How would classify a flare?

I was told not to take naproxen with pred as it is contra indicative and can cause stomach problems.

Sorry you are having such a painful time, I agree with Ptolemy and your Dr about avoiding naproxyn for your pain relief, you can take paracetamol but it is unlikely to help your PMR pain.. In my experience I upped my prednisolone as slowly as I was tapering 1mg or .5 mg at a time, this worked for me, others have taken a burst at a higher dose before returning to usual dose. Might also be worth looking at your activity level, have you increased as your tapering? Might be worth having a rest then starting again tomorrow X

hope your feeling better soon x

I don't want to sound harsh but "also anxious to get off steroids. How do you cope?" This is stress - you have to accept pred as a sort of 'friend' and learn to live with them.  A better name would be 'acquaintance" that you tolerant for a time. 

Have you tried relaxing exercises?

I see you joined about a year ago – 7 mg is quite low for this time period and you are somewhere near or at your maintenance dosage which contains your symptoms but the underlining cause is still there.  Personally I would try 10 mg for a few days and see if the stiffness goes or reduces, then reduce to just above what you were last ‘comfortable’ at – hope this helps.

I find it interesting that you have a Mortons neuroma as I had one on my left foot prior to diagnosis and was seen by an orthopaedic surgeon .....the usual tests and was fitted with an insole which helped. When I started steroids a year ago all the pain went but I am tapering and noticed at 9 that I have pain in my right foot now similar to what had been in the left one. I am tapering to 8.5  now but have no other pain manifesting itself other than either withdrawal which I recognise or muscular because of what I have been doing. None of us want to be on steroids but I prefer to function so I am following the DSNS method and to date have only had one flare. It was at the beginning when the taper from 12.5 to 10 was too much. I went back up to 11 which worked for me. We are all so different in how we react to medication and at what stage the inflammation is at. A broken limb follows a certain pattern ....this doesn't and subsequently makes it more difficult to gauge.

Aspirin and  Prednisone both cause stomach problems and heaven knows we are having enough problems with PMR. So I avoid the aspirin & use Tylenol. Also in my research apparently, taking asprin with Prednisone together makes the aspirin less effective. 

If you take naproxyn at all make sure you take it at a time as far away from your prednisone as possible, and with food that will protect your stomach, like milk, yoghurt, a bowl of cereal, something like that, with a bit of fat in it.  Apparently the bacteria in yogurt are also helpful which is why so many people eat it when they take their pred.  Personally I have had to take aspirin quite a bit lately for what I'm assuming are weather-related headaches.  I had a bad experience with naproxyn in the past and won't ever take it again, but with care aspirin has been okay for me.  Acetaminophen is less effective even for non-pmr-related pain.  Ginger tea (made with freshly grated ginger) can help to reduce pain - not as an analgesic when you are suffering, but as a preventative substance, seems to reduce severity of pain; it's also considered antiinflammatory.

When I have flares (has happened 3 times) we put the pred up to 30 mg to make a difference. Now on Humira, methertexate and down to 5mg of pred. My first flare took me to hospital unable to move - had intravenous pred and was dancing in an hour!

Hi Tisser, I did have a morton's neuroma several years ago that was VERY painful and had surgery.  Years later the nerve had grown back some and more pain, but not as intense as the first time before the surgery.  I had cortisone injections that did not do much, then had "alcohol" injections, about 4, and that ws beneficial.  I had them again a while later when the discomfort returned, which helped.  I had gone to an excellent podiatrist for all of this.  You might find the injections helpful at this time when you might want to avoid surgery which would limit your mobility.  I'm glad the increased pred helped the pain.  When your feet hurt, you hurt "all over"!  Good luck!          Elinor