cycle over !! Lasted 4 weeks! I hear you all now about the pred side effects!!
Zits, boils, swelling!! pretty bad! The Cafergot was a godsend! worked like a champ! Just stopped taking it last week and Whoopie cycle over!!

GREAT MAN!
always good to hear! put a smile on my face!!!1 enjoy my friend!!!!

Great news!  You found relief and cycle is ended... ahhhh.

If that blister (mentioned in another post) hasn't fully healed, do keep an eye on it.  A wound on my shin took a very nasty turn while I was on pred in September, and it is still healing.  I went back to GP last week to check again (blood tests & x-ray - AOK).  But no pred for me with this latest round of attacks.

May your remission be long lived.

Fox

Moist heat on the boils. 2-3 times a day for 20-30 minutes each.

Take it from a pro when it comes to boils.

Those pred after effects sure can be manyfold and troublesome alright.

Like so many people, I didn't pay much attention to diet or health foods, herbs, etc. until my health went into the dumper (in my case the downturn was courtesy of prednisone over use). I wish it didn't take me  years of ill health before I started catching onto the fact that some recovery can be made with some education, effort, and rejection of med use for anything besides clusters.

Turns out the natural stuff can really help combat the prednisone damages, so I hope it doesn't take too many years for you to find this out Saxman.

If you find your immunity to colds, etc. becoming really weak, go ahead and thank the pred for that too, but rest assured that it can be improved with diet, herbs.

This approach has taken me from a sad post pred state of having a severe cold/bronchitis bout at least once every 2 months, to the place I'm at right now where I haven't hadn't any cold/flu virus or anything that could keep me down for 3 years straight.

GREAT news Saxman

  lets hope for a lOOOOOOng remission time

That's great news! May this remission last a lifetime!

Joe

thanks all for the kind wishes!! Right back at you all!! I intend to hang around the site now. (between cycles).

Again! (I know I keep saying it... but...) I had YEARS of cycles where Drs only knew to prescribe narcotics. I was left to simply suffer all those attacks!!

Then one day while being hit, I searched "cluster Headaches" and found you guys.

A few years prior to that day I had a Dr give me the miracle Imitrex shot, and that of course worked within minutes but what about the other 7 attacks per day? And insurance limiting me to treating  only 5% of attacks with imitrex.

Then you guys mentioned prednisone, another miracle, then this time Cafergot.

The cafergot was prescribed to take two at onset of attack. I took one the first time, killed attack and I slept all night!!  Then basically one per night for about 2 weeks, then off completely and cycle over!!

I actually (after starting Pred taper) only had 2 or 3 attacks the entire cycle!!! Is this very unusual??

saxman wrote on Jan 23^rd, 2010 at 12:42am:

I actually (after starting Pred taper) only had 2 or 3 attacks the entire cycle!!! Is this very unusual??

The first time I was prescribed prednisone, I started the taper about half-way through my typical 30 day cluster cycle.  Worked like a charm, with only shadows that never busted through the pred blockade during those last 2 weeks.

Next cycle, I started the pred taper pronto, and as dose decreased in week 2, the hits broke through fiercely.  2nd & 3rd weeks of my cycle are usually the worst.  Dr. (GP) restarted the taper and added Topamax (another story there), and I rode out the cycle with some nasty hits toward the end.

Next cycle, GP gives me 30 day pred course!  I refuse Topamax, and I guess he didn't know alternatives.  Smooth sailing (and compulsive eating) at the high pred dose, bumpy as it got lower. 

Lessons learned (and this Board warned me, I should have heeded):  Prednisone is not the total solution.  It should be use as transitional therapy only.  You need a preventive (e.g. verapamil, lithium) to take over as you taper off the pred.  Also I lost way too much sleep on all that pred, but my apartment has never been cleaner.

Last yeard I found HA specialist, who prescribed pred taper, along with verapamil as preventive and O2 to abort any attacks.  He insisted I spread the pred throughout the day, and that dinnertime dose kept me up way into the wee hours of AM, with very little sleep.  This seemed to shift attacks from their usual 11 PM - 2 AM window, to waking me ~7:30 or hitting within an hour of waking.  After 16 days it all stopped; I assume this was the verap kicking in.

This current cycle, I have verap + O2 only.  No pred, due to an infected wound on my leg that needs to heal.  I'm now starting week 3 of this cycle, and the attacks are becoming fewer and easier.

Prednisone is a blessing and a curse.  (Probably true for all meds.)

Hope your remission holds.

Fox