This morning when I woke up I stretched and immediately got a bad cramp in my left calf. I've had leg cramp maybe 2-3 times before in my life, and each time, it happened when I was stretching in bed. I know calf cramps feel excruciating, and this really was painful. After a few minutes it went away. There is still a tiny twinge every now and then, but nothing that painful. If I move my foot up and down it doesn't really provoke any pain. And If I recall correctly, last time I had a charlie horse/leg cramp, the muscle was still a little tender for 2 days or so afterwards.
But seeing as I have been feeling short of breath at times these past few weeks, and already have a fear of blood clots/DVT, this really set me off on an anxiety spiral again, because a lot of people with blood clots/DVT describe the DVT pain as feeling exactly like a charlie horse.
If I recall correctly however, most people with DVT said their cramp feeling was persistent, like a charlie horse that wouldn't go away (which sounds pretty agonising!) I've read tons of stories and most people seem to say that the cramp feeling lasted hours or days, or they ended up limping from the pain. My pain went away in a few minutes. But there's still this niggling anxiety in the back of my mind. I went to the doctor last week after having some leg pain in the front & side of my left calf, and she said because my calf was soft and didn't have any swelling/redness/heat/coldness, she didn't think it was a clot.
She also said DVTs occur at the back of the leg, i.e. behind the knee, or in the calf. But today, the cramp was in the back of my calf. So I immediately thought the worst.
This month has been really stressful and my health anxiety keeps flaring up. I'm on the waiting list for therapy but I really feel like I'm losing my mind...
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