Karla Dzienkowski’s daughter was 11 when she started coming into her mom’s room at night saying she couldn’t fall asleep because of a stabbing feeling in her legs. She had to walk to make it stop.
The preteen became cranky and tired. Her grades started to slip, and she even fell asleep on a bench during a family trip to an amusement park, Dzienkowski said.
It took three years, but Dzienkowski’s family finally got an explanation for the girl’s condition: restless legs syndrome.
One study estimates 4% to 29% of adults in Western industrialized countries have restless legs syndrome. It is a condition that too few people can recognize in themselves, and many doctors don’t know how to manage properly, said Dzienkowski, a nurse who is executive director of the Restless Legs Syndrome Foundation.
