Let us discuss our medication. A thread for bitching about meds.

I’m going to put this here instead of making yet another old people bitch thread.

So on the way home there was a serious storm. And I saw lightning to my right. And so, as one does, I turned right. My neck said fuck no. And I felt a pain like I have rarely felt before. My neck has decided that turning right is no longer a body thing. When I got home I found my old neck brace, from the last time my body argued with me. So now, here I am. Back pain, but I can’t take anti-inflammatory meds. Especially Aleve, which is the only fucking thing that works for me. Bad back. Bad knees and fucked up neck.

Fucking kill me now.

I have lower back pain since about a month ago. I am okay sitting or standing usually, but transitioning between sitting and standing (or rolling over in bed) hurts like hell. Getting up from the floor like I did earlier today really hurts too.

I have upper back pain (as well as pain in my fingers) when carrying/lifting stuff for several years now. The pain feels different though. It’s not the same. Also, it’s avoidable by not carrying/lifting stuff.

I will try some Aleve as you suggest. And I see my doctor next week.

:(

In my experience with back pain, the doc has nothing that will help. They just look at you like, Really? That sucks. I had back and neck stuff and it turned out it was related to an ergonomic thing with my workstation at home. I thought I had it set up to meet all the guidelines, but I removed a shelf where I had the monitor sitting and added some books under the monitor instead. Fixed me right up after about two weeks. The margin for error on that sort of thing is getting smaller. I feel as if I might have been good 10 years ago with the little shelf (in fact, the little shelf has been around for a long time, but I swapped out the desk – and the new one is probably a little bit lower-- and that’s when all the problems started).

Hey, I can play this game too - my right elbow right now is giving my grief. Think it’s tendonitis. And I know what set it off, we took some leftover wood from replacing part of our deck and decided to repurpose it into planters for our garden. But this particular plank of wood had screws all along its length for some reason, and I had to remove them. I did use a power drill for that, but I had to really jam the drill in there to unscrew, use some force. And I’ve just had pain in my elbow ever since, about a month now. I did a similar thing to my other elbow back shortly after my son was born, I forgot his stroller and had to carry him around in the portable basket. Messed up my elbow for a couple months.

I made it over forty years without giving my elbows much thought, and they’re jumping to the forefront of my attention with a vengeance.

My meds are pretty common and not very exciting.

Lisinopril for blood pressure: it’s common and cheap, but it has increased my sensitivity to sinus pain when I’m doing aerobic things in cold weather. The cold dry air will eventually give me a sinus headache.

Statin for cholesterol. It doesn’t really have major side effects that debilitate me, but everything I’ve read about statins makes me hate them and I’d love to find a way off them.

As for the back pain you guys mention, I sympathize. Every once in a while I’ll move funny and something will pop. The pain is awful and after that first time I quit making fun of back pain. Fortunately for me it’s not common. But a friend that has it mentioned that acupuncture really helped. I’m still a little weirded out by it, but if you’re struggling and medicine hasn’t helped… give it a try?

There are a lot more doctors now who will take you off statins or not prescribe in the first place if you have normal high cholesterol. Might be worth asking for a re-evaluation.

What’s the dish on statins? Why do you hate them so much, I wonder?

Ok…well, I live with my wife, son, disabled mother in law, schizo sister in law.

I do ALL the pills for them and me each Sunday…oh yeah, today.

For mother in law: 11 pills. She has diabetes, had breast cancer, stomach issues.
For sister in law: 5 pills. She is schizo, has sleep problems.
For me: Gout, thyroid, D3, B12: I just found out I have lymphoma so I will taking a lot more I"m sure.
For my kid: Allergy, D3, multi.
For wife: Gabapentin, Ambien, D3, iron.

HATE PILLLLLLLLLLLLLLLLS.

Have read they’re bad for the liver and create diabetic like symptoms. But they do work. I’d just like a better alternative.

I’ve been lucky. In my mid-50’s and since late last year, for the first time, I’m taking routine pills

Allopurinol for prevention of gout. I should have gotten on this a decade ago, since I’ve had attacks since I was 41, and attacks about 2x/year in the last 5 years. I would just suffer through them, sometimes with colchicine but usually Aleve and suffering. But I had a coming-home-to-Jesus episode last September when I got gout in both legs at the same time and literally could not move. I understand that it may also help prevent kidney stones from uric acid crystals, and I sure don’t want to deal with that. So…I guess I 'm not really bitching about my meds, since they keep me from being crippled.

I was on statins for a while about 10 years ago, but they made my muscles ache. Apparently a side-effect that isn’t all that common but does happen. My doc said screw it…my LDL isn’t all that high, and my HDL is fine, which I guess some are saying now is more important.

Yeah same for me with Atorvastatin. I take it at dinner and get a wicked leg ache every night. Maybe I should start taking it at bed time instead.

I had a gout attack in my big toe back in like 2012 and then again in 2014. Got a cortisone shot both time and that stopped the pain immediately, but man was it debilitating. I took Alupurinol for about 3 months but have been fine since.

I don’t know how old you are, but if you’ve had it twice already, I would bet good money on it coming back eventually. I went about 5 or 6 years without an attack after the first couple in my early 40’s and like you assumed that all was good. Then when it came back I figured “I’ll get through this and it’ll be another 5 years”. But it was 3. Then 1. Then twice a year. Then my apocalypse.

Include uric acid in your blood tests. I suggest that if it’s high, get back on allopurinol. It’s a cheap drug, and I don’t wish what I went through before I saw the light on anyone. I still can’t make a fist with my right hand after an attack 4 or so years ago. It’s a great preventative.

I feel like the odd man out here but I’m not. No back, shoulder or knee pain. I have high blood pressure and unlike a lot of you folks, a family full or heart disease victims.

But hey, we can walk straight and lift heavy loads. At 50 you start counting your blessings, genetically.

I lost a bunch of weight which oddly raised my cholesterol, so now I’m on statins (Atorvastatin).
I have migraines, so I take a med for that (Topiramate).
Oh, and I take Loratidine for allergies.

Thus far, I’m lucky my meds aren’t expensive with my insurance.

I had tennis elbow a couple of years ago from playing tennis. I put down the racket for about six months – it was the onset of the cold weather anyway and I only play outdoors on free courts – and it was better when I started playing again. I did change my backhand grip to give the racket a bit more support in my hand and keep the elbow from absorbing as much of the shock when striking the ball. So that was my cure.

Of course I’m on six prescriptions now so I have plenty of other things that are wrong with me.

I think it’s pretty common, at least at the start. Everybody I have talked to complained about it.

My doctor insisted it didn’t have to be like that and made me kept trying different versions until we found one that, after two weeks, had zero symptoms (livalo). Everybody is different though.

It’s crazy expensive with out authorization, and I know my doctors grouch every year about the forms they fill out, but - zero side effects now. First two weeks I did feel like i did crunches and had a sore shoulder, but those faded.

Anyways, the statin is all I am on now, which is a big leap up from nothing before. But until modern medication every man in my family died to heart disease.

Curious about how the weight loss came about. I also saw an increase in cholesterol after weight loss and was surprised and disappointed in that. But I lost the weight via a Keto type of diet, which increases fat intake and reduces carbs. And it worked great, but I figured the cholesterol was due to me cutting out oatmeal and apples from my foods. I’m trying to make adjustments and rebalance for a happier medium.

I went in for an angiogram but the doctor decided what blockage I had wasn’t enough to warrant a stent. He made it sound as though stents have (for many people at least) a limited useful life and so if I didn’t need one right away I should wait. But the plavix was to help with that.

I think it was really common 15 years ago to hand out statins like candy. If your levels were close you were prescribed. I do know people who had to try different types because of side effects, mostly body aches and pain. I was put on them in my 40’s but hated the idea of using them for the rest of my life when my levels were at the edge. Now with some blockage and being in my 60’s I am more willing to take them. Plus they are available in generics now.

I had a similar approach; lower carbs, reducing my eating window, stopped “grazing” (I’ve dropped about 40 pounds over 5 months). I didn’t go full keto, but my doctor explained it’s an unusual yet not super rare genetic abnormality for some of us (sounds like you might be one of the lucky few) which determines the sequence our fat cells shed stuff as we lose weight. He said when I stop losing weight, I could probably go off it, but if I don’t have any side effects from the statins then it wouldn’t hurt to stay on a lower maintenance dosage afterwards. Thankfully, I’m side-effect free. He did warn that true keto diets, where fats are added, will also cause an uptick but usually not a huge one (mine was quite large, going from normal at my higher weight to alarmingly high quite rapidly).