I get charleyhorses. I walk from 2 to 10 miles everyday with dogs. Play racketball 3 times a week.Generally I play about 6 games half doubles .So what causes them. They wake me at night and really hurt.
I drink tonic water and they just go away. No more cramps of charlie horses.
Charley Horse - Definition; Causes, incidence, and risk factors; Symptoms; Signs and tests; Treatment
What I want to know is why is it called a charley horse?
They dont come when I work out. They occur at night when I sam sleeping.So how are they workout related.Also I have had them most of my life.Am I short on something?
Yahoo | Mail, Weather, Search, Politics, News, Finance, Sports & Videos This is one crappy answer.
According to Phrase Finder it’s just one of those uncertain things.
Oh, you’re gonna love this one. There’s a natural remedies column in the Indy Star. A recurring subject in the last few columns is curing night leg cramps with soap. Not by washing with it, oh, no. You put it under the sheet at the foot of the bed! People write in to thank them for this “miracle.” Every time, the column writer says he knows no reason why this should work. :rolleyes:
Back to real life, cramps are a symptom of dehydration, which tends to deplete minerals. Because of that, a popular cramp remedy is eating a banana (rich in potassium.)
Do women get them too? Do children because I dont remember getting them when I was a kid.
I get them while sleeping when a leg gets tangled up in the blankets and my muscles are stretched too much because my leg is stuck straight out.
I get them, frequently. What I have learned is that if I strain to pull my toes up towards my knees as hard as possible the second I become aware a cramp is hitting, it seems to short circuit the cramp.
As in, it’ll still hurt vilely for a few seconds, but the cramp doesn’t get to the hard knotted stage, and I won’t have residual soreness afterwards.
+1
For severe cases you can use your hands to pull your foot.
There was one day that I hit the treadmill at the gym really hard. When I came back home I was so tired I could barely move. I sat at my computer and started to watch a DVD. And while I was relaxing, the meanest, badest cramp ever hit my leg. I tried to lift my toes but the cramp didn’t go away. I had to bend down, grab my foot and pull it.
The problem was that I was so tired that bending down required significant effort and also, even the smallest movement would send jolts of white-hot pain to my leg. I spent maybe 15 minutes until I managed to reach my foot 
Are you sure it’s a real charlie horse?
I get muscle cramps (so bad that they wake me up and have me gasping for air) in both of my upper calves, right below the back parts of my knee, several times a month. I found out it’s because I don’t have enough potassium in my diet (I take supplements now).
But according to my doctor, it’s not a charlie horse. Not sure what the qualifier for a charlie horse is, but apparently, I don’t fit the bill.
My suggestion (and recall, I am not a doctor, this is just what I would do) is drink more water and pop some potassium pills and see if that helps. If it doesn’t, you might wanna see a doctor.
~Tasha