Remicade levels low and antibodies present

Imuran enzyme test results came back today and were normal, so I guess I can do my Humira today afterall. I really hope Imuran doesn't make me throw up. I hate throwing up!

Thank you! FedEx just dropped off my Humira (they even gave me a cute little sharps container and bandaids. Is it weird I'm oddly excited about this? Lol.)! I think I'm just gonna do it on my own. I don't feel like driving 40 minutes one way to the hospital to ask if the lab people will show me.

I took my first dose of Imuran 2 hours ago after a snack and so far no side effects. I plan to switch to taking it at night. I just wanted to take a dose before the Humira. And yeah, I probably still have Remicade in my system, plus 50 mg of prednisone the past 3 weeks, and now the azathioprine, so really I have 4 immunosuppression agents working on me right now!!! I'm thankful I work from home and can avoid a lot of germs/sick people!! Thanks for the well wishes.

Oh, also, you gotta love when the first thing you see when you open the box is a warning saying "some people have died from taking this medication. Most of them were also on steroids or methotrexate." :/ Lol.

Post Edited (Sara14) : 11/16/2019 10:12:25 AM (GMT-7)

I just did it. That was super easy. I didn't feel any pain or burning at all. After the first shot though, when I pulled the needle out, quite a bit of liquid came out. The instructions say to call Humira if more than a few drops of liquid are on the injection site. Only a drop or two was there with the second injection, so maybe I did something wrong the first time? I waited until the yellow indicator light was finished moving and even a little longer to be safe because I counted to 15. I've never been thankful for my belly fat before but today I am. Lol.

Yes! Thank you!

Thank you very much! I'm sure it's too early to have any effect, but I didn't need any pain meds yesterday, and so far today I feel normal (granted it's only 7 a.m. here, lol). Going to start tapering prednisone tomorrow. Been on 50 mg 3 weeks.

Ok, thanks for the info. I called Humira yesterday, but they were closed. The starter dose was 2 80 mg pens. I do have one more 80 mg pen that I'm supposed to use in 2 weeks, but I don't really want to do another one since I have no idea how much of the medicine I did get. I definitely got some because the needle went into my skin. And the second pen went just fine. It may have been user error versus a misfired pen. Lol. I felt like I did everything right, but maybe I just needed to wait a bit longer before pulling it out or maybe I needed to push the pen into my skin harder.

Thank you, Lisa!

Thank you. I just talked to my Humira ambassador. She said it's possible I was squeezing my fat too firmly and squeezed some of the medicine out. That was actually my guess, too. She's going to call me and walk me through my next injection over the phone.

Yesterday and today I feel completely normal (knocking on wood)! It could be the prednisone finally kicking in after 3 weeks on 50 mg, I guess. I dropped to 40 mg today.

Oh, no, it was extremely easy. I couldn't even feel it. I just didn't get quite all the medicine (probably because I accidentally had a death grip on my fat and squeezed it back out, lol). Thank you. I have felt almost completely normal going on 3 days now! Still on a ton of prednisone so time will tell but fingers crossed.

Prednisone is a potent immuno-suppressant, it ceases/mutes the attack of your immune system. The less of an attack that's mounted, the less new inflammation and damage can be caused. That enables your body to heal itself. The affect from pred depends on the dosage being enough, and the length of treatment being long enough that the immune system attack is shut off for long enough that your/my immune system enters a dormant/quiet state. That way, ceasing pred keeps us into a remission. It's why you want to be 90% or more healed before ceasing pred, and be on pred for 2-months or more. If you stop pred too fast, or are not healed enough the immune system just attacks with renewed vengeance once the pred immuno-suppressant is gone.

Disease progression in extent and severity can mean pred doesn't respond as fast or fully as in the past. Pred doesn't get weaker, rather your UC flare is more potent than in the past. Necessitating more pred.

Should I go back up to 50 or just deal with it? Im probably having 5-7 BMs a day but they are what I call compacted, sometimes more on the constipated side but not really because I'm still producing a lot. Sorry tmi. Lol. And Im exhausted.

Solid. Like it looks all pushed together, not healthy or normal. Kinda like number 2 in that chart. What poop would look like if it had been constipated and stuck in there for a while...only it is weird because I am going 5 or more times a day so I dont know why it looks like it does.

Ok, thanks.