Dr. Feigenbaum and Dr. Baraki,
I’m fairly familiar with your thoughts on cramping in general but I just experienced a severe bout of abdominal cramps that left me somewhat worried. Just to preface this, I’m going to include a lot of information that may not be relevant but I want to get everything out there so I can get the most well-informed opinion possible. Essentially what happened was I was getting up to pee and I had severe contractions in my abdomen for about a minute or so. I thought this was normal cramping so after it subsided I tried to go about my business but a couple minutes later they started to contract/cramp up again. This happened about 2-3 more times and by the end I was left in bed and didn’t even want to get up out of fear I might start cramping up again. I thought it might be a hernia (because I had no idea what a hernia feels like or even the symptoms) so I called a nurse’s hotline but she pretty much ruled it out. She suggested I make some dietary changes (no caffeine, carbonated drinks, limit fat & fruit intake) and try to see a doctor within a couple weeks.
Now in terms of my training, I lift fullbody 4 days a week and do a sort of quasi GPP workout (pullups, standing ab wheel/kneeling ab wheel/leg raises, arms, lateral raises, face pulls) twice a week. I feel like I’m pretty strong on abs (right now I’m up to 2x8 and 1x6 of standing ab wheel and could probably knock out 40+ kneeling ab wheel rollouts pretty easily) so I don’t think lack of training is a particular issue.
The part that generally has me concerned is that I feel like I’m cramping up pretty often. This is the first time in my abdominal area, but I get hamstring and quad cramps anywhere from 1 to 4 times a month. Sometimes I just feel it tense up/contract and I have to pullout of a movement before it gets really bad and other times it will leave me sore for a couple days. The fact that it’s happening often is leaving me concerned especially with this latest episode.
Finally, I want to mention I did increase my caffeine take and probably have been sleeping a little less than usual the last 2 days so I don’t know if those are confounding variables or even if they’re related to other periods of cramping. Also on creatine if it matters.
Essentially I’m looking for recommendations on how to adjust training based on this information and any particular thoughts on what kind of action I should take outside of lifting. Thanks for you time.