SALUTE

I have barely watched Breaking Bad

07 flag-trans-pride 07

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Let's have another good week everyone lets-fucking-go trans-ferret

  • lapis [fae/faer, comrade/them]
    ·
    3 months ago

    damn, already surpassed the news mega, and they had a 3hr head start. what a time to be alive.

    cw: injection + allergy talk

    so, a few weeks back, I had an awful allergic reaction to my estradiol injection – got this huge, swollen area next to the injection site, it was big and red and itchy for over a week. the next two injections had a similar, but milder, reaction, that mostly went away (aside from what looks like mild bruising) in 5-7 days.

    talked to my dr. about it last week, after it'd happened three times and I'd confirmed to myself that it wasn't some issue with my technique, and they gave me two options:

    1. switch to estradiol cypionate – this would be my first choice, except apparently my pharmacy only offers it in 5mg/mL concentration, so I would need to inject over a full mL of fluid every single week, which just... no?
    2. ice the injection site before and after injecting, and apply hydrocortisone cream to the area, both of which should reduce inflammation and itchiness.
    3. (suggested by pharmacist, not dr., and I forgot to discuss this one with the dr.) switch from subcutaneous (subQ) to intramuscular (IM) injections, because, according to the pharmacist, sometimes allergic reactions happen due to the injection being near the skin, and putting the estradiol deeper can avoid that allergic reaction.

    I tried option (2) last week, with the exception that my phone call to discuss options with my dr. was about an hour after I did my weekly injection, so I was only able to ice the injection site after but not before injecting. this + applying hydrocortisone cream that evening seems to have minimized, if not done away with, the allergic reaction, but I'm not convinced a topical steroid is the right long-term solution, so I'll probably be discussing maybe switching to IM injections with my dr. this week.

        • WalrusDragonOnABike [they/them]@lemmy.today
          ·
          3 months ago

          I've seen and used (on someone else) single-use autoinjectors, which seem a lot less scary than just a plain needle (I wouldn't be able to use a needle on someone else). Cool seeing there's reusable options. Although it doesn't seem like it hides the needle and pressing the button seems scarier than any individual step in normal injections (but at least its just a single step).

          • lapis [fae/faer, comrade/them]
            ·
            3 months ago

            it does hide the needle once the plunger is in attack position, which makes pressing the button marginally less scary than piercing the skin manually, for me. but, crucially, this doesn’t require all the extra scary of inserting the needle the rest of the way, and it helps hold the syringe in place, so I only have to think about pressing the button, pushing down the plunger, and yoinking the whole thing back out. it’s not a perfect solution, but it helps me, at least.