Why can induce muscle cramps in my feet so easily?
Have it (slightly less easily induced, but more painful). More potassium does help but doesn’t eliminate the problem. Seems like more calcium helps too but I don’t have real data on that, just a feeling. Personally, I always thought they came from the foot damage I did during years of ice skating– but if the others with it haven’t done any such damage, maybe it’s just a genetic predisposition? They’re easy enough to stretch out, though, and only really bug me when it happens while I swim (sucks to release them mid-water). Personally, I’m not too concerned about it– and I shouldn’t think you should be, either. (But hey, you could bug your friendly local podiatrist if you’d like a more medical answer).
Just about everybody gets cramps. There are several different kinds, a couple of which I know about: the overexertion type, and ‘night’ or ‘rest’ cramps (what I presume the op is writing about). Some light stretching will usually prevent the onset of the spasms that lead to cramps. My mother had to deal with real painful leg cramps as she got older, and the stretching before bedtime really helped.
Cheap & easy: Potassium & magnesium. Magnesium is the overlooked partner to calcium, and functions in relaxing the muscle. I had an easy-to-cramp foot too for years, and it got worse and worse. Then it got to where I couldn’t bend my toes, and then it turned into regular calf cramps where I would wake up in intense pain. Doctors blew it off and said “it happens.” Fast forward to now where I’ve learned some of the basics of vitamins & minerals, and my legs & feet work normally again with no cramps. There is plenty of information about this sort of thing out there, and maybe it’s not foot-specific, but a muscle cramp is a muscle cramp. Potassium can help tremendously, and should be the first line of action. But don’t neglect magnesium intake. Our diets just don’t give us enough of some things, because factory farming methods have stripped the soil of much of the minerals. Fortunately, both Potassium and Magnesium supplements are cheap, and both are also pretty easy to get in foods if you
I discovered that one on my own feet many years ago, and I always thought it was kind of strange. It’s almost the same experience for me, where if I do it for a short period of time and release it feels kind of neat and goes back to normal fairly quickly, but if I curl down for longer it starts to cramp up and hurt more and more. The longer I curl down, the more it cramps, and the harder it is to get it to release. I actually hadn’t done this in years, and never knew it happened to other people. Strange.
