Feeling horrible after been on the steroid prednisone

So wondering if I'm alone. I get really bad malaise after about 3 days of steroid use..I get really miserably feeling sick with no other real symptoms. I feel so sick I can't really function. It happens even with the smallest doses. Anyone else have similar?

It goes away after a day or so. Budesonide is one that can cause it. Dexamethasone another

I want to make it clear that there are two opposite problems people might be having. One is if you stop taking corticosteroid abruptly after you've been taking it long enough to shut down your natural cortisol production, then you get symptoms of low cortisol. This can be extreme fatigue, aching through your body, feeling faint, low blood pressure.

The opposite is if you're hypersensitive to corticosteroids then you get symptoms of very high cortisol. This includes symptoms like adrenaline, anxiety, high blood pressure, difficulty sleeping, muscle weakness, bloating, pain in bones etc. I was hypersensitive enough that a hydrocortisone injection caused an explosion of these side effects two days after the single dose, and it's lasted almost 3 years but gets weaker as time goes by. These side effects go away on their own as the drug leaves your body, but it can take a long time and varies for each individual.

The most important thing I've learned and best advice I can give is that if you're experiencing lasting side effects of high cortisol after taking prednisone or any other corticosteroid, start donating whole blood regularly at a hospital. I've done it 4 times now, so about 40% of my total blood volume removed, and I feel huge improvement and continue to feel closer to normal. It works because it physically removes the drug metabolites from the body.

hey did it get better I feel like a space cadet

To anyone who has a long term side effects, try donating blood plasma to physically remove the drug from your body. I'm doing it and it's working for me.

Tammi!

i understand your pain. i just started these meds 4days ago to date for chest congestion: asthma and these side effects are horrible that i am currently heading to emergency so i can get premission to stop them. my head feels and body like its on fire im so weak and tired. I cant sleep becuase i feel like i am dying. I do trust God to restore my health and to bring me back to my normal self. my question to you is how are you feeling now? I pray are better.

im on prednesilone for polymyalgia i feel dreadful hot flusjes dizziness soooo tired iv been on since march 21 i haye it im slowly tapering doen to 12.5 mg i wish i voukd just stop

I must be honest cortisone saved me, after suffering for months from a confirmed medically reported adverse vaccine reaction rash that did not respond to cortisone creams and got progressively worse, my complete body was covered in lichenoids . i changed Dermatologists he immediately put me on a 10 day course of 30mg of cortisone for ten days inclusive of the weaning off to get rid of the toxicity in my system. then i had to wait three weeks then he doubled my dose to 60 mg a day for four days , then 45 mg for 4 days, 30 mg for 4 day and then 15 for four days. I felt wonderful on the treatment not only did it stop the itch it finally cured my rash and my arthritic bones weren't painful . this past week being off the cortisone tablets has been hell, i am exhausted everything is an effort and all my bones are aching and i feel fog brained and fluey .

i am hoping these symptoms are temporary, as I am useless right now,But i keep reminding myself that thanks to these meds my condition has finally been cured and that continuous itchiness has gone.

All, there are lots of replies in this thread with a few being very consistent providing updates. If you posted in here and have recovered it would be hugely beneficial to many of us in this thread to know details such as how long it took. A lot of people are reading these comments looking for any support/hope that they will recover. Any updates you can provide will help many continue pushing through tough times. Thanks for your support!

Hi Tammi31 i know its 5yrs since you wrote on here .im just wondering are you fully recovered now .I have been on steroids for 10 mths ive just come off them 11days ago and my head is still feeling blocked and my ears seem plugged im zoned out and not hearing well sinus and blurred vision still and awful anxiety ribs tightened for months do you think these symptoms will all go away in time ?

Hey all, I could be wrong on this but just throwing this out there: some people metabolize certain meds at different rates based upon the amount of liver enzymes available in the body to break it down.

You might have heard of how people shouldn't drink grapefruit with certain meds because they end up with way more of the med in the system, since the liver enzyme binds to the grapefruit and is less available to break down the med. The same thing could happen when you're taking multiple medications - the one medication's impact on the liver enzymes impacts the metabolism of the other medication.

For people like us, perhaps this is where we should be focusing our attention. Prednisone a prodrug which means it's first metabolized into prednisolone by cytochrome P450 to be used by the body, and then there is a second phase of metabolism where it is excreted from the body.

Maybe on one of these steps, there is something of a bottleneck occurring where either phase 1 or 2 is occurring to slowly. Maybe it's either very slow to convert predisone into prednisolone or it's very slow to clear the body of prednisolone.

It could be that we just happen to have a lower amount of enzymes to process each step, but I also wonder if many of us are on different medications that are inhibiting the process of metabolizing predisone, resulting in it lingering around in our body for much longer than usual.

I stopped taking my ritalin for about 4 days, and these prednisone after-effects (anxiety, higher BP, spaced out feeling) came way to the forefront and in full force, as opposed to being in the background. It's like me stopping the ritalin, suddenly made my liver focus on the prednisone instead and I felt the full effect. When I took the ritalin again, I thought it would make me even more racy (it's a stimulant) but it actually seemed to calm down the prednisone after-effects to a large degree.

Anyway, in summary I think maybe if we started checking and experimenting, we might find we're taking other meds that might be interfering with the body's ability to process and eliminate the lingering prednisone, prolonging these symptoms. I wonder if we were to stop taking non-essential meds for a week, would it help us to get through this hell quicker.

New to this Site . about a month and a half ago i was put on methylprednisolone 84 mg total 6 pills then 5 the next day etc . for chest tightness and fatigue . i felt better on it but felt neck chest face and arms constantly warm . after finishing my week prescription i have had periods were im super anxious and feeling out of it . had a couple of panic attacks the first week off of it. i feel like i do tend to have hypersenstivity once in a while but it seems like its taking me a long time to get back to feeling normal . also have been having points were i feel hot and cold at the same time like i have icy hot on feet or hands . this just confirms im done taking steroids . what makes no sense is i told the doctor hey like 4 years ago i was put on prednisone and had a bad heat rash on chest and face . he turns around and put me on a stronger steroid . 