I’ve been searching the archives here and it seems that some have had positive experiences with prednisone, but I am worried that it may be connected to the recent downturn I experienced and to the other major downturn I’ve had since getting hit with Propecia symptoms.
Since quitting the drug 7 years ago, I’ve had persistent sexual issues and what seems to be a slowed metabolism. Overnight, without changing diet/exercise, my body wanted to gain ~15-20 pounds. This has been a pretty steady state thing for me, but…two times I have seen these symptoms get much worse:
-
About 4 1/2 years ago, I had a runaway sinus infection (this is something that I believe is part of PFS for me; just about every cold now becomes a sinus infection, often a bad one that won’t clear up on its own). In this particular case, it got so bad that I went to an urgent care clinic and was administered a decadron shot and a follow-up course of Prednisone. In terms of addressing the sinus infection, it was amazing. But my sexual symptoms, which were already bad, noticeably worsened. In the days after the corticosteroid treatment, it was much more difficult to attain an erection and, when I did, it would go away much more easily. I had hoped this would be a short-term thing, maybe stress-induced, but it has persisted ever since – even though (as I detail in my personal story thread) I spent much of the past four years thinking I had learned to manage PFS and to live with it. Basically, my metal health improved dramatically and I moved on with my life and could even be sexually functional with ED meds, but the changes that coincided with that corticosteroid treatment never went away.
-
Because of the recurrent sinus infections, I’ve periodically taken prednisone treatments over the last 4+ years. I try to avoid it but, again, my body seems to turn every slight cold into a raging sinus infection now. Generally, I’ll take a four- or five-day course of 5mg prednisone. I’ve probably had 8-10 treatments over the past 4+ years.
Anyway, my most recent was this past June. Same story as usual. Minor cold turns into major, stubborn sinus infection, no amount of steam/sinus irrigation does anything. So I went to the clinic and got a short-term 5mg prednisone script. And it did the job, as it always does. And I thought nothing of it. This was mid-June. Then, in mid-July, seemingly out of the blue, I noticed that I was gaining weight, despite no change in diet or exercise. It was dramatic. Shirts that I’d been wearing for years suddenly didn’t fit. I was baffled. It felt like what I went through all those years ago, when I first quit Propecia and my body started gaining weight. But this time, there was no obvious reason. I’d been doing the 5-2 diet (two days of fasting per week) for several years, and it had been keeping my weight in a normal/acceptable range. Now, for seemingly no reason, my body again wanted to add ~10-15 pounds.
I upped my fasting to three days a week and cut my food consumption on the other days. Stepped up my physical activity too. But even with this, my weight it still higher than it was at any point since I went to the 5-2 program. It’s like there was a sudden and major drop in my metabolism. But why?
My mind is now fixating on prednisone and corticosteroids. It can’t be proven, but I strongly feel a heavy dose of them caused sexual damage to me four years ago. Did this latest dose – a much more modest dose, prednisone only – do something similar to my metabolism? If it did, is the damage as lasting/seemingly irreversible as the sexual damage has shown itself to be? And if there is a connection, why would it take a month for me to notice? I know it can take a while to notice weight gain, but I’ve been pretty obsessive about keeping tabs on mine and I really don’t think there was any sign I was gaining weight until at least 3-4 weeks after this latest prednisone use.
But I can’t think of any other culprit. I had a surprisingly good run these past few years, after hitting some very low depths with this. Figuring out how to manage my weight without shutting down the rest of my life was huge for me, and I found that looking “normal” to the outside world made a huge difference in my mood and mental health. But with where my metabolism now is, I don’t know what to do. Eating even one normal-size meal now ends me ballooning.
I have been seeing Dr. Jacobs in NY and we just sent out some bloodwork. I’ve been on Armour Thyroid for the past few years. Looking through the bloodwork over this period, there’s no clear connection. It’s not like my RT3 is crazy high or my free T3 or T4 is really low. Cortisol does seem to be potentially low, or close to low, though. It’s at the low end of the range in two tests I have records of. Maybe this new round of bloodwork will show something, but I’m feeling very pessimistic right now. All of the darkness I thought I had escaped feels like it’s consuming me again.