Anybody working fulltime with chronic pain?

I am a 27 yr old female and can certainly relate to working full time while dealing with chronic pain for the last 10 1/2 months. I deal with migraines, tension headaches, neck pain, and shoulder pain all due to a MVA last Decemeber. Both my husband and I work fulltime, but we both have to, to get by.In the beginning of this my job was not that busy, so I was able to get up and move around as needed, and didn't have to stare at the computer all day. There were many many days where the pain was so bad that I should not have been at work, but went anyway. My bosses and coworkers knew of my condition and were supportive of it. How did I deal with it? Not well, but I did. I had no choice really. Soon depression took over my life, and I was like a zombie at work. It felt as if I had a dark cloud above me. It was horrible! I describe the pain as a monster that took over every aspect of my life.  The other aspect that messed me up at work was all the medication I was on. It literally clouded my brain and I made several mistakes that came back to haunt me. It also added to the depression. Finally I decided to get off them, especially since they weren't working!

 

I don't know, something finally clicked and I worked my way out of the black cloud. I changed my attitude into something more positive. Doctors could never figure out exactly what is causing the pain and told me to try and forget about it and move on. easier said than done. But I tried my best to have a positive attitude and know that I would not be in pain forever.

 

I am getting better. I have more good days than bad, but still get bad days frequenty and when I say bad, I mean really bad. But like I said, my supervisor knows of my condition, and I signed up for intermittent FMLA so that if I miss work due to this monster, I will not lose my job. That alone relieved a lot of stress. It might be something you should look into.

 

Good luck to you!

Nina, I know how hard it is to work while in pain. I did it for many years. At the time I was undiagnosed and kept thinking I just needed to "deal". My last year of working I was on pain meds and it helped although it was still very hard.  Finally I couldn't do it anymore and filed for disability which was granted in 04. I was bringing in 60% of our income and carried my own insurance so it was quite an adjustment when we went down to just my husbands income and I had to go on his insurance. 

I'm sorry you're in the this situation.  Would you be able to stop if your husband found something?  Have you thought about disability, is that an option?

Melissa

I am a 24 year old female (25 in 8 days hehe) and I have worked Full-Time with CP for the last 6 or 7 years...unfortunately. (I've been unemployed since Sept but I'm working on that) I have no choice, the bills gotta get paid right? Man what I wouldn't give to be able to work just Part-Time!!! Anyway, I am not sure what type of pain you have but it sounds like back pain so I'll give you some suggestions that have helped me some. 1. I got a chair for my desk (from Drugstore.com) where the seat is one of those exercise balls. It makes you sore at first but it's a lot better for your back. Also, it had a back on it that you don't lean against, you use it to strech and came with a booklet of streching you can do with the chair right at your desk. It wasn't cheap but you might be able to find one on E-Bay or something if thats an issue. 2. I always keep a heating pad and ice pack at work, those two things can be lifesavers on bad days. 3. If you don't already have them ask your doctor about trying Lidoderm patches, they aren't like amazingly effective but they do help and can be worn for 12 hours. On days when I didn't put them on before leaving the house I would ask a good friend of mine at work to come into the bathroom and help me apply it (with tape around the edges). 4. Icy Hot & Therma Care patches - I also use these alot. Of course I am also on a CRAPLOAD of medications. Through trial and error I have discovered which thing (or combination thereof) helps best for which pain and I use that accordingly. No matter how hard we work at it it's a constant struggle and I've lost a few jobs (and come close with others) due to excessive absences mainly b/c of pain. Good luck...hope this helped!

Hi Nina,

Fantastic question. I'm 29 *since two days ago* and have worked in office environments with chronic pain due to invasive endometriosis for 10-12 years now. I just had 6 surgeries to fix everything and i've been out of work for 7 months, but work through the computer. I manage a surgeon's office and he watched my deterioration in the past 4 years since I joined. Before that i was a copy editor at several bigtime newspapers. Because of my age I could not find a doc for nearly 15 years who could/would diagnose my pain or prescribe painkillers, so I got pretty creative about taking care of myself. A few of my top tips:

1. Naproxen - Aleve OTC - For about two years I took between 2-6 every 3 hours. Also, you can get a prescription for 800 mg ibuprofen. you have to eat regularly and well (I vomited a lot due to my endometriosis, but I KNEW i had to keep my stomach lined).

2. Heat patches - Thermacare. you can slap those suckers on any part of your body and it's like heaven on earth when you're in pain. They truly last for 8 hours, cant be seen under business attire and fit in a small purse. They were essential.

3. Hand-deliver messages. I'm Gen Y, I believe in computers, but I found getting up to hand-deliver messages allowed my muscles to move. Also, ther are lots of 'desk' exercises. It helps, it really does.

4. Live your life on a schedule. Discipline is your friend when you have chronic pain. It gives you a feeling of some control despite the harriness of what is happening to your body.

5. If you can get prescription painkillers - use them. I used to fight my boyfriend, I hated sleeping through the weekends, it was demoralizing to feel as though my life was nothing but work and sleep, but when you have chronic pain sleep is the thing you need. In the last two years before my surgeries I devised a system: wake at 4:00 am, eat, take valium and a painkiller 30 min. apart - valium to relax my muscles, painkiller for obvious reasons. Shower and go back to sleep. Wake at 8:00 am, dress, drive to work. Repeat valium OR painkiller, occasionally both with food. Same at noon. Same at 4:00 pm. Leave work at 6:00 or 7:00 pm. I waited for the roads to clear and to metabolize the drugs a little more. Eat at home, valium and painkiller, restful evening. Eventually I moved to walking distance from work to cut down on my driving.

It was a real relief when my surgeon finally said "you can't drive any more. you are functional and i'm proud of you, but there is too much in your system to be safe." I knew it and I was relieved to have it acknowledged, but it takes time to get to a place where your life can go on hold.

6. Acupuncture - I am in awe of how much "spare" money I have now that I'm not having twice weekly acupuncture visits, sometimes 4 times a week, but they kept me alive for 5 years.

7. Breathing exercises. Working in journalism and medicine is stressful, there are ALWAYS emergencies, real or imagined (patients who launch us into STAT mode, Sept. 11th) but breathing is steadying and brings youinto yourself. I took some yoga classes until my back made it impossible, but I continued the breathwork. You can tolerate a lot as long as you are breathing, including a hateful boss.

now that i'm healing and not in pain i recognize myself again and many of my close friends and family are "meeting" the adult me for the first time. I lived in a pain and medication fog, but I built a career of which I am proud, I remained financially independent, i even started and continued a wonderful relationship with a remarkable man. It takes a lot but when all else failed I prayed "God, I don't know how to make it through the next minutes, so please HELP ME." sometimes, all i said was "Help."

I'm wishing you the best Nina, I hope some of these tips HELP - you can do it, you already are, and there is an end to the suffering.

  Well

Reading all the respones   is REFRESHING! to say the least & ahsgiven me some pointers too-  so THANKS everyone

I work a 50 hour week , and ahvnt yet found meds I can tolerate, I seem to ahve side effects from them all, that are not acceptable for quality of life.

Part of my job is desk, and administrative,  the other requires sitting also & counseling

and some standing , speaking /presenting/ teaching .

I get a lot of position change,

my biggest  obstacle,  is learning how to bend, to move, to pick up things; and to

make it thru a work week.

I am newly injured & diganosed,  so Chronic pain , is new to me as an everyday,... every hour part of my life.

I wish you the best Nina

I am sure you have found  some good  resources & answers here

Ran_Man

Sorry to hear what you're going through. I never applied for SSDI although I found out after a slew of surgeries that I was more than eligible. Go through the process.

I had to give you a mental high five on the "not being able to remember where i parked" thing. I'm 29 (just turned) and haven't been able to find a car since I was 23. Really. I'm a wreck at airports and I because of the chronic pain and general prescription medication existance I used an altered work schedule that allowed me to be int he office alone for a few hours so I could concentrate. I also could almost always get the same parking space. Unfortunate were the days when I had to park somewhere else, I would wander our 10 story parking structure looking for my car - unsure of what it even looked like.

I wish you strength and luck and health in the future. i hope you are able to get SSDI and leave the stress of 'coping' behind so you can focus on recovery. If you have crohns then perhaps you might consider an ostomy? I'm an ostomate and it made a ton of difference in my life.

Best

Thanks everyone for kind words and suggestions.