If your child has frequent tamper tantrums (or is crabby a lot), and she is getting to bed at a reasonable time, you might want to notice how well your child is sleeping. Let’s face it, none of us feel great about taking on the world when we have had insomnia. A child often expresses his poor night's sleep through temper tantrums. Could she have Restless Leg Syndrome? ( RLS)
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Restless Leg Syndrome. What's that? Doesn't everyone get restless sometime?
No. Not like this.
Imagine waking up in the middle of the night; half your body wants nothing but sleep, the other half needs to get up and run (or do isometric exercises until the muscles are exhausted.) Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. It’s a miserable experience for those who suffer from it, & I often wonder how many people up in the wee hours of the night/ morning surfing the net are there because it takes their mind off their RLS. To you sufferers out there: you will know what I mean when I say that RLS is its own special form of torture.
I have had RLS since I was a little girl. I usually fell asleep quickly enough, but then woke up in the middle of the night, my legs crawling with a current just under the skin. I'd shake my legs, hit them, massage them, pray, sometimes get out of bed and walk around. I never knew how long it would last or how long I was awake. Eventually I fell back to sleep; exhausted, I suppose. For a long time I never mentioned the sensation to my parents. In the hustle-bustle of getting ready for school, it was forgotten. I also didn't have a name for it, and especially for a child, that alone can make it difficult to talk about. I was a teenager by the time I had a name for my wide-wake night-time nightmare.
Fortunately it was not an every night occurrence. For some people it happens just at night; perhaps a few nights a week, a few nights a month, or just a few times a year. For a few unfortunates it happens every night and also during the day. Some describe it as a “creepy- crawly” feeling. For some it is a burning sensation. Mine feels like an electrical current under the skin that only is tolerable when my legs are moving. It was worse during pregnancy and has been at times almost as bad during peri-menopause.
About 15 % of the population experiences some level of RLS. Chances are good that you know someone who has RLS. It's interesting to note that it wasn’t that many years ago that the number quoted as having RLS was about 5%. Perhaps it wasn't reported as often because people who did report it were often sent to psychiatrists. I suppose we can "thank" the pharmaceutical industry for making many more people aware of the syndrome through their medication advertisements. Symptoms of RLS are reported more frequently to doctors now & it is no longer a psychiatric diagnosis. It is hard to know whether or not RLS is more common than it used to be, or just reported more frequently.
RLS is now seen as a neurological disorder. I would like to point out that RLS is yet another example of a disorder that because it was misunderstood by the medical community, was chocked up as a psychiatric disorder, as were these diagnoses at one time: epilepsy, PMS, chronic fatigue syndrome, & fibromyalgia. I am quite certain I have missed a few diagnoses that also fall into this category. Suffice it to say there is a lesson to be learned here: no matter how certain the medical community was/is about your diagnosis yesterday or today; tomorrow they could be completely wrong. A few years can change much about what the scientific community knows regarding health and illness, and it can take many more years for the information to filter down to your doctor and the public at large. That is why you, Ms. Consumer, need to educate yourself about your health, your body, you rights, and responsibilities. (and it is an on-going process)
RLS can be aggravated by a lot of things. One significant aggravation is a low iron level. If you suffer from RLS, have your iron level checked with your doctor. Make sure he/she is checking serum ferritin levels & TIBC (total iron binding capacity) NOT hemoglobin and hematocrit(H/H). Many doctors are still not aware that H/H levels are not a specific enough test.This information has been out for about 10 years, (which just supports my point mentioned in the above paragraph). When you ask your doctor to check your iron levels ask specifically for ferritin levels. I hate to have to say this, but check the request form that is going with you to the lab. You'd be surprised how often I have checked this, only to find H/H marked, but not the ferritin and TIBC, even after it has been requested. If you don't want to make a second trip back, check and double check. If you get to the lab and notice the error, have the lab call the doctor immediately and have him correct the error over the phone. (Yes, they can do this) The recommended lower levels of iron are 50mcg/L.(and this is a relatively new change) If you have any sort of inflammatory process going on such as arthritis, allergies, etc., you should know that your levels may appear falsely high.(Few doctors seem aware of this also.)They may tell you your levels are fine. However, if your levels fall within the normal range, but still are at the low end on ferritin & you have some inflammatory process going on, you might find some relief by adding iron to your supplementation regimen. Have your levels checked after a few months, as too much iron is bad for your health too. My ferritin levels hover around 50-52mcg/L. I find that taking iron does help, though it doesn’t completely get rid of the RLS.
Exercise gives some people relief but it can also exacerbate RLS. The worst RLS I have ever experienced (outside of pregnancy) was after using a stair-stepper machine. The sensation of a burning electrical current started at the bottom of my feet and went straight up to my hips. I could not sit still for hours. So gage your exercise. Use new equipment with caution. Start out slowly. Do not work up to your full aerobic capacity. Try the exercise for a limited amount of time, then see how you feel after the exercise period is over and you are relaxing. My 15 minutes on the stair-stepper was not worth the 4-5 hours of extreme discomfort afterward. Needless to say, I don’t use a stair-stepper machine now.
Five years ago I couldn’t sleep more than an hour and a half. Sometimes my RLS bothered me, sometimes not. Either way I would be awake an hour and a half, then sleep and hour and a half. This went on all night. ..all night, every night for 6 months. I was pretty much a wreck at the end of the 6 months. The doctor I went to was nice, but no help at all. I knew more about my condition than he did. The hormonal fluctuations of perimenopause exacerbated my RLS, but since it was not a constant, it was harder to recognize. A friend finally suggested that perimenopause might be complicating the picture. She told me about over-the-counter (OTC) topical progesterone to help with perimenopausal symptoms. The first night after starting the topical cream I was able to sleep 4 solid hours! and the next night 6 hours! Heaven! Read What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Peri-menopause by Dr. John Lee,M.D.. ( or What Your Doctor May Not Tell You About Menopause) I had always assumed there was a hormonal connection to RLS, but I hadn't put it together, and like a lot of women, I thought I was too young to be starting menopause. Peri-menopause begins about 10 year before menopause so it is quite common to begin to have signs your 30's.
The RLS was awful during my 2nd pregnancy. It wasn’t just legs: it was arms and legs. I was probably low on iron then and didn’t know it, and the hormonal changes exacerbated it too. Perhaps a bit of extra progesterone might have helped. But generally you are cranking out large amounts of progesterone during pregnancy, and one wouldn't think it would make much of a difference. However, that being said, if I had to relive it, I would try the topical progesterone and get my ferritin levels checked every few months.
I love coffee, but I felt that it might be making my RLS worse. The dilemma? How to get through the day after a lousy night of sleep without coffee? It became a vicious cycle. Bad sleep…need coffee... more coffee…more RLS. Finally the misery from the RLS won out over the cravings for coffee. I started cutting back coffee and drinking decaf. I try not to drink or eat foods with caffeine after 12
I took the homeopathic remedy “coffea cruda” for those afternoon cravings and it worked great to squelch the desire. I keep some coffea cruda next to my bed just in case I wake up with RLS and I think it’s because I over indulged in caffeine during the day, though I am pretty good now about adhering to my rules. It usually helps me get back to sleep in such cases. It may or may not help you if your RLS is bothering you, but you haven't had coffee. "Rhus tox" is another homeopathic remedy that has worked on occasion to relax my running legs at night. But it too does not work 100% of the time.
The coffee-liver-connection made me think that perhaps my body wasn’t processing other things very well either. I wondered if that could be exacerbating my RLS. After taking a nursing course on RLS and learning of the similarities between RLS and Parkinson’s disease,(not the same), but some suspected similar pathways, and knowing that in the alternative world Parkinson’s is thought to be connected to pesticide exposure, I wondered about a possible pesticide exposure link to RLS. I had taken a supplement about a year ago that had a chelating agent in it that would detoxify my system. It was suppose to pull off heavy metals, and it probably did. Four days into the regimen, my RLS went NUTS. I could not stand it. It was worse every night. I stopped the supplement and started on iron, assuming that my iron had been low and it pulled off iron along with heavy metals. My naturopath later confirmed this. The RLS gradually lessened as it responded to supplemental iron, but it did not go away. It was still extremely bothersome. I was reluctant to take any other chelating agents after that.
In December 2006 I went to the World Health Fair in
I did a urinalysis to see if I had particularly high levels of anything. They checked about 30 heavy metals and while I had some of each, I didn’t seem to have anything that was grossly out of whack (yeah, that’s a medical term) Newborn babies have approximately 300 contaminants at birth. (Gone are the days when they thought the placenta protected the fetus from most substances.) With a 1000 new chemicals dumped into the environment yearly, I figured that it was about time for another try at detoxification. This detox product was not suppose to pull off essential minerals (such as the iron that put me over the edge the last time.)
I was more than pleasantly surprised after about 6 weeks when I noticed no RLS, especially before menses, which can be a particular difficult time for women. I kept taking it for several months. Then I stopped taking it. I ran out and was feeling good so I didn’t really think too much about reordering it. I also wanted to know if this was a permanent fix. After about another 4-6 weeks I started waking up at night, a bit restless. At that point it was not in the same way as Restless Legs before. However, I was unable to get back to sleep without taking something like a homeopathic remedy for sleep, some lavender essential oil, 5-HTP, GABA, or melatonin. I have also tried Passion flower and Valerian. Progressively the RLS returned, so I started back up on the Zeolites. Again with in a few weeks, I was sleeping without being interrupted by RLS.
Other things that have been helpful:
1) a good antioxidant & mineral,
2) Ca/mg supplement. I like a cup of magnesium tea (raspberry lemon flavored.) I use Natural Vitality by Peter Gillham before bed occasionally.
3) I also take amino acids to help increase dopamine levels which are thought to be low or used improperly by individuals with RLS.
4) probiotics & enzymes to get the most nutrition out of my food
5) I still watch my iron levels
6)I still watch my caffeine consumption, though I can be a little more liberal now.
According to Health Breakthroughs 2007, by Bottom Line Books RLS is caused by low level or impaired transmission of dopamine. Could heavy metals or xenoestrogens from pesticides be blocking the transmission of the dopamine? or possibly play a role in preventing the proper neurotransmitters from being made? If so, did the zeolites pull the heavy metals and xenoestrogens out and allow the dopamine to be used properly or perhaps allow for the proper creation of dopamine?
I don't know the answer to those questions but, I do know that the best, most consistently effective remedy I have found for RLS is the Zeolites. I use Natural Cellular Defense by Waiora. I put the drops in water or any liquid. You can’t taste, feel, or smell them. They have the GRAS status (Generally Recognized as Safe for human consumption). Is my RLS cured? I wouldn't say that. I would say that since a month into starting the drops, I have been able to manage the RLS much more effectively. I definitely am sleeping much better. I still have to follow some rules. If I go hog wild on caffeine, I probably will suffer the consequences that night.
I did not try prescription medication accept when I broke my back. I did noticed then that my pain killer helped my RLS a lot. But who wants to be taking addictive drugs for this problem? Most of the drugs available for RLS are addictive and some have a rebound effect. In other words they work for a while then the RLS comes back, and often it is worse than it had been previous to using the drug. No, thanks!
There is a new drug on the market called Mirapex. At the end of the commercial when they warn you of the side effects, get this,… "possible increased urges for gambling, alcohol, sexual or other urges"! What?! . If you go on line
It’s awful not to sleep through the night & have to deal with that awful creepy-crawly feeling, night after night, but risking developing an addiction isn’t a choice I am willing to make. I have seen too many lives destroyed by addiction. For me: I will use the detox and take care of my health as naturally as I can, for as long as I can. So far I am sleeping better than I have in years.
Click here if you would like to try the zeolites I am talking about. By the way, I can’t speak about any of the other products offered on this site. I haven’t tried them.