Posted , 6 users are following.
Hi All!
why is it that I'm only on 1.5mg of pred, but my stomach is still bloated and I'm still looking like a grape on legs!! 😡 I would have thought that on a low dose of steroid I'd start to look normal again??? Is anyone else out there in my position too?? Feeling depressed that I'm still shapeless.
many thanks Andrea xx
0 likes, 4 replies
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dan38655 andrea93419
Posted
Do you mean digestive distension or just the bloated look of your belly?
Everybody is different as far as their metabolism's tendency/capacity to store or burn fat under different conditions.
Once a fat-storing metabolism sets up, insulin levels may sustain at a high level which causes sugar in the blood to become automatically stored as fat.
Normally, one's muscle and liver tissues are the first "line of defense" in accomodating rising blood sugar load from one's diet, so that insulin need not be secreted by the pancreas in such quantities as to maintain perpetually-high insulin and/or blood sugar levels. As the liver and muscles reach their saturation point however, only increasing insulin secretion can deal with higher blood sugar levels mainly by means of converting this excess sugar into fat, at which point blood sugar levels may fall rapidly and fall below normal due to the residual excess of insulin, thus making the person hungry for sweets, so a vicious cycle can be set in place.
Moderating carbohydrate intake from all sources should be the best approach at this point, if this is your problem. Vigorous exercise for a lengthy duration is also useful in more-quickly depleting the liver and muscles of stored glycogen (converted form of sugar), making room available in these tissues for them to resume their regulatory functions without the pancreas having to secrete excessive insulin.
I hope that this is simple enough for anyone reading this to understand these different levels of blood sugar control, as each works by a somewhat different mechanism and each has it's own limited capacity for storage before unwanted conditions/symptoms including weight gain arise.
gwen81475 andrea93419
Posted
My husband's rheumatologist said that adding salt to your food when taking Prednisone causes bloating.
Anhaga gwen81475
Posted
I was having so much trouble with faintness and skipping heartbeats last summer, and a doctor who wasn't worried about it and wouldn't do any investigation, I thought I'd add more salt to my diet to see if it would help. Either it did or the continued decrease in pred dose has helped. Not as troublesome any more, although I think the heart is still doing the same thing, I just don't notice any more, and certainly faintness comes for a reason now, not out of the blue for no apparent reason. Not bloated.
sheila105 andrea93419
Posted
My tum is also bloated not due to GCA I suppose, but to kiddly disease I have skinny legs and arms then this protruding great 11 month pregnant bulge Andrea93419. My docs use to remove the fluid with a huge syringe and long needle but then I became quite sore and said no more. So perhaps GCA is affecting it just as much. I am at the hospital on Tuesday I'll ask them.