I've been suffering with a ton of inflammation since about week 2 (after taking some citalopram) of covid recovery. Inflammation is all over but I feel it most in my throat, neck and ent nerves/glands and tonsils. However I think it is also manifesting as insomnia and quite possibly anxiety as well. I think anxiety can be made significantly worse my raised cytokines, but stress also raises cytokines anyway, so it's double edged.
Yesterday I decided to take 5mg of hydrocortisone, I think this is probably the safest low dose to take, although some people say it's also safe to take 10. The body produces 20 a day so doses under that are not meant to be immune supressive. Within an hour I felt a lot of relief and brainfog was improved but I felt dizzy, a bit weak and slightly fatigued. That evening I felt more relaxed and like myself than I had in years, it was like a light switch. But it didn't last I micro doses mertazapine for sleep and managed to get about 8 or 9 hours which for me is good right now.
But all day today I haven't had any major worsening of inflammation. Even if tonight I have a small amount, but nothing major. Sadly brainfog was much worse all day and I was even a little fatiuged. But as I can't go to the shops right now or leave the house I don't think I am often eating enough food, as I haven't got the energy to cook bigger meals. My diet was also very restricted before covid even if I can now tolerate lacto free cheese and have begun eating tinned tuna again, it's still not a lot.
But I was quite impressed with the hydrocortisone, I felt very mellow for hours after taking it as well. But I did have some fatigue and breathlessness today. I am noticing however that when my blood sugar is low my symptoms are at their worst.
I also found a paper tonight from 2011 that disusses rna viral clearance. They studied several RNA viruses, about 6 in total mostly in vivo analysis and concluded that they all had rna virus in tissues well after serum clearance. One virus had the viral remnants in the tissues seemingly for life - held back from reactivation by igg/igm and some base neutralising antibodies. These aren't working properly in long covid according to Akiko Iwasaki's work, therefore it's not that surprising covid persists but also goes round the immune system.
Yet there are many who clear covid just fine, even if it takes a long time (up to 6 or even 12 months) and these people have to my knowledge never had a bad covid infection since, even though there first infection was quite severe. So why some people recover from the virus when it should do tons of damage to their immune system is a bit puzzling.
I also learnt that asthma patients don't prefer type I interferons properly, which I think explains why I don't fight off viruses very well and why they get grounded in me before I have a chance to get rid of them.
I am hoping the inflammation stays down. I remember that Suzan Jackson who's had ME for over 15 years got covid and her body was stuck in an inflammatory state and her valtrex stopped working. So her dr put her on steroids for awhile to get her back to normal. This worked and she's fine now, back to her old baseline and enjoying life (she still paces).
I'm also going to be trying ldn next week and starting to nebulise glutathione and nac once a day for lung pain and asthma. I've noticed lung pain coming back lately although it was worse before the hydrocortisone, but none the less it has been coming back with asthma. So I am hoping the antioxidants may clear it and help my brain fix whatever is causing the PENE as well, as that is a very debilitating sympom that I really need to get rid of.
Yesterday I decided to take 5mg of hydrocortisone, I think this is probably the safest low dose to take, although some people say it's also safe to take 10. The body produces 20 a day so doses under that are not meant to be immune supressive. Within an hour I felt a lot of relief and brainfog was improved but I felt dizzy, a bit weak and slightly fatigued. That evening I felt more relaxed and like myself than I had in years, it was like a light switch. But it didn't last I micro doses mertazapine for sleep and managed to get about 8 or 9 hours which for me is good right now.
But all day today I haven't had any major worsening of inflammation. Even if tonight I have a small amount, but nothing major. Sadly brainfog was much worse all day and I was even a little fatiuged. But as I can't go to the shops right now or leave the house I don't think I am often eating enough food, as I haven't got the energy to cook bigger meals. My diet was also very restricted before covid even if I can now tolerate lacto free cheese and have begun eating tinned tuna again, it's still not a lot.
But I was quite impressed with the hydrocortisone, I felt very mellow for hours after taking it as well. But I did have some fatigue and breathlessness today. I am noticing however that when my blood sugar is low my symptoms are at their worst.
I also found a paper tonight from 2011 that disusses rna viral clearance. They studied several RNA viruses, about 6 in total mostly in vivo analysis and concluded that they all had rna virus in tissues well after serum clearance. One virus had the viral remnants in the tissues seemingly for life - held back from reactivation by igg/igm and some base neutralising antibodies. These aren't working properly in long covid according to Akiko Iwasaki's work, therefore it's not that surprising covid persists but also goes round the immune system.
Yet there are many who clear covid just fine, even if it takes a long time (up to 6 or even 12 months) and these people have to my knowledge never had a bad covid infection since, even though there first infection was quite severe. So why some people recover from the virus when it should do tons of damage to their immune system is a bit puzzling.
I also learnt that asthma patients don't prefer type I interferons properly, which I think explains why I don't fight off viruses very well and why they get grounded in me before I have a chance to get rid of them.
I am hoping the inflammation stays down. I remember that Suzan Jackson who's had ME for over 15 years got covid and her body was stuck in an inflammatory state and her valtrex stopped working. So her dr put her on steroids for awhile to get her back to normal. This worked and she's fine now, back to her old baseline and enjoying life (she still paces).
I'm also going to be trying ldn next week and starting to nebulise glutathione and nac once a day for lung pain and asthma. I've noticed lung pain coming back lately although it was worse before the hydrocortisone, but none the less it has been coming back with asthma. So I am hoping the antioxidants may clear it and help my brain fix whatever is causing the PENE as well, as that is a very debilitating sympom that I really need to get rid of.
