These widely-used drugs can make you feel like you're losing your mind

Warning: Can this common med take you from normal to psychotic?

Dear Reader,

Last week, when I was having lunch with Bill Bonner, he mentioned that he’d been struggling with a cold for a couple weeks.

Nothing that remarkable, of course.

That is, until he told me that his doctor put him on steroids.

Yes, steroids…for a cold!

The logic (if you can call it that)… His doctor thought he might have become allergic to his cold.

Seriously???

At times, steroids can be life-saving drugs.

But they are often dangerous — and deadly.

So they certainly should not be taken lightly — and certainly not for a cold.

But it’s possible that Bill’s doctor, like many others, didn’t even know about the lurking dangers.

We think of them as pumping up athletes that want an edge. But steroids are given for reasons ranging from life-threatening anaphylactic shock and acute asthma attacks to things like sinus infections and other conditions that will clear up on their own.

They work by decreasing inflammation and lowering an out-of-control immune response.

But unless you absolutely need to take them, you don’t want to. Because one side effect can make you think you’re losing your mind.

It’s called steroid psychosis. Because these meds can literally make you think — and act — like you’ve gone crazy.

And it’s happening to our kids, too.

Researchers say that cases in children may be “significantly higher” than reported. And when you read about one of the “reported” cases, you’ll see just how serious a problem this is.

Five days after an 8-year-old boy was prescribed oral prednisone and a nasal steroid for asthma and a sinus condition, he started having hallucinations and severe depression.

He would cry when hearing certain songs, saying he wished he had “never been born” and that he wanted to die. He also started seeing things and said he thought he was turning into his grandmother.

After his doctor took him off the drugs, he had a full recovery.

The side effects from these meds can be so horrible that taking them is sometimes called “a deal with the devil.”

Adults have had reactions to steroids like disorientation, feeling like they were going “totally crazy,” and suicidal behavior.

And most say they were never warned by their doctor that this could happen.

One woman who was given 20 mg of prednisone to take twice a day for a sinus infection was so disoriented that she went to the ER. After being taken off the drug and recovering, she said, “I am warning everyone I know not to ever take a steroid unless your life is in danger.”

Another, who was given prednisone before taking a testing dye for a CT scan said it gave her extreme anxiety, a racing heart and high blood pressure. I “feel like I’m going to explode” is how she described it.

As I said, there are times when steroids can be life-savers. But they’re prescribed far too often for conditions that will either clear up on their own (like a cold!), or can be treated with far less risky drugs — or even non-drug therapies.

For example, treating a sinus infection with supplements such as curcumin, vitamins C and D, and a saline nasal rinse can be very effective. And these treatments will boost your immune system, instead of suppressing it like steroids do.

Remember — and this is very important — if you’re currently taking an oral steroid like prednisone, never stop taking it suddenly. You need to be “weaned” off the drug, usually under a doctor’s supervision. Stopping suddenly or too quickly can cause even more problems — very serious ones, like causing your adrenal glands to crash.

And that makes it even more urgent that unless it’s absolutely necessary to take one of these drugs to never start up on them in the first place.

Sources:
“Prednisone side effects: Deal with the devil?” Joe Graedon, October 2, 2014, People’s Pharmacy, peoplespharmacy.com