What It Means When You Have Muscle Spasms In Your Feet After Sex

As much as sex feels good, if we break it down and look at it from a technical standpoint, several things happen to your body during sex. Heart rate increases, genitals become engorged with blood causing them to swell, breathing turns into panting, moisture begins to secrete from the vagina and penis, and your anticipation of what's to come rises — it's all so tantalizing and exciting.

Because so much is going on, sometimes after sex, as the body comes back down from cloud nine, part of it can go a bit rogue. It's as if after all the high-intensity fun, your body isn't sure what to make of it. When this happens, you can experience muscle spasms in your body, most notably in your feet.

Although sex injuries are not uncommon, especially if you have a penis, it's certainly not the only part of the body that might act up after a romp. If you're experiencing muscle spasms in your feet after sex, then there could be a couple of reasons for it.

No matter what position you and your partner have sex in, your muscles tense up in anticipation of what's to come. In fact, this muscle tensing during sex, both voluntary and involuntary, is called myotonia and, according to Medical News Today, it's one of the "two basic responses to continual stimulation." The other is vasocongestion, which we'll get to in a hot second. While most of your muscles get involved during sex, really pushing themselves to the limit, there's a good chance that the lower half of your body is doing most of the work, enabling you to bump and grind, so to speak. So, if you strained your muscles or over-exerted them during sex, then it only makes sense that your feet may be experiencing spasms or cramping after the fact.

According to an article published in StatPearls, dehydration can also possibly contribute to muscle spasms because muscles need to be hydrated if they're going to function properly. If you find yourself dealing with muscle cramping of any kind after sex, ask yourself if you're hydrated enough. If you sweat excessively during sex, then having water nearby can definitely help ease any cramps or spasms.

Vasocongestion is just a fancy word for when parts of the body become engorged with blood, as the genitals do during sexual arousal. Although vasocongestion, like myotonia, is a necessary component when it comes to sex and, more especially, having an orgasm, it can wreak a bit of havoc on the femoral nerve in your thigh. This happens to be the largest nerve in the lumbar plexus, the intricate network of nerves for the lower limbs, so when it's affected by anything, it's going to send out signals to other parts of the body to respond appropriately.

According to a 2022 study published in Sexual Medicine, when vasocongestion occurs, it can result in the compression of the femoral nerve which, in turn, can affect the saphenous nerve that runs down the back of the leg. Because that nerve heads straight to the foot, the nerves in that area become alarmed, responding with spasms, cramps, tingling, and in some cases a sharp pain. While this may be uncomfortable and inconvenient, it's not something that you should worry about unless, of course, it becomes a regular occurrence. In that case, you'll definitely want to ask your doctor to check things out to make sure it's nothing serious.