Margaret... OK, as the well worn saying goes, my memory is good, but its short! I don't remember the specific dose of the pred. I was on. It was only for two weeks, and was up there.
I know what you mean about it making you hyper, the first few days I was on that mega dose, I was waxing the floors, (at 2 a.m.) and all kinds of crazy stuff, just could not sleep. But then, the energy from it wore off, I was tired all the time again, with the added bonus that I still was stuck awake. I probably did not average 3 hours of sleep a night for those weeks.
In the year leading up to that, I was on anything from 10 mg every other day, to 30 mg a day. I remember we've talked about it before, but, for those that are just be joining prednisone discussions, doctors have found that taking the pred every other day, rather than every day helps to cut back on many unpleasant or potentially harmful side effects (i.e. 10 mg every other, as opposed to 5mg every). When you make it down to the 5 mg daily dose, this would be a maintenance dose, it should be effective at keeping the polymyalgia under control, if it
is controlled at this point. Such a small dose (as it was explained to me) would not be effective at combating an active autoimmune condition, or during a flare.
My little eye drama (last month) leads my doctors to believe that the lesions that were observed by an ophthalmologist last spring, (and which I never followed up on ~ my bad!) were most likely not from the prednisone, but from a closed angle glaucoma attack, or, worst case, macular degeneration. They feel this because some of the scarring looks that much older and would explain why the regular eye exams while I was actually on the prednisone and plaquenil had all been fine.
So, if that's the case, I came away with no harmful effects from being on it for such an extended time, but I was also monitored throughout.
Oddly, it did not make me hungry ~ like as in at all! But I still gained weight, over 25 lbs in one year's time. Very strange.... I think it changes the metabolism. So, as a diabetic, this would be important for you to keep up with whatever regimen they have you on to monitor your blood levels.
My doctors have told me that there is a school of thought that long term usage can result in long term metabolic changes, extending quite a time after the patient is back off of the prednisone, and I would think this to be true even if no one had said it.
I did lose much of the weight I gained from being on it (without trying, thanks to this crap!) But I don't think I lost/am losing as fast as I would have if I'd not taken prednisone to begin with, which works in my favor as weight loss for those with ALS is not good.
For you, true, diabetes is nothing to fool around with, but neither are your other problems, All of your doctors are aware of your condition, so they must not not think that keeping you on such a low dose for the next few months is enough to skew your body's response to insulin secretion.
It really did help me with the fatigue, and joint aches (osteo-arthritis) I remember when I first finally was all of the way off of it, I was so achy, every day I hurt progressively worse, and thought, wow, I didn't remember how bad my joints used to hurt ~ then I got the chills, finally located a thermometer hiding in a drawer, and it registered °102.8... turns out I had aspiration pneumonia (so
that's why I had that nasty cough:roll
See what you can find out about the Lyme, I know it would be easy to just try to forget about everything, which is good to to for a short while, but in the bigger picture, you still need to get things sorted out.
take care!
