Naming names in the best formulas for sleepwear a la CFIDS/ME/fibro...

Wearing a very loose gown made of cotton - oh how I loved the gown and my friend and I tried to (unsuccessfully) replicate it!   Seen here: the pure joy of having a baby!

And so, as promised a few days ago, I have rounded up a list of the brands/designers who I feel relatively safe ordering through the Internet, having had pretty good luck with them...that is, I don't often have to return an item.  Actually, this is the third rewrite of this post because after my first "attempt," I decided to order a few nightgowns to test my tips.  The results are in and have been incorporated into the suggestions below.

I've declared my "formula" before, that is, my favorite fabrics, cotton being king, and my love especially for cotton jersey knit because of maneuverability in bed and the bed linens.  Tank type nightgowns are the way to go as far I'm concerned, with no lace, embroidery, or other embellishments because they irritate. 

Furthermore, nightgowns are the way to go if you have problems with IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome) because then there is no pressure around the belly area, and as stated in my earlier post with my "formula," they should be at least tea-length or there may be psychological trauma for all involved if that gown goes up too high when bending over, caught in bed with gown twisted up to waist, etc.  Please spare your loved ones (and especially the NOT loved ones like a plumber in the house you weren't aware of - it CAN happen!) the trauma.  Anyway, without further ado:

• Hanro nightgowns, especially the tank style.  Although, unfortunately, they aren't a jersey, they are a beautifully luxurious mercerized cotton, very smooth and almost silky without the problems that come with silk.  I try to keep the bleach to a minimum with these gowns but sometimes the temptation is just too strong and so I have a couple that started out a beautiful soft robin's egg blue (which I always think of as "Princess Diana blue") but are now white.  They're uber-expensive yes (huh! she says, "exhorbitably so") but I find that they last forever.  I have a couple that have got to be at least eight years old and and are worn regularly, not to mention abused.  Hubby sees these gowns as "go-to's" for Christmas presents and Mother's Day gifts - bless his desperate heart!  

Addendum: In order to do my research for this blog (HA!) I ordered a short one and it also had sleeves.  Yes, I should know by now (over fifteen years of buying Hanro) that this was a potential failure.  How wrong was I? INCREDIBLY.  The sleeves were bothersome, though a cute and wonderful length for fall, winter and very early spring - IN CLOTHING, not in sleepwear.  The fabric was the heaviest I've experienced with Hanro.  I'm definitely sticking to the plain white and the longer length.  I looked preggers with the pleating below the buttons and my stomach was NOT bloated today!  No embellishments is definitely now seared into my head.  I'm very sad.

• Natori - moving right along - is well known for it's silk (and polyester) super outrageously-priced gowns, but will occasionally come out with a simple knit white tank gown.  When they do, I snap them up.  Unfortunately, this has happened only once or twice, but I keep hoping that it'll happen again soon!  (Hope springs eternal, anyone?)  

Addendum:  I ordered a tank type of gown in a beautiful rich purple and am debating about keeping it.  It has a "built in bra" that I may find too irritating.  On the other hand, I do have one gown with a built in bra that I love, but again, I rarely wear it.  

• Ralph Lauren comes out with a nice couple of cotton knit nightgowns each year but you have to keep an eye out for them and order immediately.  They disappear as soon as they show up on the Ralph Lauren website or on Nordstrom's or Macy's sites too. They last for years.  

Addendum: I ordered one and thought it would be long enough: only if I were a pre-teen!  And what was I thinking when I went for ruffles too?  Desperation (and the great photography, stylers and models) will get you every time. This was most certainly a cautionary tale!  

• Donna Karan, Calvin Klein and Dior:  I've lumped these three designers together because it is almost impossible to find any of these designers any longer in nightwear and most certainly with the "CFIDS/ME/fibro restrictions."  Please, if anyone out there happens to know how to get word to any of these designers, please ask them to get back to designing more nightgowns too.  I used to bank on their gowns and am really upset that they seem to have stopped designing nightgowns, or at best, rarely so.  I did find one by Donna Karan a few days ago and immediately ordered it.  It was almost enough to make me jump out of bed and do a jubilation dance!  

Addendum: Regarding the Donna Karan: what the heck???  The fabric (black) was completely see-through even before trying it on.  There was some awful ruching in the back of the neck, plus the gown went out and then in, tulip shape.  Really, Donna????  Oh, I can just see every single CFIDS/ME/fibro-er out there tripping on every step taken.  My heart is broken.

• Eileen West:  After such a great success with the pink tank jersey one I bought a couple of months ago, I was ready for experimentation.

Addendum: Two came in and unfortunately, they were failures, but again, I was experimenting, hoping to find something besides my beloved cotton tank long gowns. They were really large and I was swimming in them.  The lace around the neck was bothersome.  This is what I get for tweaking with my "formula."  

• Nautica:  Ah!  Finally, my experimentation worked in my favor.  I've never bought Nautica before but when I saw the tank, long, no frills, and 100% cotton and a jersey, I couldn't resist and I'm thrilled. The one I bought is a green and blue stripe (stripes are so "in" now but I hate to think what they'll look like in a season or two?  They ARE going the "wrong" way and so difficult to wear though I have a couple of dresses in stripes: to be worn WHERE, exactly?  Oh that's right: to the doctor's!)  

OK, back to topic.  So, I've learned a very good but expensive and time-wasting lesson.  Expensive because now those charges are on my credit card and will need to be refunded.  Time-consuming because hubby will need to do returns for me.  On the other hand, going to the store would have been even MORE time-consuming (I thought to myself as I was trying those gowns on with the a/c broken and wanting to cry from the sheer exhaustion).

Of course, there's also the boxer shorts/tank top combination to wear, but if you suffer from IBS the bloating and indeed, sensitivity around the waistline in general, it may be a bit hard to deal with.  I also keep a couple of PJ's on hand, just for variety and every-once-in a-while, and wear a tank top while using the top of the PJ's as a bed jacket as my body temperature does its St. Vitus Dance throughout the day.  

I have found that keeping down the carbs helps me with the IBS and temperature fluctuations, so you may want to see if there are any foods that contribute to your IBS.  I'm convinced that each person has foods that help them/harm them and these foods vary with each person.  Gosh: not too off-topic, am I?

Anyone out there with any ideas of comfy sleepwear that works as "live wear"?  Let us know.  Don't be shy!

Thanks for stopping in and hopefully there were a few pointers to make your life easier.  I'm hoping that the day is treating you well, or as well as can be!

Nightwear Online Shopping Tips

A safe but very expensive online buy: the classic Hanro.

So, what is it that dominates in the wardrobes of a person with CFIDS/ME/fibromyalgia?  Why sleepwear, of course! I've touched on this a bit before, in the March 15, 2012 post.  


At first glance, shopping online may seem to be the answer (akin to the promised land!) for the sick and/or those who are home bound and have no way of getting to the stores because, let's face it, with the Internet, all appears to be at our fingertips. 


But ay ya ya ya yay!  What a misconception online shopping can be.  First, nothing takes the place of seeing the true shade of a color, the proportions and cut of a garment, the weight of the fabric, the feel between your fingers. Secondly, everything looks so wonderful on the various shopping sites to the point that when said item arrives, often you cannot make heads nor tails of what the heck it is and need to go back onto the website to see what it was that attracted you so much to the item that you actually went through the whole hullabaloo of buying. Suddenly you realize what liberties were taken when the product description was written and you also realize that there was a huge army involved in the look: stylists, tailors, hair dressers, makeup artists and an veritable army of who know what to make the article of clothing you're holding in your hand and you are shocked by the "misinformation" or "brainwashing" or "propaganda" - take your pick as to which words apply to your disillusionment.


...I so miss shopping, the thrill of the find, the immediate gratification.  The KNOWING that this article has a huge chance of being successful, or knowing that said piece of clothing will never, ever work out.  Yes, there are times when my BFF Linda and I say right out loud, how we wished we had a crystal ball that would tell us if a garment will be a "success" or a complete and total disaster and a waste of our money.  And BTW: Linda and I are always on the look-out for one of those crystal balls, but no luck. Imagine that!


The perils of shopping online when you're never really able to go out to shop in real life is that a frame of reference is often missing and, unfortunately, desperation often causes you to start adding clothing to various online carts willy-nilly, most of which will need to be returned because of problems with size, suitability, fabric. In other words, said garment looks bloody awful.


To add insult to injury, this necessary "overbuying" and "unsuitability" also ends up wreaking havoc on your the credit card because of delays in refunds, etc.


However, I've finally found a bit of a formula that has allowed me to cut down on the returns part of online shopping, thus sparing my credit card and, hopefully, keeping the overinflated balances down to a minimum.    I have developed a few basic rules for buying my sleepwear (nightgown, of course) which is helping me, though not as much as I'd hoped for.  Another example of my being a work-in-progress!    

• Cotton is, to me, king. It breathes even as we sweat.  It reminds me of gold: it's largely non-reactive, so fewer chances of skin allergic reactions.

• Yes, the "new" modal is wonderfully soft, made of a natural source, cellulose, but it has a tendency to stretch out of shape and sag, so you do need to see if you think the spandex (an artificial non-breathing material) often added to the modal is enough, while at the same time not giving you the itches.  I have one beautiful modal gown sitting in my closet at the moment that needs to be returned.  Bummer.

• White is most practical. I admit it: I love bleach!  Yes, I know that bleach isn't the greatest thing for the environment, but there are some things I'm just not willing to compromise on and that is, killing the heck out of germs!   

 Furthermore, "we" can go an awful long time without bathing and changing clothing.  (Oh boy!  This is just so embarrassing to put on paper for the whole world to see, but I'm really trying to say it as it is).  A lot of us eat all our meals in bed because it's just too hard to eat sitting up (shudder: sorry, I just got a visual of me eating at the table and the word "torture" flashed through my mind) and so our nightwear can start looking something like my babies' "onsies" did after a struggle of the mouth and spoon connecting.  Bleach helps me now just as it did with my babies' clothing.     

• Jersey knit: may very well be my absolute favorite fabric.  It's soft, easy to maneuver in bed as you toss and turn trying to fall asleep.     

• Tank-style nightgowns: my favorite.  Need more be said for this über-comfy style?        

• Tea -length nightgowns work best for me.  If I'm having a clumsy spell, the extra fabric of a long gown can get twisted around the legs when I momentarily forget I'm not healthy and jump up to do something - and proceed to fall down very quickly.  (Admit it!  I COULDN'T make this stuff up!)  Short around the knees, on the other hand, is asking for family members to see something that might scar everyone for the rest of their lives.        

• "Sleeveless only" is what I buy  99% of the time.  Those nightgowns, when I've broken down and bought them with sleeves, have just newer worked out for me for so many reason.  These buying mistakes tend to be never work, despite how cute they are, how welcoming they are to the skin.   Body temperature fluctuations can drive one mad, so going sleeveless where you can slip on something soft and light when you start freezing works well.  Layers is key to survival.  

So these are the basics I've come up with in this category of the sleepwear/loungewear we all too often live in at home.   Part 2 will be continued in my next post, though depending how I feel (physically) something may pop up before I put the finishing touches on Part Two.


In the meantime, I do so hope that something in this post may end up in your CFIDS/ME/fibro arsenal  as a great tip for survival.  


And I do so hope that all are doing as well as can be!