Okay, not trying to panic but when your toe starts arching up (and I'm sleeping), and I wake up and I go "oh no, please don't let this happen", It's very painful.

Now I used to get spasms when I was a kid. Once in a great while, my middle toe would all of a sudden rise up in the air. I would look and go: "Oh, my look at this thing". I would press it back down and it would be fine"

Rarely happened again. Then as I got older, I would get spasms in my upper left muscle in my chest. This usually happened when I visited my mother in Florida (we did not get along), she was a (well, let's just say she was not a nice person).

But that passed also. Then years ago (when I was going through the crap with my son's behavior (about 10 years ago), I got bladder spasms (every test ruled out everything, so I just called them bladder spasms). One night I was in the shower and the hot water poured over me and it passed and it never happened again, thank god for that.

So about 6 months ago, my left foot started doing the spasm thing in the toes. I was laying on my bed and I started to do stretching exercises and BAM, the spasm started in my calf and I had to just wait and it went away.

So last night (in my sleep), it woke me up and my big toe was arching (all my itself, so I know this is a spasm). I tried not to panic (lasted all of one minute). I just tried to relax my body, I too my right foot and gently put it over my left foot and pried the left big toe back down. Then I sat up, slid over to the side of the bed, slowly got up, and i was fine.

Now you might be asking what happened right before bedtime. My girlfriend (the one with the alcoholic son who is driving her crazy), called me up from a motel and she was all upset about her son and she was drinking too. So I gave her support, and of course I started thinking about my own son. Not enough that I cried or anything, but I'm wondering if all the little stressors in my life (and of course the big stressor), my son, and the fact that we are trying to get a wound treatment center to see Alan and we found out that they bill as a clinic visit and it's $50 every time you go, and sometimes it's 3times a week. So we are trying to find one that bills through the hospital so there's no copay. Well could the fact that my mind has all these things going on and my body is responding with spasms.

I mean, I eat healthy, I do my walking, my PN is fine due to the Methyl B-12. I got so unnerved when I woke up this morning, the first thing I thought of was Dystonia, but I don't match any of the rest of the symptoms. This is only my toe.

I didn't have to do warm compresses or anything. It was over in 1 minute. I looked up the causes of toe spasms and they did say Diabetic Neuropathy, MS, Dystonia, and a whole bunch of other stuff.

When I have gotten these I was always lying down. Never when I'm standing, or walking. I feel perfectly fine this morning. Very confusing.
Anybody have these things besides me??

Mel

Hi - I used to get calf and feet spasms at night when I was working - I think it was beause of the shoes I had worn during the day - I'd go from heels all day long to flats to go play on the beach..... get them rarely now caues I'm usuallly barefoot inside - but do get them occasionally - if I've put some kind of stress on my legs during that day....

Anything different on your feet or??? lots of stair climbing or something along those lines?

Well, the only thing that MAY have influenced my toes were that yesterday I bought a brand new pair of crocs. Hot pink. I wore them around the corner at 6 p.m because I made a brand new batch of blueberry muffins and my neighbors go nuts over them, so I went around the corner carrying my muffins and wearing the hot pink crocs. Now these crocs are different than the black ones I ususually wear. They are a big smaller. My middle toe is longer than the thumb toe (on each foot, and my doctor noticed that the other day when he was measuring my feet for my new (insurance paid) pair of diabetic shoes. He said out loud "oh, your middle toe is bigger than your thumb toe".

So yesterday, I put on these hot pink crocks and I noticed two things immediately. They were a bit smaller than my black ones (didn't bother me at all). And when I slipped my foot into the shoe, the prickly things that stick out in the sole, well I FELT THESE PRICKLY THINGS. Didn't feel them on the back crocks.

I just said "oh, wow, my feet are getting an acupressure workout". After two minutes, I don't even notice them, because I sat on my friend's porch.

So as soon as I got home at 8 p.m. I took off my crocks. The spasm in my big toe happened at 2 a.m. So I really don't think (or don't know) if it had anything to do with the crocs.

I just spoke to my friend Esther and she said "oh my god, I used to have toe spasms every single night, I would watch the toe go straight up and you can see the bone go up as the toe goes up". "And there's nothing you can do, you just have to walk it off until the muscle spasm goes away".

Last night at 2 a.m. I wasn't about to go walking around the house in the dark, so I just took my right foot and gently pried the spastic toe downwards. It was very very painful, (didn't really know that toe spasms could be so painful).

Because all my life I've had spasms here and there, (in the calf, in the chest, in the bladder (they lasted for years and I wanted to kill myself, and I went to doctor after doctor and they never found anything). And the odd thing about the bladder spasm was that it mimics a bladder infection, only you pee normally, but you always have the urge to pee. Imagine having this feeling "down there" for 4 years. I was going through hell with my son at the time.

Well, one day I went to my doctor and said "I need muscle relaxers, maybe that will help". I did not take any xanax, I did not take anything during this time, so I figured the muscle relaxer (I think it was SOMA), I thought it would help.

So I fill the prescription, I took it home, and I was prepared to take it before bedtime. I will never forget what happened. Before I even took one pill, I was in the shower and the hot water was going on my body and it was like I took 10 muscle relaxers, my bladder just stopped spasming. I will never forget that. I never had to take any of the muscle relaxers.

This is why I feel that this is all in my head. My whole stress level affects my body. I know there is nothing we can do about the stress in our lives, only how we deal with the stress. I've dealt with a 26 year son who lives 3000 miles away who is a compulsive gambler and who never comes out of his room and who never gets off the computer.

I have had to put the worry about him about of my mind and heart. I have had to detach my mind from what he is doing.

I've been able to do this, but at what cost? It's like my son and I no longer have any connection. Don't know if anybody out there in PN land can identify with what I'm talking about. But when you go through this, your body has to react in some way.

And I think my body (in my sleep) is spasming.

I just took a co Q10 (my friend said it helped her enormously with her spasming toes). I guess I'll give it a try.

Isn't it odd that it only happened at 2 a.m. and lasted for 30 seconds. I think I would have lost my mind if it lasted any longer.

Oh, and this is important. What do I do if it happens again?? Do you put heat or ice on a spasm?? I never like ice on my body. Only warm compresses. Do you think that's a good thing for a spasm??

Melody

I used to get them actually late at night, eary AM - word of advice, dont jump up - woke up with a calf cramp so bad once I just started screming and hyperventilating from the pain, so made the mistake of getting up to try to walk it off.. passed out cold and cracked my head on the way down! (from the hyperventilating)... I found just staying in bed and rubbing the muscle until it stopped aching was the best therapy!

Now you know why I didn't jump out of bed at 2 a.m. and start walking around the bedroom. I just remained calm (pain was horrible), but since I know that spasms are horrible, I just pushed the big toe down as best I could. And believe me, when a toe is in the middle of a spasm, it doesn't want to go down.

Reminds me of when I was about 17 years old. I was asleep in my bed when I got this pain in my calf. I woke up screaming. My father and mother came running in and my father said "take it easy, it's a charlie horse". Never heard that word before. He massaged my calf and it went away. The next time this happened was 6 months ago when I tried to stretch my hamstring in the bed and it started to spasm. So I just stopped, I started to massage it and that was it. So from age 17 to age 59, no more calf spasms. Isn't that strange.

You know, how when you have a sprained ankle, they say to do RICE, Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation.

Well, what do you think is the best thing to do for a spasm?? Ice it, or warm compresses. I'm heading in the direction of warm compressions.

Simply because I remember being in the hot shower and my whole body just relaxed.

Melody

For a while last year i was getting such bad calf cramps while sleeping that my calf muscle was sore for days afterwards. I havent had any in a long time now.

Hi Melody:

I get those too. I have found that if I sleep with a heavy bedspread on my bed, I apparently lift up my toes while I am sleeping and every now and then, get those toe spasms, where they rise up and are very stiff. I sit up and press the toes down with my other foot. OF course the spasmed toes hurt the whole time.

In the winter when I have that heavy spread on I get the charlie horses too and the only remedy for me is to again sit up on the edge of the bed, and either massage the calf with my hands or stand up. I am careful not to fall. A cane on the side of your bed might be a good thing to have for balance.

Now during the summer I have just the top sheet and when chilly outside, a very light blanket and have not had many cramps or spasms lately. But I agree, they are very very painful and quite disturbing. Some say that drinking more liquids will help prevent them.

But my dear, I am much older than you! I never had them till the last couple of years. Hope others will have some tips.

Cheers...
Shirley H.

Don't sweat it Shirley. You've still got it going on!!!!!

We're two hot chicks (even though we get spasms).

Right now, here in Brooklyn, the weather is absolutely crazy. The humidity is through the roof and the thunder and lightening before was something else.

That's when I can't stand up straight. But I don't want Alan to see me all bent over (isn't that stupidly vain??).

So I'm trying to walk in as feminine as I can be, and I probably looked like Quasimoto from the HunchBack of Notre Dame, and I said to Alan, "Please don't look at me, I want to have some dignity", and he burst out laughing.

At least I still make him laugh.

lol Melody

Try taking the magnesium and calcium on a regular basis. Mrs. D's thread in the vitamin forum discusses this combination. It has helped my cramps and twitches tremendously.

Billye

Mel my computer is crashing so get yourself checked for potassium
and with toes can be gout. The thing to do is try what Billey said
first and drink water. Go through hospital for wound clinic better Drs.
anyway, insurance will pay. I am spasm from head to toe. Darn this
sticken computer,no now. how this one gets through . Dakota
have a good time,i love you all,and may this is curse of putting
pig skin o a Jew.. Sue