I just got back from a long walk with my neighbor. My leg muscles are twitching like crazy—all around my thighs and butt. And I just adjusted my position in my chair and it stopped for a minute, and now it’s happening again.
It almost feels like my legs think they’re still walking.
Weird. I’m not worried, it’s just a mundane observation.
Has this ever happened to you?
Yep- it’s probably something called benign fasciculation syndrome- usually a harmless condition.
It’s especially common in the calf muscles but can occur anywhere.
Be sure to take magnesium supplements in case you might have a deficiency there. It’s good to take magnesium regardless- most people don’t get enough.
Something similar, yes.
You’d be amazed at the search results for “itchy trigger finger”.
Yeah, I’m a terrible vitamin taker. I always forget. Will go do that now! <shuffles off>
It happens to me a lot, especially if I haven’t walked very far in a long time. It usually subsides after a few minutes. To me it has always felt more like blood rushing around, with a mild twitchy sensation.
It has happened to me hundreds of times since I was just out of my teens, usually after a really long walk(more than 5 miles). I actually like the feeling now. I feel like I have done some decent exercise if it strikes. It has been some time since I have felt it…
Well I’m not exactly the picture of fitness lately, so I’m sure my legs are just saying “WTF?” after a long walk. Part of me hopes my muscles were continuing to burn calories, but I’m sure that’s just wishful thinking! 
You know, after a long walk, I used to get what the OP describes. I had forgotten about it, because it hasn’t happened for a long time. Stopped about the time I started taking magnesium for menopause-related heart palpitations!
If I had to take only one supplement it would be magnesium. It helps you use all the other electrolytes (e.g. potassium, calcium) and it’s easy to avoid the kind of foods that contain it (e.g. almonds). I had bad muscle twitches for a long time and even had one episode where my muscles were cramping up all over my body- it freaked me out so bad I went to the emergency room where I was diagnosed with low magnesium. Magnesium supplements got rid of the twitches after a while, though it takes a while to get your blood Mg levels back up.
It’s especially important to take magnesium supplements if you take a diuretic for high blood pressure, as I did at the time. Doctors always tell people taking diuretics to eat more potassium, but they often leave out magnesium. Epsom salt baths are a good way to get a quick magnesium fix- it enters your bloodstream through your skin.
I used to get that when i went to bed on the night after Taekwon Do training. maybe I’ll get it again tonight, I’ve just started training again today!
A few weeks back my left calf muscle kinda spasmed then contracted REALLY hard. i mean painfully hard. Of it’s own accord. It was sticking out about 1cm more than if i just tense it, and the bottom of the muscle was a lot higher on my leg than it normally is. It was very painful, and I couldn’t get it to relax, it just happened on it’s own, after about a minute. It also continued to hurt for the next day or so, like a strained muscle kinda pain.
Were your cramps anything like this description?
I reckon i could do with more magnesium, i probably don’t get much in my diet, which is basically meat and carbs
I really don’t think you are that far off. As long as it never hurts, it is probably just your muscles and blood vessels settling down after being taxed during a workout. They were all revved up and just take awhile to cool down, and work at their normal rate.
How much exercise did you do? I really need to get my @ss in gear and do some walking. So, hopefully soon, I will be having tingly legs myself. 
[quote=“CAT_1, post:10, topic:483601”]
How much exercise did you do?/QUOTE]
I walked at a medium pace for about an hour, with about 1/4 of it up a steep hill.
In the one severe episode I had, it was more like a general stiffness over my body- kind of what I imagine the onset of tetanus might be like. Scared the hell out of me. I had full-scale hypomagnesemia though- medically low magnesium caused by taking diuretics and eating no magnesium.
Before that incident and a few months afterwards, I had much milder symptoms like the OP describes. Eventually my body absorbed enough magnesium from the supplements and my symptoms stopped altogether. The good news is that it made me so health conscious that I lost a lot of weight and got off blood pressure medicine altogether. Was very scary at the time, though.
What bugs me so much is someone told me that before you fall alseep your legs twitch and now I am acutely aware of this and just as I’m nodding off I get little leg seizures all the time.
It’s bloody irritating.
Seriously? I want to believe this, but I’m torn between the people who say “you cannot get ANYTHING into your bloodstream through your skin!” and the fact that you can get mercury poisoning through your skin.
If it’s the truth, then I know how I’ll be getting my magnesium supplements from now on! (claps hands) Cato! My bath!
If that were true, nicotine patches wouldn’t work.