Tablets for the rest of my life..

[medusa]

Welcome to the world of being an old crip like me, although I've officially been an old crip since I was 22, when my back collapsed.

 

It's not that bad getting used to taking regular pills- it's just a matter of making sure that you have a routine and that you have a plan for when your routine is not happening (like having a pill dispenser or calender pack which will enable you to check whether you've taken your pill later in the day in case you aren't sure).

 

I'm at the other end of the scale on blood pressure, so I'm hoping that I'm not going to end up on calcium channel blockers or ACE inhibitors, but then it would just be another to add to the pain medication that I'm on for the rest of my life and multiple asthma inhalers which allow me to keep breathing. I've also just found out that I've got the start of arthritis in my hips (oh joy!) and because of my spinal condition it would be a miracle if I didn't also get spinal arthritis in a decade or two, so I don't imagine that the pain is going to get any easier.

 

I had my first 'you aren't getting any younger and you need to think about how this is affecting your health at your age' lecture from my GP when I was 31, so I'm positively ancient at 39! Here's to still getting the lectures in another 40 years

[cloudybay]

After a recent hospital visit it was found that I have high blood pressure and now have to take Ramipril for the rest of my days. I am healthy, eat sensibly and exersize often so it came as a surprise to me, then after a recent blood test at the doctors came back I am now told that I have to take Simvastatin every night too !! My cholesterol was less than 5 ?? I was told that it is just a precaution as hypertension and angina runs in the family Great !! No more grapefruit for me then Gutted.... I hate taking tablets plus I have to have 6 monthly blood tests from now on.. So much for leading a healthy lifestyle eh ?

 

How high,exactly is your blood pressure?

[Karis]

Hey buddy.

 

If it helps, think of those tablets as a life line.

 

Or, failing that, your regular M&M fix!

 

I know it might seem weird now, but in a few months you'll be popping them without a thought.

 

On the plus side, never say never. Good diet and exercise could turn the need for medication totally on its head!

[Harry O]

Just be glad that you are alive, my wife hasn't been so for 6 months now and until her death was on far more medication than you are. Live life to the full.

[mojo1]

I'm on semi sodium valproate for the rest of my life as I'm Bi Polar. I have to have blood tests every 6 months too and to top it all off they have a vile aftertaste that lasts for hours.

 

I tried another medication (I would have been on that for life too) Olanzapine, but that caused me to gain a lot of weight in an impossibly short space of time.

 

It's one of lifes trials. You can be healthy on pills or unhealthy/dead without. Which is the lesser of those evils?

[EdnaKrabappe]

Me too. It's a small price to pay for pain reduction.

sulphasalazine

I also go through ibuprofen like no tomorrow.

Apart from the horrendous cost of tablets I have to take, (iron levels affected so i have to take high dosages of those too) and i've got asthma too, that doesn't like cold weather so have to use my purple inhaler at the moment

. I'm thinking of getting one of the monthly perscription thingies.

Luckily my blood tests have now been reduced so less effect on my life.

[Gormenghast]

After a recent hospital visit it was found that I have high blood pressure and now have to take Ramipril for the rest of my days. I am healthy, eat sensibly and exersize often so it came as a surprise to me, then after a recent blood test at the doctors came back I am now told that I have to take Simvastatin every night too !! My cholesterol was less than 5 ?? I was told that it is just a precaution as hypertension and angina runs in the family Great !! No more grapefruit for me then Gutted.... I hate taking tablets plus I have to have 6 monthly blood tests from now on.. So much for leading a healthy lifestyle eh ?

 

It's all part of life's rich tapestry. I'm on lifetime tablets too. But I'd rather it had been diagnosed than to die prematurely.

 

We should be grateful for the advances in medical science that allow us to take these drugs and allow us to live longer. Giving up grapefruit isn't such a big deal is it anyway. I've not missed it yet.

 

Keep taking the tablets. I don't like to be taking them either, but the alternative is......

[bizzle]

After a recent hospital visit it was found that I have high blood pressure and now have to take Ramipril for the rest of my days. I am healthy, eat sensibly and exersize often so it came as a surprise to me, then after a recent blood test at the doctors came back I am now told that I have to take Simvastatin every night too !! My cholesterol was less than 5 ?? I was told that it is just a precaution as hypertension and angina runs in the family Great !! No more grapefruit for me then Gutted.... I hate taking tablets plus I have to have 6 monthly blood tests from now on.. So much for leading a healthy lifestyle eh ?

 

Sorry to hear about you being ill. I think sometimes it is the luck of the bad straw. I have a friend who like yourself is fit & healthy. She religiously follows a really good diet yet was diagnosed with cancer earlier last year?! Some illness are unexplainable.

 

In relation to your cholesterol a couple of years ago yours would have been fine, really good infact however with the changes of goverment guidlines in the NHS in relation to health targets they seem to lower the target of cholesterol levels every so often. I think at the moment the correct or "normal" cholesterol range is under 5 which yours should be fine or it may have got lower like 4.5 which is ridiculous.

[Greybeard]

Anyone put on statins should be aware of the possible side effects. I was put on them by a vascular surgeon even though my cholosterol level was only 5. After four months I was feeling knackered all the time and weak to the point of getting upstairs being a struggle. This situation had crept up on me quite gradually but eventually I suspected the statins and checked up on the side effects.

 

This page was a real shock and then I remembered a TV programme I had seen about the side effects, - on CH4 I think, so I stopped taking them about five weeks ago. I don't know if the effects are reversible but I hope so. One of my symptoms was that I started needing a nap in the afternoon just to keep going and this need seems to have disappeared over the last couple of weeks but the weakness remains.

 

The one really annoying thing is that neither the surgeon who prescribed them or my GP who said she wanted to see my chlosteral level down to 4 has bothered to organise a further blood test to see if the statins were having the desired effect in the six months I've been taking them.

[skippy_54]

After a recent hospital visit it was found that I have high blood pressure and now have to take Ramipril for the rest of my days. I am healthy, eat sensibly and exersize often so it came as a surprise to me, then after a recent blood test at the doctors came back I am now told that I have to take Simvastatin every night too !! My cholesterol was less than 5 ?? I was told that it is just a precaution as hypertension and angina runs in the family Great !! No more grapefruit for me then Gutted.... I hate taking tablets plus I have to have 6 monthly blood tests from now on.. So much for leading a healthy lifestyle eh ?

 

I was an athletics coach I ran and played football and ate healthy,I have the same things wrong with me now.

I have recently been told I have stomach cancer and today been told that I cant have the operation to remove it because of the angina and hypertension so dont worry about not eating grapefruit,make the most of life I shall be doing for the up to eight years they say I have left.