drugs versus the alternative

about a year after luca was born and after a couple of ear infections treated by antibiotics, i suddenly remembered that i didn't like drug therapy. kind of like an aha moment except feeling more foolish than that, i went to my bookshelf and looked at title upon title focusing on natural therapy, the body's organic response and others. rocki and i made a decision to not give antibiotics to luca unless absolutely necessary. i researched alternative care treatments.

i feel kind of in the same place - like slapping myself on the side of the head. hard. when i got my poison ivy, not a dangerous thing just a profoundly annoying thing, and it continued to spread unabated, i went to the doctor's. she recommended prednisone pills (25g three times a day for five days, two times a day for five days and then one time a day for five days) and steroid cream for the outside of me. "wow, you're really allergic. good thing it hasn't got infected yet." and "you'll see significant changes in 24 hours."

after a week of oatmeal bathing every three hours followed by the slathering of every over the counter product you can think of - and still the stuff crept from torso and out to extremities - a 24 hour cease fire sounded like heaven. so i went to the pharmacist and got my plastic cups of pills and cream.

prednisone is what we gave our dog, elsa, when she had hip problems. it's what we gave her when she had a massive urinary tract infection. i didn't know people took it, too, until my doctor said so.

"oh," she said, "you might get drowsy. if you do, just take benadryl. you'll be taking that anyway for the itching."

ok, taking one pill to counter another pill always bothers me. but still - an end to itching. i took my prednisone and she was right - in about 24 hours, the frontlines stopped and over each day, it disappeared a little bit more.

but then after four days came the "side effects": crawling skin, my bones feel like someone is jackhammering my teeth and skull and it's resonating throughout the skeleton. sticky sudden sweats. water retention with that tight skin crawling feeling that goes along with it. leaden legs. muscle twitches. tired and irritable and sad while at the same time feeling very distant from anyone and anything. heavy chest.

every few days, i google prednisone again. and i slap myself on the head. this stuff is evil - and every doctor on the net seems to say, yeah, it sucks, but there isn't anything else that works for the things it works for. so deal. but by the way, it speeds up aging, gives you brittle bones, puts fat on your torso, thins your skin, gives you high blood pressure, increases your cholesterol and might knock out your adrenal gland.

there are lots of people with lots of chronic things who have no recourse but to take this stuff. unlike my line between itching and itchless, for some it is a line between life and death, between intense chronic pain and side effects.

what i am surprised by is how quickly i nuked myself because the doctor said it was good for me, because i was uncomfortable, because i wanted to feel better. slap bang let the bomb fall and didn't even check to see if diplomacy was possible.

i forgot that, when i have the choice, i prefer to look for alternatives. i forgot because i was uncomfortable and wanted it to stop. and so now i sit and google my way through my regrets. you can't just stop taking this stuff without weaning or baaaaaad things can happen.

next time, please, help me remember. don't take the white pill unless you have no other choice.