BORN WITH RLS/BERTHED TO LIFE BY SOMETHING?

[buglegs]

Diagnosed with RLS / PLMD back in 2001, started on 0.25 mg Requip increased to 4 mg over the years. The requip stopped working and I was switched to Mirapex 1.0 MG 2xday (equivalent to 12 MG Requip later finding out) which worked great for about 7-months. I started having trouble breathing, felt as if someone had put a plastic bag over my head causing suffocation, stopped Mirapex and restarted requip 4MG at night. I'M CURRENTLY EXPERIENCING AUMENTATION, so I'm getting about 2-3 hours sleep each night. I need to taper-off requip and start something different, no more dopamine antagonist for me once I figure out the less painful way to become Dopamine Antagonist free.

Anyways the topic of my conversation is do you believe that RLS which I believe to actually be a disease and not a syndrome could actually be in your genes at birth waiting to be activated by some outside means? The reason I ask this question is because of the initial way my RLS started. US Navy,
USS Enterprise (CVN-65) 4-year tour which lead to my last deployment in 98-99, ended up heading for Persian Gulf (WAR), October - November 1998. The possibility of Anthrax attacks were considered high, so everyone on-board the ship were given 3-Anthrax Vaccines over 6-week period and the vaccines were all of a sudden stopped. The Anthrax Vaccines are a series of 6-shots over a certain period. I departed the USS Enterprise in July 1999 reported for duty ONBOARD Naval Station Norfolk, VA , Shore Duty...Depression set-in, agitated all the time, mad most of the time for unknown reasons, constantly tired day after day, tried covering-up with alcohol. I went to the doctor and he says: I believe you have depression lets send you for a sleep lab this is approx. August 2001 time-frame. I was diagnosed with Restless Leg Syndrome / Periodic Limb Movement / Obstructive Sleep Apnea...started on the 0.25 Requip and CPAP machine...before the vaccines I was fine???

[Rustsmith]

RLS has officially be recognized as a disease. It was initially named as a syndrome at a time when some people had it ideopathically while others had it as a comorbid condition for things such as kidney dialysis, Parkinsons and the third trimester of pregnancy.

About ten years ago, an effort was made by all the international RLS organizations to change the name to "Willis Ekbom Disease" in recognition of the two doctors responsible for initially describing the symptoms of RLS. VERY unfortunately, the organizations decided to reverse course after about two years because the new name wasn't catching on. The RLS name was too well entrenched and it was too difficult to educate doctors who were not in frequent contact with the various international foundations.

As for genetics, the answer to your question is an absolute "Yes". About 20 different genes have been correlated with RLS using the GWAS technique. Three genes have a strong correlation and are now listed as risk factors for RLS. The researchers are now trying to figure out what these genes do and how they cause RLS. These three are PTPRD, BTBD9, and MEIS1. 23andMe says that I have two of the three, so like almost all genetics, having the gene only increases your susceptibility and doesn't cause you to get the condition.

[badnights]

in your genes at birth waiting to be activated by some outside means? The reason I ask this question is because of the initial way my RLS started. US Navy,
USS Enterprise (CVN-65) 4-year tour which lead to my last deployment in 98-99, ended up heading for Persian Gulf (WAR), October - November 1998. The possibility of Anthrax attacks were considered high, so everyone on-board the ship were given 3-Anthrax Vaccines over 6-week period

I realize this is an old thread, but I have just come across it. Your comment "waiting to be activated by some outside means" is very well said. Finding out what that means was in each person's case might take some digging. My WED/RLS came out of nowhere, seemingly, but when I was questioned more closely about what was happening in my life when it started, I realized that it was preceded by a perfect storm of stressors. Not by vaccines, but all of the following at once: a potentially deadly infection in my arm that ate into the bone; two operations on my knee within a week of each other, as soon as the infection healed; a son who was doing drugs; I had returned to school for my Masters and was finding it a lot harder than I expected; and my childhood-derived personality traits were driving me to achieve more and more without resting. KaBOOM, I was awake all the time even when I was exhausted. A year later a doctor diagnosed me with WED/RLS and prescribed DAs and the horror show was on.

I've put what I found about anthrax vaccine safety below; unfortunately, there isn't anything more recent than 2002. Besides any potential effects of the anthrax vaccines, you might also consider what sorts of stressors you were under (personal as well as the obvious one of entering a war zone) around the time all this began.

The anthrax vaccine doesn't contain any anthrax bacteria (alive or dead) but does contain small amounts of a protein that's part of the toxin released by anthrax. The usual course of treatment seems to be 3 doses (https://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/hcp/curren ... thrax.html). The military was apparently doing 6 doses but a 2002 report recommends considering reducing the number of doses. The military report (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK221082/) also notes that there are not enough data to assess how common later-onset adverse health events are, therefore they should continue to collect relevant data. A second report (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK220538/) says the same thing: "The committee concludes that in the peer-reviewed literature there is inadequate/insufficient evidence to determine whether an association does or does not exist between anthrax vaccination and long-term adverse health outcomes."