Last month while at my infusion, my nurse asked me if I was ready to take the Evushield monoclonal Covid shot. We had discussed it months prior but I wanted to wait to take it. Should of trusted my gut but today I decided to take it. That was my first mistake. Ten minutes after the shots were administered I began reacting to it. My chest felt tight like someone was sitting on it and breathing was getting difficult. My ability to swallow was not working anymore. I panicked! I waved to my nurse frantically that I couldn’t breathe. She asked me if I was having a reaction and instantly gave me an epi shot. Unfortunately that didn’t help much. Luckily I had my IV in for my infusion which gave her the ability to give me 50mg of Benadryl. That didn’t help very much either. At this point my rheumatologist was called and she ordered a steroid injection.
The steroid shot did the trick, just barely. By this time I was so worked up from the reaction they gave me a sedative to put me to sleep. I woke up to my husband kneeling next to me. The doctor told me I had gone into anaphylactic shock. I was sent home to rest when I probably should of gone to the ER to be monitored. Nonetheless they sent me home.
Next day was tiresome because I had so many drugs in my system. I wasn’t feeling great and my chest tightness was still present. I thought maybe this was normal. later that afternoon while picking up my kids from school I began going into anaphylactic shock again. I had to pull over at an urgent care doctors office and get another epi shot. This time I was given a ride to the ER via ambulance. Same drugs given and monitored for 4 hours. My pulse ox was low and my white blood count was 28. The ER doc was concerned but there were no blood clots just an over abundance of drugs in my system the last two days.
Was I reacting to the Covid shot again? Yes. The next 7 days I would have three more reactions needing Benadryl/steroids to stop from going into anaphylaxis again. Fast forward to seeing my doctor who diagnosed me with being allergic to the Evushield Covid shot. Being that this drug stays in your system 3-6 months I was worried I would have more reactions. My doctor agreed. If you do your research you know that this drug is a monoclonal antigen that attaches to your immune cells. Well folks my immune cells are already damaged by my lupus. And yes, I could potentially have reactions for the next 3-6 months because they attach to them causing reactions to my body. I’m exhausted from taking antihistamines and the steroid rage is intense at this point.
Being proactive my doctor and I created a treatment regimen to help fight the reactions and it’s been excruciatingly tiresome. It takes 40 mg of Zyrtec, 40mg of Pepcid, 20-50mg of prednisone, and 50+mg of Benadryl daily to keep my body from continually reacting. It has me in a fog of exhaustion and such intense rage I could tear your head off!! And I have to do this for the next 3-6 months!
I’m on my second month and I’m completely exhausted. And the worst part is that I’m still having reactions. I’m just able to feel them come on before I need my epi pen. I have a severe allergic reaction when I take anything with dairy in it. And this reaction is mimicking my dairy reaction. So next question is does this drug have dairy in it? Upon researching the ingredients it does not contain dairy. I am reacting to the two main ingredients because of my lupus. If you have an autoimmune disease I would recommend not taking this drug. Even though many won’t react to it I can tell you that it’s possible and it’s not pleasant. The next few months will be my most challenging time since I’ve been diagnosed with my lupus 7 years ago.
Right now I’m trying so hard to get through the day without taking Benadryl but that’s not proving to be the case. My body is fighting hard and working against me daily. I guess that’s not new for me because my body fights me every day. However, this fight is so much harder. Trying to function day to day in a groggy and hazy fog makes the days very long. This will be another drug added to my long list of allergies I’ve gotten since my lupus diagnosis. Lesson learned and now I know. I won’t be taking any more experimental Covid drugs moving forward. I’m done with that.
The Lupey Mom 