Fit - Femara/Arimidex gals how are your joints ?

eleataylor

I took Tamoxifen for a year and due to severe side effects my oncologist put me on a trial of Femara. I took it for a month and felt like my left pinky had been crushed and my chest had been cracked open. I went back on the Tamoxifen and have been working on trying to control the side effects and not let them control me. Changing jobs to get a regular schedule has helped tremendously and I don't spend every Saturday in my chair from exhaustion. Some stress cannot be avoided but being able to recognize what triggers the SEs really has helped. I also take Effexor and Gabapentin which has helped also. I haver started trying to exercise on a regulare basis and sticking to a regular bedtime.

As for the Femara, I have a small amount of residual sternal pain but my pinky pain has gotten worse.

sasquatch

I'm so glad to read your posts! I went on Arimidex a year ago and altho my Dr. warned me about the joint pain being a possibility, I didn't believe it could be as bad as it was. Nice to know I'm not the only one and I thank you all for your ideas. One thing that helped me immensely was going to a chiropractor. Once I was in alignment, alot of my pain stopped. I also take Effexor XR for the hot flashes and do water aerobics for flexability. 

trigeek

well I thought I owe an update to you all...

I have been taking fish oil, Cosamine(from costco), curcumin.. vitamin D3.. and my hands have recovered yeah !

Now feet are a different animal as I have too many things going on not sure whether Femara is actually the culprit or the scapegoat.

However... the more active I am.. the less they hurt.

The more I move the less stiff I get... soo keep on moving gals !

PattieSue3

My feet have been hurting too, I thought it was just my shoes. Will have to check into that. Have only been on it about 6-8 weeks now. PattieSue

trigeek

Things are looking up and I thought I owe an update to you all after being on Femara for 19 months...

I have been taking fish oil, Cosamine(from costco), curcumin.. vitamin D3.. and my hands started recovering, the foot pain remained tho..

 Then came another suggestion and I went Gluten free in my diet.. it was tough but within 3-4 weeks my fingers miraculously got rid of the triggers (which were even there before I had chemo !) the foot pain decreased 80% almost gone..

The stiffness I had and bending over like a 90 year old when getting up GONE !!!

So my suggested regimen would be:

1 - Cosamine (from Costco) twice a day

2 - Liquid fish oil

3 - Gluten free diet.

Now I have to figure out how to get rid of this 25 pound tire around my body which is a gift from surgical menap+chemo+femara...

I am hopeful !

flyinmit

I see your post was in 2009. Do you still feel the same way about the AI? I am having a hard time wrapping my head around these drugs. There has to be something else out there. I also had a very slow growing cancer and very tiny 4mm.

Would like to hear if anyone has not had any problems with AI's

trigeek

fly there is hope.

My joint pains are gone and even my sleep habits have improved (I was not sleeping this well before bc) but I still am yet to lose that tire around the waist.. 

I cannot totally blaim it on the AI tho.. ( just paid a visit to kilwin's for a killer choc fudge ice cream cone yumm... )

Scrappygrl

Three months into taking Arimidex, I got to the point where I cried for two weeks straight getting out of bed.  This was due to joint pain.  I went to see my PCM who ran some blood work and discovered that my Vit D levels were way too low.  I was immediately placed on 50,000 IU weekly.  Within a month I started feeling better.  Since then, if I sit too long it hurts but other than that I do ok.  I must mention though that I do Epsom Salt baths when my back hurts and I have also slept with a heating blanket around my back and hips at night.  This has made sleeping much better and I do not wake up with achy joints as bad as before.  I was told that with the Arimidex the colder weather makes it harder on the joints hence why I now sleep with the heating blanket.  I won't be able to do that once the weather warms up but I am planning on using a small heating pad to help when I sit or lay down for longer periods.  It's a little bit of an inconvenience but these few things have me from originally crying every morning just trying to get out of bed to now I can almost hop out of bed.  Hope that helps someone.  :-)

aspen

I finished my five years of Femara in Aug. 2010.  During those years, I had the painful hands, hot flashes, not too much weight gain just the tummy pooch-thing.  The biggest problem I had was with my feet, hurt so much getting up in the mornings and trying to walk or trying to walk after sitting for a long time (car-ride).  I used to take the stairs down one at a time every morning because of the pain and fear of falling on feet that didn't work too well.   Now, it has been almost 5 months since completing the Femara and I can go up and down stairs with no problems even in the morning, joint pain everywhere is almost non-existent, hot flashes are all but disappeared and weight/tummy pooch is so much better.   I can certainly understand what you ladies are now going thru.  If you can tough it out, I can tell you from experience that there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Keeping active as much as possible certainly helped me during those 5 yrs.

Trigeek- now I don't have anything to blame any weight gain on but the old hand-to-mouth problem.  I guess that means I'll have to take full responsibility for that now myself.. Rats.  Off to the gym.

Lena

My joints suck to hell, and I think I know what it feels like to be 90, even though I'm "only" 49. By now I've been on 3 AIs -- Femara, Aromasin and Anastrazole (generic Arimidex) and they all had exactly the same effect on me, which was to kick my cancer's butt to the ground (I had regression on my last scans). Problem is, they kick MY butt too! Regression, and I feel like complete crap all the time?! WTF?! But it's true. There's nothing left I can do without pain anymore (without narcotics, anyway).

So get this: the medication that successfully controls my cancer and keeps me alive makes me feel like I don't WANT to live. I just can't freakin' win. 

:::sigh::: 

:-(