A Prednisone Rant

 I would like to toss these out the window. 

But, realistically,  I'll probably need to take them again soon.

Over the course of the last four months, I've been tapering down oral prednisone.  I started at 40mg (on the IV at the hospital), and then transitioned to 40mg orally.  Over the course of many weeks, I tapered by 5mg (sometimes stalling to get blood under control).

I was on 5mg every other day for two weeks, and now I'm off completely.  (However, I still take Cortifoam and Hydrocortisone enemas, so prednisone is technically still getting in there.)  And I'm still on 80mg (two pens) of Humira every week.

Things aren't perfect.  I still see some blood and mucus daily.  But I'm hoping the enemas keep things under control (or maybe even alleviate the symptoms I'm seeing).

In the past year, I've been on high doses of prednisone for 8 out of the 12 months.  And it's taken its toll.  Here is my rant:

What I love about prednisone:

1. It lets me keep my colon inside my body.

What I hate about prednisone:

1. Fatface.  Sometimes it gets more dramatic than others, but I always get a voluptuous double chin and some truly lovely jowls.  Sexy.
2. Hairiness.  Holy fuzzy fatface!  And then when I taper (ie. right now), the hair on my head falls out in disturbingly chunky hand fulls.  You should see my shower walls, sinks, laundry lint filter, vacuum...
3. Insanity/complete lack of patience.  Looking back now, I regret the rage that almost everyone in my life (and some random strangers) were subjected to.  At the time, I was sure that they were the ones who were crazy.  Oops.
4. Insomnia. Who needs sleep when you can lie in bed thinking about all the things to be anxious about?
5. Total exhaustion when tapering.  Not sure how much of this is pregnancy related, but whooooooa...I'm tired. Maybe it's just that I'm not fueled by all that rage and anxiety anymore?

I'm sure I'll be back on oral prednisone sometime soon, but I'm crossing my fingers to get through delivery without a relapse. (Yes, I can hear the universe laughing.)