Thank you, Broomstick. Fortunately, I’m only half as miserable this week (so far) as last week! I wish I had a recliner! Heck, I wish I had a bed. I sleep on a foam rubber pad on the floor (which is plenty comfortable enough, normally).
If prednisone helps with the inflammation and not directly with the cough, that’s good news, right? Treating the underlying problem and not just the symptom. But then, there must be an underlying underlying problem behind the inflammation too, n’est ce pas? Presumably, it was just a transient viral infection that’s done and gone, I hope. I have a long history of mild seasonal allergies, but never any serious or major allergy problems, so I don’t think it’s that.
I use Prednisone for perhaps 2 or 3 months a year these days, and have been on it for as long as a couple years straight at dosages of 40 to 60 mg per day, for chronic bronchitis. My observations:
It makes me edgy, overambitious, impatient, and jumpy. I am usually extremely patient and tolerant and forgiving but I get less so. It is hard to maintain consistent judgement about starting projects and making commitments. I often also take codeine to help with the cough, and while both drugs reduce the cough, their effects on my edginess work in opposite directions, so I get some moderation by being on both. I have a book illustration from Alice in Wonderland hanging on my office wall to honor this mood balancing act through chemistry. I also tell my closer friends and coworkers that I am “riding the white stallion” and they know it means I’m just in a modified work mode.
It used to seem to be more powerful for the bronchitis, and have milder side effects, 20 or 25 years ago. It seems like the main effect has gotten weaker but the side effects have gotten stronger. Damn.
I went through a period of low bone density and had to take osteoporosis meds for maybe 3 years a while back, which doctors blamed on the Prednisone.
I also have a growling intolerance of anything that interferes with my free and easy access to food while I am on Prednisone. It’s best to keep your extremities away from my mouth and hands during treatment. I am ramping down right now, having been at 20 mg for a few days, and I got way more Santalike than was useful during this Yule season.
Inflammation can become self-reinforcing. Basically, as I understand it, when your lungs get inflamed enough then the normal function becomes irritating in and of itself. Of course, you can’t simply give up breathing for a week! Steroids dial down the inflammation reaction to allow healing, thereby interrupting the vicious circle and ending the problem. This is why allergy and asthma treatments are moving more and more towards preventing inflammation and reactions from occurring in the first place.
Maybe a doctor around here can drop in an explain it better or in more detail.
I was on high-dose Pred (80mg) (along with some other meds, treating an auto-immune disorder) for about 6 months a few years ago, and it knocked me around something shocking. Weight gain, the moon-and-hairy-face, severe depression leading to suicidal ideation…it was really horrible, and took freakin’ months longer to taper down.
But it worked, and I still have some vision, so I ain’t complaining now.
No shit, Sherlock! When every breath gurgles and rattles the lungs and pipes like a freight train thundering through town and every cough is like an explosive jackhammer ripping the road up, day and night, yeah, every breath seems to get worse and worse. That’s exactly why I wish I knew a way to get aggressively proactive every time this shit starts, and nip it in the bud!
I wish!
Yeah, that’s what I wish I could get, every time the first hint of a bronchitis attack rears its ugly snot! Like I said, I wish I knew a way to get aggressively proactive every time this shit starts, and nip it in the bud!
The prednisone only seems to work for a few hours. I’ve taken 2 daily doses so far (yesterday and today), around 11:00 a.m. Then I breathe relatively easier for several hours. Then, around mid-afternoon it begins to get bad again, for the rest of the day and night. :mad:
I just hope it’s always two steps forward and one step back. That seemed to be the case yesterday. Today, not so much. Right now (7:00 p.m. 12/25) I feel somewhat worse than this time yesterday – more congested, coughing harder and it’s doing less good. Is this going to help “dial down the inflammation reaction to allow healing, thereby interrupting the vicious circle and ending the problem”?
There’s more to the vicious cycle besides that, too. When you’re sick and alone and don’t know anybody, it can get bad.
For a week, I was too weak to do more than open a can of cold soup and eat it straight out of the can, or an occasional slice of bread, and even that only occasionally. Much to exhausted to do so much as heat up something in the microwave oven. And getting more and more exhausted with each explosive cough! I haven’t showered or changed clothes for two weeks. (I was hoping to get up to that this evening, but now I’m not so sure.) I’m way to wiped out to drive myself anywhere, like to a doctor!
That too, is a vicious death spiral. I was having visions of just coughing myself painfully to death as I starve and rot in my bedroom. I’ve been through several times before too.
I caught a break this time: My neighbor, a frazzled single mother of three out-of-control children and impoverished under-paid under-employed McEmployee, has taken a motherly interest. She took me to the ER on Sunday evening. She and her grandmother have been cooking soup, chicken, and other goodies to keep me fed.
I just learned that I have a follow-up appt on Friday morning. Neighbor can’t take me. She has to work. I hope I feel well enough to get myself there somehow! If I take the prednisone an hour or so before that, it may work out.
Thank you, Auntie Pam. Can I call you Auntie? Will you come over and cook for me? Yes, I’ve absolutely got to keep that appointment to decide where we’ll go from here, even if I have to call the Marines to get me there.
Two doses. I wish. I’ve had three so far. (1st by IV in the ER Monday; 2nd yesterday; 3rd today.) I felt better yesterday, worse today. I am keeping hydrated well, I think, mostly just on water, and soup that neighbor lady has been making for me lately.
Like I wrote above, the prednisone only seems to help for several hours, and then I get congested and coughing (sometimes with much difficulty) again. And I only get one dose a day. So the interruption of the vicious cycle of inflammation gets interrupted! This afternoon, even the 20 minutes breathing albuterol just got me coughing more, and not easily either.
I just spent 30 minutes breathing steam from my vegetable steamer. Now that did seem to help noticeably. But even that only lasts for a half hour or so. But! I can repeat that as often as I want, I guess. I don’t think you can ever OD breathing warm steam. Maybe I’ll do that every hour or so, all day and all night for a few days and see how it goes.
Would that be the Tenniel drawing of Alice facing the caterpillar with the hookah on the mushroom? (Jog my memory here. Was there also a drawing of Alice reaching around both sides of the mushroom after the caterpillar left?)
Unholy sh|t! What does life come to when you have chronic bronchitis (COPD?) like that, and it just gets worse and worse over the years, while the meds get less and less effective and more and more troublesome? Will it eventually get to where nothing more can be done? What will happen then?
Maybe you don’t even want to think about that. But I am worried. I have long-term chronic (but usually entirely mild) bronchitis, with occasional exacerbations like this. I am chronically worried that it may gradually come to that for me. Illness sucks, and chronic illness chronically sucks.
The last time I had an asthma flare up, the doctor recommended OTC cough medicine and Vicks Vaporub to supplement the prednisone and calm the coughing. I’ve had codeine cough syrup prescribed for that purpose in the past, too. maybe they can recommend something additional to help with the symptoms while the prednisone does its thing calming the inflammation?
I’ve been trying a few things, some with bad results so I’m afraid to try things now – even things you, or doctors, or anyone, recommend
I have Rx cough syrup, guiafen/codeine. It is helpful for minor coughing spells, including early in this nasty episode. For worse cases, like now, I found it backfired badly! :eek: It’s an expectorant, which means it increases and supposedly loosens secretions, and the codeine is a cough suppressant. Now aren’t those two actions working at cross purposes? Anyway, it seemed to greatly increase secretions, but I guess didn’t loosen them enough, so I felt like my lungs were plugged up with bubble gum – seriously, I couldn’t breathe through the bubble gum several times and thought I was going to self-strangle. This began within minutes after taking the syrup and persisted for hours! It happened on several tries on several days, and finally precipitated my trip to the ER on Sunday evening. Now I’m afraid to uses this again. I might as well inhale super-glue. I wonder if an extra teaspoon of syrup would loosen the stuff up more, enough to make it work as advertised? I’m afraid to try it. Maybe I could try it someday when I have a bad cough that isn’t this bad. Doctors tend to be conservative and won’t suggest experimental work like that.
Early on, I also tried diphenhydramine (a.k.a. Benadryl), which I thought was actually more helpful. But again, for the really bad congested cough like now, I’m afraid to try any more of it.
Help! Even the albuterol didn’t do the job well earlier today! I discussed that above somewhere. Then I tried breathing steam for 30 minutes (another experiment the doctor didn’t suggest), and THAT seems to be REALLY helpful. I’ve done that steam treatment three times already this afternoon, and it really seemed help. It was soothing too. I just did an albuterol, with somewhat better results (following a steam), but now, a half hour later, my lungs are getting irritated again. It’s like there’s some dust or something mixed in with the albuterol mist. I foresee more steam in my near future, I guess!
So I’ve already thought about other OTC syrups and Vicks, but I’m afraid to try those now. But I can see that it would be good for me to experiment with stuff like those, sometime when I’m not feeling quite this sick and panicky.
What exactly is Vicks supposed to do?
And guess what folks! After all that steam, I managed to take that long-delayed shower that I’ve put off for 10 days now! That’s progress, that I felt well enough for that (especially after feeling crappier earlier today)! And now, I’m about to try another drastic experiment by, y’know, having something to eat. Neighbor lady’s grandmother sent me a plate of their Christmas dinner, consisting of a pile of turkey with fixins! I ate half yesterday, and I’m ready to eat the rest now.
Once I’m fully back on my feet, I should try a really drastic experiment, like doing some housecleaning. There’s such a thick layer of dust on everything, you could plant a garden in it. Strangely, that never really seems to bother me, but at times like this, maybe it really matters.
ETA:
Yes, they did that, but never told me what they found. So that must mean they didn’t find any problem there. They sucked a whole lot of blood out of me too, but they didn’t mention what tests they were doing, nor any results. Strangely, they took some blood out of the IV in my arm, along with a separate draw from my other arm too.
I should explain about the Vicks - he recommended putting a small amount, like 1/2 teaspoon, in the water for the steam inhalation. He also has asthma and said he’d used it that way since he was a kid himself and found it helpful. And yeah, it sounds like you need better attention from a primary physician.
They help immensely. 5 days worth never caused me any problems as long as I took them in the day time, couldn’t sleep if I took them before bed, made me too hot and restless.
I’m feeling much less awful (still far from well though) since about yesterday, even to the point of becoming borderline functional again. Have follow-up appointment with doc today.
Coughing much less, with one annoying exception: I still cannot lie down, not even for a minute, without starting up with the out-of-control coughing again. I am still sleeping (what little I can) sitting up. This is getting real tiresome (literally, as it’s uncomfortable and I can sleep only very poorly that way).
I can’t say I’ve noticed any side-effects of the prednisone. (I have two days’ doses left to go.) My mood has changed a little bit for the better these last 4 days, presumably as a result of gradually feeling less crappy. My appetite has somewhat recovered; perhaps the prednisone has been helping with that, maybe.
He gave me another 6-days of prednisone, with the 60/50/40/30/20/10 mg dosing schedule. The plan is: After my current 5-day Rx (50 mg / day) is gone (tomorrow), I’ll quit for a day or two and see how I feel. If I feel like I’m relapsing, then do this new prednisone Rx.
You’re still healing up. I’m sorry about the sleeping sitting up thing - I once went two solid weeks like that, it does suck - but don’t push it. Breathing is important. If sitting up is what you have to do then sit up. Get what rest you can.
If you’ve escaped the worst side effects of prednisone then great! Keep getting better.
Likewise. When I had a similar awful cold/bronchitis and coughed upon laying down, I begged for something from my doctor, got Tessalon perles and a tiny bottle of codeine cough syrup. At least it helped.
I used benzonatate (tessalon) during a previous nasty episode several years ago. As best I recall, it was vaguely helpful but not greatly. I described my problem with guiafen/codeine syrup above: Briefly, it seemed to increase secretions but not loosen them up enough to cough up as it should have, so my lungs felt like they were plugged up with bubble gum, and I had nasty difficulty breathing. In fact, that is what precipitated my trip to the ER earlier this week. Now I’m afraid to try it again.
The VERY BEST therapy I’ve discovered for congestion this time around has been breathing warm steam! I just put up this post in the nearby congestion thread describing my observations on that in a little more detail.
When every breath gurgles and rattles the lungs and pipes like a freight train thundering through town and every cough is like an explosive jackhammer ripping the road up, day and night, yeah, every breath seems to get worse and worse. That’s exactly why I wish I knew a way to get aggressively proactive every time this shit starts, and nip it in the bud!
Yes, I’ve absolutely got to keep that appointment to decide where we’ll go from here, even if I have to call the Marines to get me there.
I am keeping hydrated well, I think, mostly just on water, and soup that neighbor lady has been making for me lately.