To wish people would stop saying “just put a jumper on”?

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There have been sooo many thread over the years with people saying how no one really needs heating - how e.g. 16 degrees is positively sweltering - and if you feel the cold you should just put a jumper on and a bit of cold never hurt anyone…

This is complete rubbish and I think this myth needs to be debunked. It’s not helpful. Of course many people are being forced to have their heating off but that does not mean this is good for their physical or mental health.

I was prompted to start this thread as I was listening to a radio 4 science programme that tackled this topic head on. In summary:

• when we get really cold (e.g. a room at 10 degrees) our body has to work really hard to keep our core warm and this places great strain on our body - increased heart rate, blood pressure, decreased congnitive ability, etc;

• surprisingly, for a lot of people 23 degrees is the right temperature if you are just sitting around - this does not surprise me as if I am working from home, if I have my thermostat set to 19.5 degrees, I still have to wear ugg slippers and a big jumper;

• getting chilled does make you likely to get sick - this is because we are constantly being exposed to viruses, which we do fight off (the cold virus in particular) but when we get chilled our body’s immune response is severely impaired.

I'm frequently too hot, my temperature is slightly lower than the norm, it only hits 37 when I have a fever.

I did put the heating on yesterday for the first time, I also closed my bedroom window.

But that’s heating, isn’t it? Aga, electric fire, the rare coal fire. That was quite normal -bar the Aga. That’s how it was when I grew up. No heating in bedrooms, but an electric/gas fire in living room. Nothing in the kitchen.

Thank you - hugs are always welcome! Our central heating is uber-complicated, and I'm not techy, so I wouldn't know where to start. His study is much warmer than the living room, and when he's working he probably wouldn't even notice if I died! I probably wasn't direct enough. Our DS has a diagnosis of ASD, and I'm pretty sure he gets it from DH.

In the end, I got used to putting a hot water bottle under the blanket, and I stayed warm that way.

I lived in a terribly insulated rental house with no central heating for several years. The internal temp got down to about 10 degrees. I had oil filled radiators but they just weren't enough.

I had really painful chilblains.

I barely washed in the depths of winter, because it was a horrendous experience without the possibility of being warm after.

I slept in a hoodie to conserve head heat, two layers of clothes at all times and fingerless gloves.

It was deeply unpleasant.

I think there is a massive difference between suggesting use of a jumper at the moment when it is unlikely to get below 16C inside in many parts of the country and suggesting the same in the middle of winter when it’s freezing. While using extra clothes will be less comfortable if your funds are limited it’s a sensible thing to do it now and save so you can use heating more when it’s really really cold.
We are in the north and it’s currently 17C. We have heating to come on and bring it up to 19 from 6:30. I’ve been up since 5 in thick pjs and while it is a bit chilly it’s ok. If I were on the current tarrif and not a fixed one I’d not have the heating on yet.

Of course people had some form of heating in the past but not wall to wall heating like we do nowadays.

In my lifetime we've gone from just a fireplace in the main room of the house to radiators in every single room. Anyone can see why it's costing us a fortune and causing no end of environmental damage, let alone turning us all soft.

I've no issues with the concept of being warm but we need to kill off the idea that the entire house needs to be 23 degrees as it's not sustainable.

I don't have the heating on at all and work through it at home. Hot drinks and doing some star jumps while the kettle boils works a treat. If I go to the gym at lunchtime I've no need for heating as my body is hot all afternoon. Most of us that can, just need to work smarter and not just sit there getting colder and colder.

Seriously 🤔

I feel the cold but also hate heating as it feels drying. So I don't turn it on and focus on heating the person. So it's possible for me.

I did not get sick and I've got weak lungs/propensity to chest infections. So I'm not a buyer, OP.

Two things occur to me, firstly that far too often people miss the opportunity to be active which will help reduce feelings of cold (take the car instead of walking is one example), and secondly, the amount of heating I think would be reduced if we had BST all year round.

It was heating in 2 rooms out of 20
It was in response ton the poster that said house had heating of some sort.

Yes, but unless you live in a country that's warm enough to not need heating, they presumably have some heat source, even if it's not central..?

Pre-central heating in Britain, all houses had fireplaces. Now, modern houses are built without them, many older houses have them bricked up, lots of rental contracts forbid their use, and some urban areas have bylaws forbidding the burning of solid fuel, so lighting a fire is no longer an option for many people if they can't afford to turn their central heating on.

Same - it's actually in my tenancy contract that we have to maintain a constant temperature throughout the house to prevent damp. It doesn't have to be baking, but it does mean we would have to put the heating on in winter even if we personally were prepared to put up with 10 degree temperatures.

Jfc did you understand the OP at all? If you turn your heating off completely and have an poorly insulated house (which, I've forgotten the exact figure, but it accounts for a large percentage of British housing) and your job requires you to sit at a desk all day then a jumper on its own isn't going to do diddly squit - and no adult is sitting in these conditions shivering away in a T-shirt!

You're talking thermal underwear, fingerless gloves, a hat and scarf, a water bottle tucked inside the dressing gown you are wearing over the top of the jumper that you are (obviously🙄), and still having aching bones, damp bedsheets, and less than full dexterity in your fingers.

People who say "just put a jumper on" are probably the ones sitting in lovely toasty insulated homes where even with the heating off, the most they ever get is "a bit chilly", but never properly cold.

I’m horrified that after twelve years of Tory government we’re having these desperate unrealistic conversations about how to keep warm for half the year at a time by just adding an extra jumper. Let’s all start by writing to our MPs to ask what they will be doing about this cost of living emergency as a matter of urgency.

Fine if you might not feel cold yet where you are or you might have a cupboard full of layers to wear when you do, or you might have good insulation or other ways to heat your home affordably .That is great, but decades of underinvestment mean that your elderly or disabled neighbours may not be able to afford those things. Anyone on a low to middle income won’t be able to, or they will massively struggle. The mental and physical health effects will be on a huge scale nationally and that affects all of us.

We should have invested in green renewable energy nationally years ago when borrowing was cheap. Now we have record energy company profits on astronomical prices and thousands of ordinary people will be starving and freezing this winter. Where I live our libraries in the county only survived George Osborne’s austerity by becoming a charity being run by volunteers. They still are. They’re rebadging our local library as a warm bank. Great for the limited hours and days it’s open, but many communities have no library now due to government cuts or being rural. And what about the falls and broken bones of elderly people who have to leave their freezing homes on icy days and dark afternoons to use the warm banks? What about the many too frail to leave their freezing home in the first place?

This government is borrowing from our own taxpayers’ money to give us a proportionally tiny cash float to help us pay these awful prices. We need another huge windfall tax on energy profits instead of more massive borrowing indebting us for years into the future.

We need huge investment in short and long term green and renewable energy. Free and subsidised Home insulation. Energy security.

How will jumpers help us if energy prices stay this high or get higher for the next decade or longer? Petrol and diesel prices are rising back up, food prices are rising at an ever greater rate. The only actual solutions to all of this are political. Please do write to your MP if you haven’t already. We all need to engage in whatever way we can with the political solutions to this awful situation.

There's something about acclimatisation too. I've not had the heating on yet (NW England) and have slowly been adding layers as it's got cooler and used hot water bottles while WFH and am basically fine. But next April when temperatures are similar and I know we 'should' turn off the heating it will be a real struggle because we'll have got used to the house being warmer. Will be interesting to see when we actually do put the heating on because I thought it would be November but definitely don't feel the need yet.

Feel pretty chuffed to be burning a lot less energy tbh, should have done this years ago. Depressing really how ultimately the main motivator for human behaviour is always money.

I'm in the same position nowadays - what I try to aim for is a lower temperature than I would prefer, but keeping it consistent, and of course ventilate, ventilate, ventilate.

I noticed it was huge temperature swings that seemed to cause most issues, rather than the actual temperature...

Bring back the heatwave

Yes, but unless you live in a country that's warm enough to not need heating, they presumably have some heat source, even if it's not central..?

I never said we didn't have heating, of course we do, but I was responding to someone who claimed people died a lot younger pre central heating days!!!! The point is, in countries without central heating, as in the UK in pre central heating days, that people don't heat the whole house. We heat the living area, the rest of the house is like an ice-box, but it doesn't mean everyone dies at an early age because of the cold. It's really not difficult to sleep in an un-heated bedroom, but according to some on MN they just couldn't cope. Somer people here have fires, but many don't - we either use heat pumps, or ordinary heaters - and somehow we manage to survive. It's not central heating or fire places or nothing!

I've been wearing a giant Norwegian cardigan I got from a vintage shop. I don't think I'll ever get cold wearing it. It's been relatively warm so I've not had the heating in.

It's been raining lots for a while and I have noticed the humidity in the house creeping up. So I've put the heating on to help desk with that more than anything. I can deal with a cool house, but I don't want to deal with a damp house.

Interesting point about damp. How do those people who never intend to put the heating on dry washing? We have ours hung on airers in the winter. No heating in the middle of winter and not only would it take forever to dry but would create a lot of damp. Are people who don't want to put the heating on happy to use tumble dryers?

I don’t have heating on -not yet anyway - and I don’t have a tumble dryer. I hang washing outside and then it’s brought inside on a rack.

Central heating has “made us all soft” oh fuck off.
Can we bin off this idea of the ‘good old days’ and that suffering makes you some sort of higher being who is better than everyone else due to their martyrdom.

I do have heating on but not in the room where I dry washing, as it happens. It is well ventilated on dry days and I use a dehumidifier on damp ones.

Central heating has made us all soft. Myself included. A change of mindset is helpful to get past the problems that face us.