Prednisone linked to acne?

I am been having problems with my skin ever since starting the steroids back up again as of a little over a month ago. It's not my face but my chest & back. At first I thought it was just my normal weekly breakout around the time I would have gotten a period (but don't because of my mirena) but it's been giving me problems since I started the prednisone! :( I hate hate hate this stupid pill! I'm taking myself off of it as of this week, since I STILL don't have a rheumy appt! I've been using neutragena acne body wash & this help a little bit to keep it from getting out of control but has not cleared everything up. It's so gross!

Has anyone else had skin problems with prednisone?

I'm on two other new meds as well that I started up around the same time but i'm pretty sure it's the steriods.

Meloxicam (1 a day) which I have been taking regularly
& Tramadol (up to 3 a day as needed) which I havent been taking.

I was taken off of diclofenac because it wasn't helping any.

Anybody else experience skin problems due to prednisone? I don't think it's stress because that's stayed the same and I haven't changed laundry soaps, I use tide free and clear.

Results

Well last thursday I was able to start my shot of Enbrel again, and friday I started my methotrexate as well. The rheumy got my blood results back and has crossed out the possibility of the medications causing the low white blood cells! I was so happy because I really was hurting so badly that last week of no meds and didn't go back to work until yesterday. The rheumy said that he believe i MAY be developing lupus but he didn't want to say for sure yet because it's to early to tell. He mentioned something about my Sjogrens being hard to tell apart from the Lupus as far as symptoms go, so I have to get blood done every 4 weeks now instead of every 6 :( he says he will be watching me more closely now and that my white blood cells still aren't what they should be but they got a tiny bit better and he believes it may have been caused by all my infections i had the past month. He just basically didn't seem to sure about anything =/ It was frustrating waiting for him to call me to give me my results, so I smoked some weed that day because I wasn't allowed to take pills and wow did that help relieve the pain for the night and following day! It's not something I like doing unless I really have too cause it makes me feel kinda loopy lol.

My rheumy instructed me to start up pred again 2 pills every morning for five days then 1 pill every day until I see him again on august 13th which also means I need to take the omeprazole again too for now. It's helped a lot but i still feel icky taking steroids and I don't wanna get fat. He mailed me another blood paper so i gotta go 3 days before my appt to get that done again. I hope we can just figure things out so i can get on some sort of schedule and deal with what I have.

ps: im working on social security disability benefits right now, oh my gosh lots of paperwork and i'm also going to be filling for a disabled parking permit.

blood work

Went in today to get the blood test done. 6 tubes total. Let's hope i'll learn some new info when i call my rheumy in two days. So after getting that done i took a pred pill today, i'm hoping it'll help a bit since the blood is now done i figured it couldn't hurt to have it now.

Oh i've been reading the book "out of joint" by mary felstiner, i'm hooked I downloaded in on kindle for my phone and macbook, cause the sony ereader store didn't have it :( but either way i highly recommend it!

Been awhile

It's been awhile since I've made a post! I've been doing really good lately. I saw my rheumy yesterday and i get to cut off the Prednisone !!! I will have half a pill for a week then stop completely cause I had already gone down to 1 pill a day when I started Enbrel. Not just that but he said to use the Diclofenac as needed. :D this also means I can cut out Omeprazole after this week!! I'm so happy!!! He checked out my knees and wrists and said he sees a big improvement I had no inflammation! :D The only downfall is that the past 2 shots of Enbrel I've been getting injection site reactions that are red/swollen almost and last a few days then it turns to a bruise. Anyone else get this and have any tips? The rheumy said to give it a few months and if it gets really uncomfortable we might have to change medications =/

I'm still looking for a job with good benefits, each day that goes by makes me worry more and more. It's hard not to think about. I faxed over my resume for an opening for a clerical/legal asst today that my dad found in the paper. So we will see about that one.

Ok but that is not the only exciting news.. i'm so happy about! I have an new boyfriend who is absolutely AMAZING! I've never met anyone like him everrrrrrr. He makes me soooo happy! One of the best things is that my RA doesn't bother him. So that blog I wrote here: Relationships, yeah I was worrying for nothing. He is really supportive and just, I don't know, just to good to be true

& something a friend told me a few days ago..

".... everything that happens has some kind of explanation of reason we ourselves conclude it to be. And yes it is okay, you know your strength and capability of knowing whats worth it or not. theres nothing that isn't or wouldn't be okay unless you, yourself say and believe that it wont be." she is right. :)

Well time to get ready for work. I'm happy i'm off fri and sat!

Vacation to FL coming up

I leave for FL this Friday. I'll be gone the 9th - the 14th. This will be my first time traveling with RA. I have a checklist printed and my suitcase is almost packed. Just have to pack up my carry-on bags which include all my medications. Thankfully I will thank my Enbrel Injection that morning before I fly out of CA so I don't need to worry about dragging that along with me. I work tues/wed/thurs but I get off Thursday afternoon so I have time to finished up whatever I need to before Friday morning. My flight leaves in the afternoon 1 something. I'm just hoping I don't get to stiff while sitting on the plane for so long. I do have 1 layover though so that will give me time to get up and move around. I'm really excited though I can't wait! I will be getting a tattoo while i'm there too! It's going to be a dream catcher on my upper arm. I'm not sure how this will work with having RA. I'm expecting a longer healing time for it though, so I'll have to baby it more then I did my other tattoos that I got before RA.

Medication updates: I'm only taking 5mg (1 pill) of prednisone at night right now instead of 2 a day and this was an adjustment, I did notice the day I went down and the day after I was feeling a little sore, but with my second Enbrel injection this past Thursday I've been feeling better. I've read that Enbrel can start taking effect anywhere from 2 weeks to 3 months. I'm hoping sooner rather then later but we will see :) so far so good!

Second Enbrel Shot

I did my second Enbrel shot today, this time all by myself. It was a breeze! & didn't hurt at all again. =] I am now only taking 1 prednisone pill a day (5mg) at night. So I'm crossing my fingers and hoping this all works out! I've noticed I get a slight headache after the Enbrel shot but I read that is a normal side effect, & it goes away so no biggie there!

My First Enbrel Shot

So today was an important step forward for me, I had my first Enbrel shot. I had the Enbrel Sureclick auto-injectors delivered to my work today because I was there 8am-4:45pm today so i wouldn't be home to wait around for it to come to my house. This all went smoothly, as there is a pharmacy inside my work. I work at a Super Target. So my pharmacist is a sweetheart and told me there would be no problems having them deliver it there for me and i could pick it up after work! Fantastic he called me in my department to let me know it had arrived which was around 11am. So during my lunch i picked it up and took it home to put away in the fridge. I just couldn't wait to get off work so I could have my first shot!!! So i will be during this every Friday from now on. Which works well because my vacation out of state I leave on a Friday so i won't have to take my Enbrel with me on the plane :)

So finally I got off work, and yesterday I called my Uncle to ask if my Aunt would help me with my first shot because she is a RN. They said yes of course so after work I put my Enbrel in my travel cooler and headed over there. I was superrrr anxious but kinda nervous too. Well we read all the instructions together and then I let her give me the first shot because I wanted to know what kind of pain to expect. Well we let it sit out for a bit so it wouldn't be so cold because I had read that it stings if it's to cold. So after that followed all the steps and this is where I got really scared!! I hateeee needles (yet i have lots of tattoos-- how ironic) just something about drawing blood and putting medicine in me freaks me out. Anyways then we used an alcohol wipe on the area which was my left thigh & before I knew it, it was all over!! I got a cute hello kitty band-aid :) and it didn't even hurt like at all!!! I'm sure I can do this on my own next friday, the pain was almost non-existent.

Now I don't see my rheumy till the end of april BUT I really wanna cut back on the prednisone so i'm going to cut back to 1 pill a day at night starting tomorrow and see how this effects me. I'm totally getting the "moon face" my aunt noticed so i'm not CRAZY! finally someone else besides me can tell! That was a relief haha.

Overall today was a success, I can't wait till next friday!! and I can't wait to start feeling better! :) & my aunt even gave me a microwaveable comfort wrap thats cute w/ lavender & chamomile. :) it feels gooood on my sore joints!

Rheumy Appt Overview & Disney trip

My Rheumy Appt went well. I will be starting Enbrel, but there are some tests I have to take first. So i got more blood drawn yesterday to make sure I don't have Hep, and then Monday I have an appt to test for TB, after that's finished and my primary care docter faxes my rheumy the results I have to call him and let him know it's done so we can put in to get me started on Enbrel. I'm excited. He said he planned on taking me off pred but since I was in a lot of pain he decided to keep me on it a little longer until i can start Enbrel and he also gave me a prescription for a pain killer, the cool thing about them is that they are hot pink!! I posted a picture :) so i just have to take it as needed. I got copies of recent blood work & doctor notes that I am going to start asking for every time, so I'm going to get a file system going on to keep track of everything.

In other new; I got a new phone the day before yesterday! The HTC Droid Eris for verizon, I was ready for an upgrade and decided to stay with verizon. I love it! My first day of creative writing class was monday and that went well! & on tuesday I went to disneyland!!! & the good thing? I wasn't sore that day! I had so much fun!!! Here are a few pictures :) I love that I have a annual pass and can go whenever!


Yes i love love love alice in wonderland!! & was super excited that they finally have merchandise you can buy now since the moving is coming out! :) Anyways it was lots of fun and my feet didn't start hurting until the end, the weather was nice too! Good times :)