Stomach muscle spasms under rib cage

For about fourteen years my stomach muscles below my rib cage on left side, the muscle spasms, charlie horses, has a numb spot and sometimes has a crawling feeling.  I have tried loosing weight, excersise also had a cat scan in 2005, no hernia, or any other problem.  It is getting worse lately for about a year maybe a little more.  It is everyday all day sitting, bending cause charlie horse like effect.  Standing no problems unless I bend in anyway.  This started when I was pregnant with my youngest son.  It felt like he was trying to push his foot up through my stomach right below my rib on the left.  This is really stopping me from doing a lot of things.  I can't do any excersise that requires bending because of it.  I would appreciate any answers I can get.

[faith7748]

This is exactly what i have. Been seeing doctors for 5 years. No answer. It seems to be worse now. after one of these charlie horse attacks now it hurts for months now. I feel your pain.

[LaurenPiz]

I have the same thing!  I had my gall bladder removed last Feb and this week I started feeling everything that you describe.  I just got over H1N1 and a nasty sinus infection.  Had to go to ENT for continued hoarseness of my voice & he is sending me for a barium esophorgram (sp?) in the AM.  I am hoping the test my reveal the cause of the sensations I am having under my ribs on the left side.  At least I know I am not alone.
I will let you know if I hear anything useful.

Lauren

[ValVic]

Hi Lauren

Did the doctors ever find out what the pain was? I have the same pain and my doctors keep giving me the run around.

val

[dee55566]

I, too, experience abdominal muscle spasms. I don't work out but every time I bend down to pick up something or if taking a bath, reach to wash my feet, my stomach muscle will spasm and all I can do is bend backwards and wait! I have talked to many, many Doctors about times and they basicly just blow it off. My biggest fear is if I have a stroke and am unable to communicate, that I might have these cramps and no one will be able to help me bend to get rid of the pain. I have toldmy daughter about this fear I have. My mother also would get these muscle spasms and would cry  out with pain.

[begee99705]

I have muscle spasms or charlie horses around my rib cages on both sides, that just makes me freeze as it is difficult to breathe or even move cause it hurts so bad.  My doctor said I was lacking in calcium, magnesium and zinc.  So I have been taking those vitamins once a day for the last year and the attacks are more often now. I had my gall bladder removed in 2006 so I don't know if this type of thing is an after affect or not. The rest of the emails above are about muscle spasms in the stomach area, below the rib cage. Mine is happening inside my rib cage.

begee99705

[mogab]

I have this as well.  It started 8 years ago when I was pregnant with my daughter.  It has never gone away.  It can do many things, tighten up so tight if I cough wrong.  Or just be a nagging burning pain while I do the dishes.  I try to stretch to make it go away but doesn't really help much.

[Lauralight]

The first thing I'd do is get on a hefty does of magnesium citrate as that is the spasm reducer they use in hospitals in IV's for many things including stopping early labor pains. And don't be afraid to read up on how much of an epidemic there is in our country of the deficiency of this. And then look into Potassium deficiency as well, then calcium if you get tingling sensations in your lips/tongue/jaw or numbness as well.

[Lauralight]

Look up descending colon spasms and potassium deficiency. If you aren't eating 7 bananas a day, you like 99.9% of the rest of us Americans aren't getting enough potassium, and I have suffered from this before. It's very very uncomfortable. It's ok to take multiple of the 3% of your daily allowance vitamins that they sell over the counter. I take 8 pills twice per day with meals and lots of water to wash them down. It only give me like 48% of my daily allowance however, so bananas, potatos, prunes/prune juice, or OJ are also great support for this.