Prednisone is very evil

I am considering what breathing is worth.

Prednisone is a useful drug, but the side effects are now dipping into the ridiculous and I'm not sure what they are worth. I like breathing. Frankly, it is rather important to me! However, the heart thing is getting scary.

Last week I scared myself and a room full of people when my heart suddenly started racing so fast that I turned beat red, couldn't breathe and began shaking uncontrollably. It wasn't fun. Until this happened, I never really got how bad a racy pulse can make you feel. It lasts for hours!

The next day at my cardiologist appointment she said what has happened is the Prednisone has triggered something called Supraventricular Tachychardia (SVT). Basically, the electrical wiring in my heart is haywire and can set off the racing and pulse when I get upset or, really, at anytime. Until now, I only had the racing heart at night, and it would stop after a little while. The SVT lasts a very long time and makes you feel kind of sick after.

The doctor says we just wait and see if it starts happening more often. It is not dangerous, unless it does happen all the time or won't stop. And of course, there is a medication for it, yippee. The alternative in some cases is a small operation where they remove a tiny piece of the heart muscle where the tachychardia is starting. NOT happening.

For most people, triggers can be caffeine or alcohol and cutting those out really helps. In my case, it's Prednisone and stopping that is not an option yet. Though we did drop my dose a little, so I'm headed in the right direction! I still have months to go, though, so this is just one more side effect to deal with.

I'm determined to get the Sarcoid into remission and get on with my life. But there are weeks like this when I wonder if it is really worth it.

Prednisone is evil

For the past several weeks I've been trying to figure out why my blood pressure has been so high recently and why my heart races in the middle of the night, and why my chest hurts most of the time. My family history is riddled with heart disease, so my big fear was that 20 years of vegan diet and exercise had failed me yet again and that my heart was bad!

The pulmonologist sent me to the cardiologist for tests. The Nuclear Stress Test was first, and that showed no blockages. Thank goodness.

The next tests were an EKG and ultrasound to check for fluid build-up around my heart (pericarditis) or evidence that the Sarcoid had invaded my heart. For some reason, waiting on this test had me more stressed out than anything in a long time. I just couldn't stand the thought that yet another part of my body was failing me, or that I'd somehow done something long ago that damaged my heart.

My visit last week to my oncologist didn't help this. His only issues with me were that my white cell count was too high, my blood pressure was too high, I'd lost a lot of weight, and my lungs sounded terrible. The cancer is still in remission, but the Sarcoid is definitely not.

I had the tests last Thursday, and everything was fine, though the cardiologist still didn't like my blood pressure or pulse. Conclusion? Not pericarditis or more Sarcoid, but Prednisone.

The most common side effects of Prednisone are fluid retention and weight gain and moon face. My face has definitely gone "moony", but I haven't gained the weight like last time. However, a less-common side effect is that the Prednisone messes with your heart, causing it to race, raising the blood pressure and pulse rate. Knowing this and knowing that there is an outside reason for it does help and is a huge relief given the other options I was facing last week. However, I also learned that this hypertension is by itself not healthy and we do have to get everything back to a normal range.

The cardiologist's first choice was to take me off of the Prednisone. Then she looked at what the pulmonologist sent over and agreed with him that that wasn't an option.

So, the new solution is hypertension medication. She did stop the first heart medication the pulmonologist chose, but changed it out to something else. Oh, and apparently this stuff has its own side effects so she wants to monitor me closely for awhile to be sure the new medication isn't causing any other problems. More time in the doctor's office. Great.

I am now on 11 different medications and vitamins. 3 are just to counter-act the side effects from the Prednisone. I counted.

Prednisone is evil; but for now, I do like breathing; so I suppose it is a necessary evil.