Is there such a thing as Prednisone withdrawal?

Hi Roxanne, My endocrinologist told me that since I have Cushings Syndrome from 10 months of Prednisome that my adrenal glans are probably less than half the size because of the long term steroids and that it will take a full year once I am able to slowly taper off to get them back to a normal size and normal function. 

A few days ago I went from 7'5mg to 7mg as per my rheumatologist & on day 2 I noticed bad pain on the outside of my legs ,above and below where my knee is . The next morning it took me 15 minutes to get my legs off the bed since the pain was excruciating . I got back back in bed & was freezing cold for 2 hours with the shakes & shattering teeth.Then I got warm & my temp. was 101.5 & I thought I had the flu. When I got to the bathroom which took forever since I was in so much pain in my side legs & now my shoulders it took me 15 min. to get up from the toilet with tears in my eyes from the pain. When the usual symptoms of the flu never came I realized my body was reacting from going down just point 5 mg & I went back up to the dose I've been on for months. Four hours later I was in pain but was no longer crippled with it. Now I realized my body isn't ready to go down a half mg. . Early on when I got PMR & most likely GCA I did get a 102 temp with the horrible chills & I read that on rare occasion some get a fever of unknown origin with these diseases. Every other time in my life prior to getting these I always had the flu following the chills & high fever but now I know if I don't get the flu symptoms that it is the PMR or GCA. Two days later I can get out of bed & walk again with pain but I think that will soon go away. Good luck on finding out if it is your adrenal glands needing more time to get back up to normal size & function.

Thanks Roxanne. I was glad my endocrinologist told me what Prednisone did to my adrenal glands since my rheumatologist never told me. It is very important that we know that since our adrenal glands are so important to the human body functioning normally and if long term steroids shrink them down to a small size & now longer functioning since the Prednisone takes that away ,many don't know what is wrong with them when they don't go off the steroid very slowly for about a year which gives the adrenal glands time to grow back to a normal size. SO GLAD FOR THIS SIGHT TO SHARE INFORMATION WITH EACH OTHER SINCE WE ARE ALL GOING THROUGH SOMETHING THAT MOST OF US HAD NEVER HEARD OF PMR & GCA UNTIL WE GOT IT .I went to 4 doctors before I was diagnosised.