TEMPORAL  ARTERITIS, polymyalgia rheumatica...

My mother was diagnosed in March 2007, and was put on 60 mg prednisone. She is highly allergic and was only told that she might be a little "jumpy" and to watch her BP.  Insane!! She has had the shakes so bad that she broke her back, her teeth are crumbling, she has increased glucose numbers and other side effects so numerous and weird that it defies description.  After a roller coaster of prednisone increases, she said forget it.  She is weaning herself off it .5 mg every 2 weeks and we are supplementing her with tinctures of Astragulus (for immune system), Licorice tincture, Codonopsis and Siberian Ginseng to encourage her adrenal glands to work effectively on their own.  Long term prednisone can ( not always) destroy your adrenals permanently.  We are finally down to 7.5 and having NO flare ups, her body is in pain but not terribly - 1 tylenol does help.  Methotrexate is the other drug of choice for dr's -- try to avoid it as it has not good track record and often causes liver damage.  We, she and I, have studied alternative and complementary medicine for 20 years -- Homeopathy has been her savior.  It also offers some remedies: Sanguinaria, Benzoicum Acidum and Onosmodium.  Temporal Arteritis is a vascular disease and has some similarities to Lupus. Also, Eugenia Zuckerman (wife of Violinist) has  a book all about her personal struggle with prednisone.  Get it through any library system --- it is a fantastic help. I think it is called Coping with Prednisone.  Best of luck and try to think outside the medical modality!!   Gabi  

Would like to talk to someone how has temporal arteritis. I was just diaognoised and need some help.....
here is my e-mail address ***@****