The last three out of four nights I've gotten about two hours of sleep. I'm tired. So, so tired.
But the Evil Dex™ keeps my eyes wide open and my brain spinning. Fuck cancer? No, fuck dexamethasone.¹
But then a miracle! I was talking to my latest nurse last night and it turned out she has the same problem. In her case it's prednisone for asthma, and the first night she takes it she's buzzing around all night cleaning the house and so forth. So she took pity on me and came back at 11:30 pm with an Ambien. I don't know if she got a doctor's authorization for this or just did it on her own, but I don't care. I got about 4-5 hours of sleep last night, which is pretty glorious under the circumstances.
Anyway, it's a ray of sunshine. I have now survived the 1 mg shot and the 6 mg shot of Talvey with nothing more than minor reactions. Tomorrow we jump up to a 40 mg shot. On Thursday we'll do the final 80 mg dose. If I survive, I'll get 80 grams of this stuff every two weeks for as long as it keeps working.
¹Though it does keep me alive, so I suppose I should show a little respect.
You should. Giving you a prescription medication without a prescription is something that could get her fired. And you’ve basically just dropped a dime on her. So you should care whether it was doctor authorized or if she has authorization to prescribe.
Agree....Yikes let's really hope against hope she did this with a Dr's authorization. I doubt that a Nurse would want to put a hard-earned license at risk.
lol less than zero chance the nurse gave him ambien without authorization. here's what happened: nurse messaged the nocturnist or night float team (depending on if kevin is being treated by pp or academic physicians) saying patient has bad insomnia can we give him something, and he/she/they said sure and ordered ambien
Yup - pretty sure that is what happened.
This is the only way any of it happened, full stop.
Prednisone for asthma? That must be some heavy duty asthma.
I was given prednisone for carpal tunnel about 10 years ago. Took it for 5 days and got exactly 0 hours of sleep in those 5 days. Also gained about 10 pounds. When I went off it, I slept straight for 3 days. Killed off the carpal tunnel though. Powerful stuff. If you look it up on Wikipedia it's astonishing the wide range of issues it is prescribed for.
Since a severe asthma attack can kill you, treating with prednisone is commonplace when other treatments, mostly inhaled steroids, are not sufficient. My son and my mother are sufferers, and my mom has had to go on prednisone multiple times. Yes it is nasty stuff, with potential side effects as noted.
I was prescribed prednisone for my (mild) asthma once. At the time I was off my inhaled steroid -- my doctor wanted to see how I would do if I stopped it -- and my asthma decided to flare up while I was traveling in Britain. (I had my rescue inhaler, but that gets old fast.) The doctor I saw there (for all its problems, thank God for the NHS) prescribed a short course of prednisone, and when I asked about possible side effects, he broke out laughing: "it could be pretty much anything." It worked; I went back on my inhaled steroid when I got home, and have stayed on it ever since.
I don't understand the problem. I love it when prednisone keeps me up all night. I feel so productive.
are you sure that's an 80g dose?
drugs are usually in the mg range
dosage for Talvey is g (of drug) / kg (of body weight).
looked it up and the monograph says highest dose is 0.8 mg/kg
https://www.janssenlabels.com/package-insert/product-monograph/prescribing-information/TALVEY-pi.pdf
I still recall an internist telling me a few decades ago that he didn't like to prescribe systemic corticosteroids (such as prednisone), since "that stuff is nasty."
A friend had two hip joints replace because of Prednisone. Her dog kept giving her poison oak and doc kept giving her Prednisone.
The Chinese found out back in the day.
(also such as dexamethasone)
Hang Tough!!!
Hang in here Mr. Drum. it will get better.
Your nurse spoke with the hospitalist about your insomnia.
The hospitalist put in an order for ambien.
Your nurse brought you the ambien.
There is no other mechanism for that encounter to have worked.
"Better living through chemistry" is a thing, no matter how dubious the source of that quote.
Hang in their Kevin. No sleep would be awful. Thank you for continuing to blog as you do battle with the medications.
As a long-time asthma sufferer, I've been through dozens of courses of Prednisone over the years. I too have experienced the "up all night" phenomenon, and while I could be very productive, vacuuming the house in the middle of the night would be too disruptive. I found putting pennies into penny rolls (and nickels and dimes too) to be a good time waster at 4 am when I had run out of quiet things to do, but that was before the internet. Now you can entertain yourself all night long.
Just wanted to say, hang in there. Sounds rough on the sleep side as usual. You can do it. You have a ton of fans out here on the interwebs who are wishing you well. I've been reading you since fairly early Calpundit—almost half my life. Felt like it was time to leave a supportive comment. I really hope this Talvey thing goes smoothly!
- J
What happens if, instead of trying to alleviate your sleeplessness to allow you to sleep, you sought to eliminate the sleepiness and become more productive during this period?
Amphetamine-type drugs. 🤷
Trump's stroke, --as it were, --of genius,
like The Purge but only the police get to riot,
https://www.rawstory.com/trump-proposes-the-purge-policy/
So, no stories of you sleep walking? sleep night photography?
You get the same effect from using LSGeewhiz - it's called the jangles and you just persevere. Although having computer game that can hold your attention as a time sink is also an option these day. Or you can take the Eric Loomis route and write copious music notes or visit graves or whatever.