Have you ever had disturbing or tingling experiences in your legs while you were lying or sitting down? Are you resisting against the pain or forcing your legs to move? Do these painful experiences in your legs occur during the daytime when you’re physically active? Or are these feelings in your legs surprisingly disturbing your sleep at nighttime?
If you have answered yes, then you may be suffering from Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS).
To the day-to-day life of a person living with RLS, the constant battle against pain is a real struggle – the painful experience is more than a toothache, and its severity is greater than a heartache.
Just imagine how it suppresses you from going into fun activities and ruins beautiful moments together with your loved ones and friends. Of course, your pain is lesser than your capacity. As long as there is treatment, life goes on.
To make your life more bearable despite the RLS condition, here are some home remedies to ease the pain caused by Restless Legs Syndrome.
What is Restless Legs Syndrome?
According to Harvard Health Publications of Harvard Medical School, Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) is a neurologic sensorimotor disorder that causes an individual to move the legs with an irresistible urge, often accompanied by a painful and unfavourable “creepy-crawly” sensation.
In statistics, 10 percent of the American
population suffers from RLS. According to WebMD, the occurrence of RLS is more
common in women than in men, and middle-aged people are prone to experience the
symptoms.
Symptoms of RLS
Furthermore, the symptoms of having RLS causes ruining events to your daily activities – whether you’re only confined in a space with an awakened presence during the daytime, or whether you’ve fallen asleep during the nighttime.
Restless Legs Syndrome causes uncomfortable sensations in the internal parts of your legs – during sitting or lying down. It aggravates your nerves in impeding sensations such as burning, aching, crawling, creeping, itching, tingling, tugging, or a feeling similar to electric shocks – which occurs repetitively or longer than seconds.
The leading causes of RLS are iron insufficiency, abnormalities of dopamine level, chronic diseases like diabetes, kidney failure, the Parkinsons’s disease, and the occurrence of varicose veins.
If you are suffering from RLS, you should immediately have your screening and consultation with a professional, such as Elite Vein Clinic, to examine the venous insufficiency in your legs through ultrasound imaging. Visiting a specialized vein center can provide comprehensive care and effective treatments for venous insufficiency, which may help alleviate symptoms of RLS. Light therapy for aches is also a good way to get rid of RLS. Don’t let RLS get worse.
What are some Home Remedies for treating Restless Legs Syndrome?
Home treatments are effective when properly and regularly executed. Through proper diet and best sleeping routines, you can reduce the symptoms and pain caused by RLS. Here are five effective home remedies for treating RLS:
1. Devote yourself to a sleeping hygiene
Most people often overlooked the proper way of sleeping. Not only because of the tiring experiences in fixing the bed, but also the factors of using smartphones and other gadgets before sleeping. As a result, your RLS symptoms get worse.
In other words, you need to devote yourself to sleeping hygiene, where you plot your schedule on waking up, your napping sessions, and the time before going to sleep. Also, keep a cool, quiet, and comfortable sleeping environment.
According to the National Sleep Foundation,
avoid using your smartphones or gadgets, at least 30 minutes before bed.
2. Eliminate your caffeine intake
Everybody loves to take coffee before going to work or during leisure time. But do you know that coffee can make your RLS worse?
Caffeine is a triggering element for RLS. It
is a stimulant that interferes with sleep, particularly when you’ve taken it
close to bedtime. While other physicians agree that caffeine has less impact on
your RLS, make sure to regulate your caffeine intake.
3. Make time for meditation
Repetitive stress and anger mismanagement can aggravate the symptoms of Restless Legs Syndrome. When you get stressed in a longer period, the prefrontal cortex of your brain shrinks and kills brain cells, responsible for giving signals in a fight-or-flight situation. Meaning, chronic stress can also lead to diabetes and heart diseases – a pathway for RLS symptoms.
As a way to mitigate stress, the habit of doing yoga, deep breathing, and stretching can give meditation that your body needs. It helps the improvement of your mood, increases your awareness, and reinforces your comfort during your sleep.
4. Manage your diet
You are what you eat. In other words, your diet amounts to your physical standing and reflects your mental condition. If you have symptoms from Restless Legs Syndrome, chances are higher for you to have iron sufficiency and low magnesium count in your body.
In your diet, always include foods rich in D3, potassium, and iron. We recommend you to eat spinach and leafy green vegetables and liver for your diet.
Spinach is rich in iron and folate, which can be included in different varieties of dishes, such as soups, sauces, smoothies, and salads. Also, a liver is a great source of iron – a rich source for haemoglobin formation and brain function. It is also the best way to suffice iron deficiency.
5. Commit to a regulated physical exercise
Exercise is the best way to combat stress, high cholesterol, diabetes, and the formation of varicose veins. Since varicose veins contribute to the symptoms of RLS, exercise can mitigate the pain through healthy blood pressure and normalized dopamine levels.
By producing sweat through a 30-minute exercise of walking, jogging, or moderate running, your legs will relieve, giving you a good night sleep. However, make sure to avoid vigorous exercise that might trigger RLS symptoms.
Key Takeaways
Restless Legs Syndrome is giving you more than the painful experience of a toothache, or severity greater than a heartache. It suppresses you from going into fun activities and ruins beautiful moments together with your loved ones and friends.
But as long as there is treatment, there is hope for a better life.
Today, RLS has affected the lives of millions of people – not just only in America, but to the entire world population. It occurs mostly in women as to men, and with middle-aged adults.
The leading causes of RLS are iron insufficiency, abnormalities of dopamine level, chronic diseases like diabetes, kidney failure, Parkinson’s disease, and the occurrence of varicose veins.
And its symptoms are generally causing an individual to move the legs with an irresistible urge, often accompanied by a painful and unfavourable “creepy-crawly” sensation.
To avoid any ruined moments and disturbing events, here are five effective home remedies to alleviate the symptoms of Restless Legs Syndrome:
- Devote yourself to sleeping hygiene;
- Eliminate your caffeine Intake;
- Make time for meditation;
- Manage your diet; and
- Commit to a regulated physical exercise.
