Leg cramps are those impressive pains that can appear just when you are asleep or when you are about to get up. They can be short-lived, but painful enough to render you immobile for that short time. To understand why leg cramps happen at night and how to treat them, we will share the following information.
What’s behind nighttime leg cramps
Around 50% of the adult population has experienced nocturnal episodes of leg cramps, these pains do not always contain a severe problem as long as they manifest themselves so repetitively. Despite being a very common problem, experts do not have a general diagnosis for them because it depends a lot on the state of health of the person since it sometimes appears as a side effect of another problem. To know if you are prone to these night terrors, you must analyze the following causes;
For sporadic cramps:
- Excess exercise at a high intensity.
- Sitting or standing for long periods.
- Taking diuretic medications, birth control pills, statins, and steroids.
- A bad diet. Absence of calcium, magnesium, vitamin b12, and potassium in the diet
- Not drinking enough water
- Gestation period.
The nocturnal episodes of these types of spasms resolve once the causes have been identified and the measures to correct them begin to be taken. When cramps last for a long time, we can say that we are facing a chronic ailment that is a secondary cause of a major health problem.
Among the major problems that cause chronic cramps are:
- Diabetes.
- Electrolyte imbalance due to the absence of an antidiuretic hormone known as ADH.
- Heart failure.
- Renal disease.
- Parkinson’s disease or peripheral neuropathy.
- Venous insufficiency.
- Spinal stenosis
- Arteriosclerosis.
If you think that the reason for your leg cramps is in the diseases mentioned above, it will be easier for your doctor to prescribe a treatment, so you should refer to him and tell him about these episodes. For cases of cramps that do not seem to encompass underlying problems, we bring you the following recommendations.
How can I prevent cramping episodes at night?
Cramps at night should not be a cause for alarm, although looking for its cause is the best way to know how to treat them, for now we will give you simple and very effective solutions to deal with them:
Do stretches
Practice simple leg stretching exercises a few hours before going to bed, there is a very easy one that consists of standing on the balls of your feet and extending your arms up. Another highly recommended is to extend your legs while sitting and touch the tips of your feet with your hands. These exercises can also be done when you are experiencing the cramp, the first thing is to start to turn the tip of the foot very gently and then try to raise one leg and lower it again.
Check your diet
Cramps can appear due to a lack of nutrients in the body, some of them such as magnesium , vitamin b12, calcium, potassium and phosphorus. These nutrients can be easily found in fish, dairy, pure cocoa, bananas, meat, nuts, seeds, whole grains, green leafy vegetables, etc. Along with an adequate diet, you should consume enough liquid, avoiding drinking beverages with a diuretic effect, these cause dehydration of the body and later cramps.
Practice these exercises
Riding a bike or spinning at a moderate intensity will help you activate the circulation of your legs. It should be noted that Spinning is one of the few physical activities that a person with venous insufficiency can practice, as in addition to not generating an impact on the joints, it helps promote the necessary blood circulation to dissolve clots in the legs.
Take massages
Massages are very effective both to treat them after they appear and to prevent them, these movements help to activate the circulation of the legs so it is recommended that they always be done in an ascending way. To do them you can use some type of cold gel to activate circulation in the legs.
Medication
The provision of muscle relaxants is the fastest way to prevent its appearance. There are also people who consume calcium channel blockers to prevent cramps, but these together with muscle relaxants should only be taken under the prescription of a doctor. Beware of self-medication!
Leg cramps should be temporary and can be resolved in a short time, if not before resorting to medication it is better to go for a medical check-up so that the analyzes determine the treatment to follow.
