growing pains? in 3yo

[balancedmama]

DD has been complaining of pain in her knees - waking her up early in the morning. She's 3.75. Is this likely 'growing pains'? If so are there minerals or supplements that could help? I was thinking of cal/mag, but there may be something else. She takes a daily multivite/multimineral but it's pretty much at the RDA, nothing extra.

[JaneS]

It's usually magnesium. We have a huge amount of calcium in our modern diets and hardly any magnesium.

Also vitamin D levels can be a factor esp. considering this time of year and where you live. We need a whole lot more than the RDA: www.vitamindcouncil.org

[kjbrown92]

lyme?
food intolerances? (my DS was diagnosed with growing pains, yet when he stopped having any dairy, they went away, and he gets them back whenever we've "trialed" it)
Mg defiency?
Juvenile RA? (any swelling?)

[balancedmama]

Ok, I doubt lyme, she's had no known tick bites and ticks are hard to encounter here.

Magnesium deficiency...def. a possibility.
Vit. D deficiency...also possible, although she does have great sun exposure and I have recently started giving her D drops.

I don't see any swelling. I need to look again though. She definitely has food intolerances. Hmm. It could be that too, thinking about her diet right now.

I think I"m going to give her a cal/mag supplement and increase her D and see if that helps over a short period of time. She's definitely growing.

Ugh, I remember having the WORST 'growing pains' in my legs as a kid. My diet was not good though. DH and I both feel so bad for her and want to prevent that for her if we can.