Woman's sweat turned blue during pregnancy: ‘I thought I was becoming an Avatar'

When Keisha Sethi became pregnant with her first child, she anticipated heartburn and morning sickness. She did not expect that she would start turning everything she touched blue. 

In a TikTok video, Sethi, 24, joked that it was as if she was becoming a real-life Avatar.

The strange symptom came on when Sethi, a fitness coach in London, was in her second trimester.

“My partner came over to me and he was like, ‘Did you wear anything blue today?’ And I said, ‘No,’” Sethi tells TODAY.com. “Then he brought me into our bathroom and pointed at the toilet seat, and it was bright blue."

Sethi didn’t think much of it. But then it happened again.

“I was staining clothing, my sheets, everything was the color of denim,” she says. "It made me feel quite anxious."

Sethi called her OB/GYN, and also posted on Instagram about the bizarre phenomenon.

"Mamas has anyone experienced this? Does it affect baby in any way?" she asked in the caption.

Sethi was later diagnosed by a professional with chromhidrosis, a condition that causes a person to produce colored sweat, most commonly on the face, underarms and breasts, according to Dr. Abigail Waldman, a dermatologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts.

In chromhidrosis, sweat becomes pigmented before secretion from the gland. Sweat may be yellow, green, blue, brown, or black. 

“It’s thought to be present in 10% of the population but usually is not clinically apparent,” Waldman, who does not treat Sethi, tells TODAY.com. “Yellow is the most common color and results in the yellow staining of the clothes.”

Though Sethi’s symptoms cleared up on their own in a week, chromhidrosis generally lasts, as there is no cure, says Waldman. She notes that it is important to be evaluated by a physician to rule out bacterial or fungal infections.

Waldman notes that chromhidrosis is not more common in pregnant people, although it could become more prominent at this time due to increased sweating during pregnancy.

Sethi welcomed a healthy baby girl named Aahana-Rae on Sept. 20, but comments continue to pour in on her TikTok.

"Omg this happened to my white clothes and I was convinced it was dye from my jeans but it never made sense," one person wrote.

Added another, "Yup that happened when I was pregnant. I turned my toilet and sheets blue."

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