Yesterday I left the house not even imagining I would end up in the ER by 4pm. It was a crazy day. It started Tuesday, with an injection for my shoulder for pain caused be a torn rotator cuff. After that we went out to a movie, and dinner to celebrate our anniversary. Oddly my face was red and swollen but I wrote it off to a special celebratory cocktail. Yesterday (Wednesday) I got up and noticed a red spot about about a half dollar size on both arms. It didn't really look like a rash, but it was hot to the touch. As the day progressed it got bigger, hotter, covering half of upper arm, encircling it, cheeks flushed, and very red on my neck and chest. About 1 o'clock, I called the clinic and they fit me in. Doc immediately thought it was a reaction to the steroids in the shot Tuesday (a three way combo) so they gave me benadryl injections and more steroid and wanted me to wait 15 minutes to see how I was doing. I felt ok, if sleepy, and asked to leave. The nurse (who wasn't the original one so she hadn't seen me when I came in) was walking me out when my eye caught the back view of my arm in a mirror. Oops! It was 50% bigger above where I got the injection. She ran and got the doctor and boom, 5 people were in there, doing vitals, ekg, etc. They decided to call an ambulance and I ended up in ER,where the doctor there thinks I had an auto immune reaction not to the steroids, but to the solution added to the steroids! In other words they don't know. So on predisone, a beta blocker,an epi-pen to have handy, and an inhaler, and more benadryl. Home again home again jiggety jig. A very Long Day...
Now this is where it gets fun. If you have ever had steroids, they have a peculiar effect of skewing your appetite. You can get extremely hungry. I started gnawing on the upholstery in the car on the way home. DH was looking at me a little funny. I said "Let's stop and get a burger and fries!" Knowing I had not had a burger or potatoes (let alone fries) in months and months. We drove into our fav Burger place (where they do have some healthy choices, which I chose to ignore, but I felt I had to make the effort. If we had gone to, say, Dairy Queen, it would have been an admission of who the heck cares what we eat? There isn't anything healthy on THAT menu)
But, I digress. We ordered turkey burgers. Oh good, somewhat in control. Then Rosemary Fries. I turned to hubby and said "You do know of course those fries will not see our table, right?" He concurred. Then as we got our order I said "I wanna cone!" (I felt like I was about 4 years old) Since I cannot eat cow dairy, but yogurt seems to be less intense of a reaction, I had a small fro-yo non fat cone. I had to mention it was non fat so you could see how virtuous I was being.
Got home and discovered that our large fry container had only three fries. We were going to demand justice and yell at them for shorting us, but then we realized, we had partaken (partook?) on the way home. Oh boy.
It got worse. This is what I ate after my so-called meal.
Chocolatemandarinorangesorangejuiceblueberriescoldcereal(which I never eat due to carbs but what the heck!)applemorechocololatemorecereal and well, you get the picture! Good thing I weighed in at WW BEFORE the incident. The problem is, I am starting prednisone by mouth today and it's gonna be a long week. So...you are my conscience. In order not to eat willy-nilly, no matter how hungry I think I am, I will tell you what I eat every day until the prednisone dose is done (about a week to ten days) Yes, dear readers, I will be accountable to you. I would be accountable to dear hubby, but he would just eat crap with me to be supportive. hahaha.
So this morning, I had my usual oatmeal with apples, walnuts, cinnamon, flax seed, hemp seed (no not the stuff that makes you high and want more food silly) and almond milk. A respectable breakfast I might add, but, the day is young and we have to go get the prednisone this morning, then all bets are off. We shall see.
Oh yeah. This morning, my arms looked better, red has gone down, just swollen and bruised looking, partly from the injections, partly from meds I imagine. My face looks less red, and even though my chest is red, it's not hot and wicked. Well, I am hot and wicked, but that's just bragging.
One of the things that has worked for me while on steroids is to drink lemonade. The sour taste seems to dull my hunger cravings, so I will make a big old pitcher of Crystal Light.
Cannot go to the gym (may make the steroid side effects more intense, plus I might turn into a body builder with a high pitched voice...just kidding) Plus, doc says no driving because of the Benadryl. Which is good, you have heard of "Roid Rage", well I wouldn't want to get angry and run some guy off the road because he switched lanes without signaling. So, here's the plan...I will put on my walking DVD and do that today for some exercise.
Chow for Now! (Of course I meant Ciao, but the food metaphors keep coming!)
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