Itchiness is a bad side effect for someone with a bed bug phobia

[pktechgirlbackup]

My doctor has agreed that I should try lowering my hydorcortisone dosage. It's
not definitely going to stay lower, but it turns out that having too much feels
a lot like having too little, and the extra I took when I was sick demonstrated
that I definitely should not be taking more, so it's worth seeing if I can get
the same or better results with a lower dosage, especially since hydrocortisone
is a Not Kidding Around drug. The timing isn't fantastic- she just adjusted my
vitamins two weeks ago, and while overall it's been helpful, the switch included
two things in the "this will get worse before it gets better" category, which
could screw up my assessment of the lowered dosage. Neither should effect the
biggest potential negative side effect from the cortisol- trouble getting to
sleep. So today I'm going to do my usual symptoms check in:

• I am itchy. My skin is dry and I have developed a mild sensitivity to my
  laundry detergent. It looks like I'm developing new moles, but that could be my
  imagination. Doctor says that can be a side effect of either of the "worse
  before it gets better" things. Actually, she's pretty sure she knows which one
  it is, but it's the more important one, so she wants me to give up the other
  (which is definitely temporary) first. I've decided to compromise on "neither"
  
• I am much more energetic during the day. Not at super-power levels, but
  better than I was a month ago.
  
• I think I'm sleeping better at night. I'm also sleeping a lot- 9 hours,
  plus maybe 15 minutes of reading my RSS feed in bed before I get up. Okay 30.
  And it's fifteen minutes between consciousness and phone. I blame the cats for
  that, but the truth is, I do it even when they're not there.
  
• I am having some trouble getting to sleep. This is either or symptom of too
  little cortisol (giving me the hypoadrenic "second wind" right when I should be
  going to sleep) or too much (for obvious reasons). Or it could be something
  entirely unrelated. Definitely one of those three.
  
• The one rolfing session I had was super amazing effective.
  
• It's hard evaluating the emotional side effects. I have no problem
  acknowledging the vitamins for giving me energy or reducing inflammation, and
  it's easy to see that hydrocortisone makes me cope with stress better, but
  beyond that, I feel like I'm a calmer, more mature, less-high strung person
  because I've experienced emotional growth, not because of some stupid pills.
  And I have the perfectly reasonable argument that there's very obvious emotional
  growth that I can point to, and that I was doing a lot of that before I started
  any of these vitamins and we lack the technology to chart maturity
  quantitatively enough to look for an inflection point.
  
  
• Inflammation- down from the worst, but not actually improving. Again
  suspect "worse before better" meds.
  
• My focus isn't great at work, but that's to be expected after two weeks
  off. As you can tell, my focus when writing is astonishing, and I've lost quite
  a lot of my ability to multitask when watching even stupid TV. It's not that I
  couldn't write e-mail while watching Hoarders if I really wanted to, it's that
  doing so annoys me
  
• I'm back to mostly not wanting simple carbs. Not as extreme as during the
  superpowers phase, but reasonable.
  
  
• My body is at the point where it will actively ask for meat, but only if
  it's one of the kinds I ate as a child. Next step is to convince it that
  breaded chicken tenders are literally the exact same thing as chicken nuggets,
  except bigger. There's a delicate balance here where I'm more inclined to try
  new things when I'm hungry or craving a particular nutrient, but if I go even a
  smidge beyond that my stomach goes into protective mode and has to be
  willpowered into eating anything.
  
  
• This combines really well with my body neglecting to tell me it's hungry
  until I'm near starving. I am still relearning how to listen for hunger
  signals, and to start preparing food before I actively crave it. Get it
  together, stomach.
  
  
• I'm experiencing much less body odor than I used to. For a while I worried that it was in fact my sense of smell that was going, but I confirmed at martial arts today that it was not.
  
  
• My motion sickness is getting better, although that could be because I'm better about taking the magnesium now.
  
  
• My neuralgia got worse for a few days. I did not like this at all.
  

Comments

[scythe-of-time.livejournal.com]

Yeah, NKADs always take a long time to tweak. You don't want to mess with those if you can avoid it, but they're shockingly effective most of the time. I hope a lot of these side effects become easier to deal with as they find the right dosage for you.

[pktechgirl.livejournal.com]

In this case I think the NKAD dosage is a moving target. 50 mg was definitely the right dosage in October, but it actually worked, and so now I need less. It's progress, even if the time at the wrong dose is annoying.

[scythe-of-time.livejournal.com]

:) I totally get you. I'm sorry you have to deal with the suck of adjusting dosages, but PROGRESS!