Struggling to Manage Work and Symptoms

It’s tough. I take cymbalta and neurontin for pain. I work as a nurse in hospital doing 12 hrs shifts, constantly on my feet and moving people. I work two days in a row then the next day when I’m off I’m useless. Sleep all day and in lots of pain.

Work with a pain management doctor and find a regimen of meds that makes it more tolerable. For me it was short courses of steroids, flexeril, baclofen, Gabapentin and neurontin and naproxen, with all those combined we address my pain from every aspect; muscular, inflammatory and nerve. It helped a bunch keep me going.

I work from home so I can take frequent breakers as long as I get my work done. When I finish working I turn off everything, close blinds and take a 3 hour nap because I don’t sleep at night because of pain

I actually recently lost my job due to calling out to much from my chronic pain. Honestly it’s really hard but I found that if I just get up and going for the day the pain eventually fades or lessens throughout the day. It’s really more about making sure I’m moving to keep my mind distracted from the pain. If that doesn’t help, I tend to use nerve blockers but only when I really can’t deal with the pain anymore. I recommend talking to your doctor about a form of nerve blockers to help with excessive pain.