Dan Patrick Talks About Suffering From Severe Joint Pain And How The Initial Treatment Made Him Feel Worse

This morning Dan Patrick revealed on his titular radio show that he’s been suffering from severe joint pain for seven years, but is now going through the brutal treatment plan that has finally helped him feel better. Patrick was diagnosed with polymyalgia rheumatica, and he described the feeling of constant pain as “having the flu but you’re not nauseous.” Patrick said he had to take vicodin to play golf on his 60th birthday at Pebble Beach; he self-medicated by drinking the pain away. Getting out of bed hurt every day, in his hands, elbows, shoulders, even in a tooth he had replaced.

So, he started taking prednisone, which is when the real trouble started.

While the drug helped take away his pain, the side effects were “horrible.” He experienced memory loss, detailing how he’d forget about going to dinner with his family, how he couldn’t remember Albert Pujols’s name, and how he would tease something on the show before going to a break, only to need his producer to remind him what he’d teased minutes earlier. “I couldn’t start my car some days,” he said. “I didn’t know how to do it.” According to Patrick, the drug sent him into a deep depression and he began to have suicidal thoughts.

The predisone was replaced by what Patrick described as a monthly session of “light chemotherapy.” It took five sessions for the inflammation to recede, but Patrick and his producers agreed that he’s recently taken a turn for the better. He said he and his family can now laugh about his “brain fog.” Patrick has five more treatments, and though there are headaches and moodiness that come with the chemo, it’s far better than more prednisone.

“That’s it, I’ve been holding a secret,” Patrick concluded. “We move forward, five more months of this, hopefully, and then they said I’ll be done with these treatments. I’ll be a joy to be around then, won’t I?”