Charley Horse

worst.one.evah!

had to get up out of bed. and did you realize--no one knows the cause . . . OR the cure!

fuggit. :thepain:

What's a charley horse?

It's a painful upper leg muscle cramp. I wake up with lower leg muscle cramps sometimes. Most painful thing ever.

usually calf muscle, actually. Sometimes I get twinges--but THIS was more than a twinge.

Suggestions for prevention are: hydration, stretching, and taking your vitamins.

phooey!

Oh. Yeah that's what I sometimes get. Horrible.

Try pulling back on your toes (with your hand). That sometimes helps.

Go try it right now.

P.S. Isn't Charley Horse a cousin of Crazy Horse?

Eat more bananas.

jinx;464190 wrote:

Eat more bananas.

I've heard that too, Jinx. There's speculation that being low in potassium has something to do with it.

Cloud;464157 wrote:

...
and did you realize--no one knows the cause . . . OR the cure!
...

I know that I wake up with excrutiatingly painful calf cramps in my left leg, after I've played gigs where I was really stomping on the hi-hat pedal.

I wake up with my calf muscle locked into fully-flexed position. I have to manually work my foot back and forth to loosen it up. Hurts really bad.

On those nights, I probably drank a lot of free beer; so I may be dehydrayted, too.

They are very common when you're pregnant. There are lots of different causes for different people (like jinx said, a potassium deficiency can cause it too,) but the cause during pregnancy is almost always a calcium deficiency. Taking a calcium supplement right before bed completely cured it for me. (And on nights when I forgot to take it, I woke up with vicious calf cramps, without fail.) Might be worth a try, since women need all the calcium they can get anyway.

that's the first thing I did (when I was able to walk); drink a gulp of my "Bone Health" Emergen-C.

Will try.

go away, horsey!

There's speculation that being low in potassium has something to do with it.
On those nights, I probably drank a lot of free beer; so I may be dehydrayted, too.

The alcohol flushes the potassium from your system. Per my lady DR. at VA.
Yes I have craps also. The potassium stops mine. Some folks use to take quinine, before they stopped selling OTC.

busterb;464254 wrote:

The alcohol flushes the potassium from your system. Per my lady DR. at VA.
Yes I have craps also. The potassium stops mine. Some folks use to take quinine, before they stopped selling OTC.

Intersting about the alcohol/potassium. Thanks.

Re: Quinine, what about tonic water? Is there not enough of it in there?

buster -- you have craps? I think that's another malady altogether . . .

Cloud;464264 wrote:

buster -- you have craps? I think that's another malady altogether . . .

:blush: Humm. Spell check doesn't catch crap like that.:bolt:

You mean the p should have been a b?

no horseys last night. Stretched and drank a calcium emergenc-c before bed. yay!

I got in the habit of giving myself charlie horses (my calves and quadriceps) every night before I went to bed, from the time I was about 9 until I was about 11. I did this until the muscles were exhausted and wouldn't charlie-horse anymore.

My calves got big and well-defined doing this. And, well, charlie horses don't bug me one bit when one comes involuntarily. I think I've developed a high level of cramp-control.

I feel very weird admitting this to anyone.

How did you give yourself charley horses?

if you get a calf cramp, jump out of bed and stand on that leg. no shit. it's the only thing that makes them go away immediately.

a couple of the sites also mention pinching the space between your upper lip and nose. Think I could do that whilst simultaneously standing on one foot after waking from a deep sleep?

HungLikeJesus;464319 wrote:

How did you give yourself charley horses?

Flex the muscle until it cramps, and continue flexing until the cramp becomes involuntary.

Cloud;464327 wrote:

a couple of the sites also mention pinching the space between your upper lip and nose. Think I could do that whilst simultaneously standing on one foot after waking from a deep sleep?

So you can control a charley horse by twitching yourself? :)

how . . . apt.

I get cramps via dehydration - at least I assume that's what it is, I get them in the early hours of the morning after I've seriously tied one on.

An ex of mine used to get them all the time, and he had big muscles, so that's a lot of hurt. The first time I had one in his company (during sex OF COURSE!) he was amazed that I didn't know how to relieve a cramp.

Work the muscle naturally.

So a foot cramp, flex the foot, a calf cramp, flex the calf etc. I was gutted that no-one had suggested it before. Of course it was kinda cute to have someone else manipulating my calf to show me what he meant ;)

I get them less now because at the first hint I just gently start flexing.