Oh dear lord you are in for an experience. I don’t mean to scare you; I just really dislike this drug. For those of you whom have experienced pregnancy and the feeling of not being able to control your hormones then you have some insight to what is about to happen.
So what is Prednisone? Well it’s a drug taken to help suppress the immune system.
From what I have been informed off my doctor this drug is probably the safest drug you are going to put into your system. If you are pregnant and have ITP this will be the drug they will provide you because as stated above it’s the so called “safest” drug out of the bunch. I haven’t experienced pregnancy and ITP but I still decided to take this form of treatment compared to the other options I was offered.
What you are in for - My experience (In point form):
A high – when I first started taking this drug it did wonders. I had an initial high because it gave my platelets a real big boost. However it only took a few weeks before my ITP fought back and the side effects of the Prednisone started to sink in.
Sleep Apena – no matter how much I wanted to sleep this drug kept me wide awake, it was great for work because my mind just would not stop (it made me super focused and I would work around the clock because I couldn’t sleep). However lack of sleep catches up and nothing effects your emotions more than being extremely exhausted.
An Emotional Wreck – Yep, this drug made me very emotional. One minute I would cry, next I’d be cranky, next minute I’d be depressed and sad. A complete emotional roller-coaster that I just could not control – I was a monster.
Puffer Fish Face – For some strange reason this drug seems to make your face go super round (I think they call it moon face). I also had noticed that my upper lip hairs started to turn brown (making me look like I had a moustache). The good news! Once you stop taking this drug this eventually goes away.
Weight Gain – This drug is a steroid therefor for most it will increase weight gain. For me I am awfully conscious about my weight so as soon as I started taking this drug I also upped my workouts to compensate (this put a lot of extra pressure on my body and it probably didn’t help with my fatigue however I know myself and how depressed I get when I put on weight so I was trying to be proactive).
Sore Joints – Maybe due to working out caused me to have sore joints however I don’t generally suffer sore joints from working out therefore this was new for me.
Regular Check-ups – This drug does affect your heart, lowers your immune system and weakens your bones. Regular check-ups are important. Luckily apart from having ITP I am pretty healthy however it’s sad to know that this drug does more harm to your body then it does good. However it’s a choice of the lesser of two evils.
A slow break up – As soon as I started to feel the side effects of this drug I wanted out. But unfortunately you can’t go cold turkey on this baby. Therefor you need to slowly drop your dosage over a period of time to give your adrenal glands time to recover and resume the production of cortisol. I started Prednisone on 60g per day and it took approx. 3 months to decrease my dosage to a point where this drug was no longer required.
To learn more about common and serious side effects of this drug go to: https://www.medicinenet.com/prednisone/article.htm