Growing Pains

My son woke up two times in the night just crying saying how bad his legs hurt.  He was holding his knees and crying so hard.  I felt really bad for him, but had no clue what to do.   I had the thought and was pretty sure it was growing pains.  He asked for a pillow to prop his legs up, but woke up an hour later crying harder saying his knee hurt so bad.  Tears were streaming down his face.  It was a good thing I had gone to bed at 8:30 because I had the patience to deal with him.  My hubby also was very helpful.   We rubbed his legs with some CM cream and got him a cozy blanket we call the “cloud” and a couple more pillows and my husband gave him a blessing and he stopped crying and went to sleep.  Poor kid 3 hours of pain is not fun.

After that I couldn’t fall asleep, I kept thinking how I wished I knew more about Growing Pains and what I could have done more for him.   I did finally fall asleep, but when I woke up I decided to look it up and found some good things.  I also asked my facebook friends what they do to help their kids that go though growing pains.  I got a lot of great answers. 
Here are a few things I learned….

• Growing pains is a normal occurrence in about 25% to 40 % of children,  They generally strike during two periods: in early childhood among 3-to 5-year olds, later in 8- to 12-year-olds
• Throughout the growing up process, the human body changes proportions many, many times. Sometimes long, gangly arms and legs seem to shoot out over night! During these spurts of growth, children often complain of nighttime leg pain, hence the common label growing pains.
• Most often, growing pains will feel like a sharp throbbing pain. The pain can occasionally even be strong enough to wake the child up from sleep. About 25 to -40% of children between the ages of 3 to 5 and again between the ages of 8 and 12 experience growing pains (Healthy Children, AAP, June 2010).
• When children are plagued by episodes of recurrent, brief leg pain, it is a good idea for them to be checked once by a physician. If the physical examination is normal, with no redness, tenderness, swelling, or limitation of movement, and if the pain is not provoked by moving or associated with any abnormal gait, then this situation is what we often call growing pains. These pains typically occur at night with no resultant daytime disability. The actual source of the pain has never been proven, but long experience has taught us that they are benign and self-limited.
• In most cases the pain can be prevented with simple, daily stretching exercises. These exercises must be continued even after the pain subsides in order to keep the muscles and tendons relaxed and able to accommodate the next growth spurt.

Here are some of the great suggestions I got from all my facebook friends to help relieve the pain of growing pains…

• A bath with Epson salt. It is said to be a natural muscle relaxant
• Children’s Motrin
• Heat, put a heated rice bag on them or you can use a heating pad.
• Wrap leg with an ace bandage
• Arnica Montana
• Up their amount of Calcium and Potassium.
• Raspberry leaf tea works good. If you get raspberry leafs from a health food store, staple it in a coffee filter bag, boil water, remove the pan and put the tea bag in the pan with a lid on and let steep for 30 minutes. Then just add honey. Hopefully he will drink it. For every tsp of herb, add one cup of water to boil.
• Plenty of fluids
• Walk outside on the cold stairs- it worked every time! I am not sure why but I treated them kind of like Charlie horses and that worked.
• Hyland leg cramp tablets
• Good leg stretch at the end of the day.

My little man was so sweet this morning when I asked him what was wrong in the night, he said that it felt like his legs were getting longer and something was pulling on them.  So tonight we did some stretching and then put more cream on them.  We shall see, crossing my fingers!
I love facebook for this reason alone.  I didn’t even think of heat, but I have it ready just incase he has them again.   I am interested in the Arnica Montana, and I know he probably should be drinking more!  So I hope this post helps if your like me and have no clue how to deal with this!  Be prepared because at least one of your kids will probably go though this,