Need help with predisone taper

This site has been such a help! I've been successfully at 2mg pred since January. Taking 2 1mg pills each am. Had trouble tapering further months ago, and count went down to 17, so went back up. A few days ago, tried 1mg in am and 1 with dinner for 2 days, but wound up with insomnia, nervousness, queasiness, so back to 2. Any suggestions if I should try 1 in the am and 1 at noon, or 1 in am, 1/2 at noon and 1/2 with dinner... Want to do this very slowly for best success so thinking of staying at a total of 2/day but spreading it out so my body gets used to it??? Thanks for any and all advice/experience.

Pred should really be taken the the morning .

Have you tried 2 tabs/ 1 tab on alternate days as a way of tapering?

Didn't know it should be taken in the am! I hadn't tried the 2/1 alternate days, only because I had the problem just spreading the 2 out, but might try that, thanks!

HI- Yes, as MrsB said, pred should be taken in the morning. Spreading it out during the day is not tapering because you are still taking 2mg per day. As you discovered it will only keep you awake at night.

Your body won't get used to it- the longer you are on pred the more dependent your body will get on it. In my experience of many years with prednisone and many tapers, the side effects get worse the longer I am on it.

They say that 2mg won't do anything because our bodies naturally make more than that- BUT I know that 2mg affects me. 2mg will bring my platelets up and cause me to have some anxiety.

Here is my recipe for a super slow taper. Its really worked for me! -- get some .5mg tablets. (its better than cutting 1mg in half, but if you can't get .5mg then cut 1mg in half) Take 1.5mg one day, then 2mg the next day alternating for one week. Then stay on 1.5mg for one week. Next alternate 1.5mg and 1mg for one week. Then take 1mg for one week... etc.

Watch your symptoms and stay on a dose for longer than a week if you need to. Last time I tapered, I had to stay on 1mg and then .5mg for longer than a week because of adrenal insufficiency.

Are you tapering slowly to try to keep your counts from dropping? I have never had any luck with that, pred never kept my counts up. Its a rescue treatment for me. I moved on to Promacta and then Nplate. Both drugs work WAY better than pred and with very tolerable side effects. I'm on Nplate now with no apparent side effects. good luck

Haven't been on this week, but thank you so much for this detailed reply!

I will definitely try your taper schedule as it sounds well suited for me.

Yes, I'm trying slow taper to keep count up -- my hematologist is sure the 2mg is helping keep me there, since the only time we tried to taper, count went way down. But my thought after reading so many threads here is that the taper was just too fast so I'm hoping to convince him to let me try a slow taper this time. He's good and I really like him....just want to get off pred if possible and feel like if I do it right it will be possible!
He knows what I want to do and told me to try splitting the 2mg first until my next IvIG/CBC to see how it works. Since the am/pm didn't work, and your advice is am only, I'm now trying 1 1/2 followed by 1/2 2 hours later and will alternate with 2 at once so all are in the am and hoping maybe my body will start getting the idea of what's to come even though it's still getting 2/day. If counts are good early Sept. I'll see if he's ok with my doing your taper and possibly spreading each drop out between visits. thanks again for the advice! Really appreciated!!!