the same thing that occasionally happens if I hop straight to my feet after lying down for a considerable length of time, and I’m fairly sure it’s just a “head rush”, as they say. My vision did kind of black-out as you put it, but that’s what it always does under those circumstances. If I just steady myself for a second, it goes away after a couple seconds. I can usually feel my carotid artery throbbing harder than normal for a few seconds as the sensation passes. It never happens spontaneously – only when I stand up suddenly from a reclining position. Even then, it doesn’t happen very often.
When you go from a hot horizontal environment to a cold vertical one, your blood remains in your extremities, depriving your brain of oxygen. The same thing has happened to me several times.
I’ve also almost passed out from standing up too fast. I doubt that how tall one is has anything to do with it, but a really hot bath might. The hot bath alone can make me feel a little woozy.
Come to think of it, I have sat back down very quickly (fell) when getting up fast from a hot bath. Never passed out, but came close to it. I need one of those angled grab bars, I guess.
Peace,
mangeorge
