Wednesday, April 30, 2008
The April Pain-Blog Carnival is now posted at How to Cope with Pain, featuring the month's best posts.
Go check it out!!
Go check it out!!
Labels: blog carnival, pain issues
link | posted by Emily at 9:14 AM
Monday, September 03, 2007
Work Issues and Pain
I'm part of a blog carnival (for the first time ever) today! The topic is : Work Issues and Pain. This may or may not contain a lot of redundant information; it depends a lot on whether or not you read my blog regularly. I didn't want people wandering in from the carnival to be totally confused (mostly as to my pain history and type) so I wanted to include at least a quick summary. It'll probably clear up some things that you might not have known before; most readers haven't been here from the beginning, after all!
For a brief summary of my chronic pain - I have chronic daily migraines. I was diagnosed with migraines when I was 20, and had them once or twice per month. The summer of 2004, they began to be more and more frequent, and lasting longer and longer, until in November 2004 they were everyday. Many things have been ruled out, including Medication Overuse (or Rebound) Headaches. I have tried treatments, many pills, etc., etc. You get the idea, especially if you have chronic pain yourself. I wake up every day in pain, and it continues until I go to sleep at night. Most days I rate the pain a 6 or 7 (out of 10). The latest development is that I am trying Kadian, a painkiller, for daily pain relief. The dose I'm at now is not nearly enough. It helps, but not much. I am continuing to see a migraine/headache specialist, as well as the Pain Clinic, and will see a Sleep Clinic (for the first time) this week.
The pain rating scale is one of my least favorite things, mostly because it's entirely subjective. And I find myself double-guessing myself, thinking how much worse pain *could* be. I know that the worst pain possible is not the pain I've felt so far, but the worst pain I've felt so far was a migraine. But then, the pain scale needs to be subjective, so that doctors can understand how we are experiencing our pain. In any case, some things that exacerbate the pain are; lack of sleep, fasting or eating late, low barometric pressure (storm coming), my food triggers (chocolate and feta cheese), and anything that gets my blood moving faster (running, etc.), loud noises and bright/flashing lights.
With all that in mind, it's probably obvious that barring financial disaster, I would avoid working. I am lucky enough to be married to a wonderful man who can support both of us on his salary. I dropped out of school after attending one semester with The Headache (we'll just call it that - not the regular, once in a while migraines, the all the time migraine). I did poorly, and felt awful. I hoped that things would be resolved quickly (ha!) and I'd be back in school and at work quickly. At the time, I worked as a receptionist and secretary in the school's library. This was your basic secretary responsibilities, including typing, transcribing, answering phones, welcoming patrons, etc. I liked it a lot. I enjoyed the things we worked with and the people I worked with, as well. Most of my jobs (post high school) were of the secretary/receptionist variety, excluding two summers I worked as a life guard.
When i was working and attending school, my main difficulties were:
1 - being able to concentrate on something other than the pain
2 - nausea and being worried about throwing up at my desk
3 - trying to be cheerful and pleasant when in so much pain
4 - waking up early after a difficult (late) night
5- one of my most unpredictable triggers is low barometric pressure (the time just before a storm comes), my headache is at its worst during these times.
Most of these speak for themselves. I think most people know what migraines are and what they're like. Hopefully no one here has the idea that it's 'just a headache'. This is a good article to read if that's the case. Unfortunately there is not only a great deal of pain, there is also nausea, and sensitivity to noise and lights. It is difficult to go grocery shopping for a short while because of these factors, much less spend a normal 8 hours at a job. The Headache has change my life in so many ways, working is only one facet of my life - exercising, sleep, eating, time in the sun; these things all must be limited or regulated to keep The Headache under some kind of control.
So then what it would take for me to go back to work? Long story short? Reliable daily pain relief. If this comes from preventative medicines, great. If it has to come from painkillers until I can find an effective preventative medication, then okay. I have relatively good control over the nausea -- many tricks and as a last resort, a prescription medication. The problem is that we've been searching for a preventative these past 3 years without any real luck. There are only a handful of drugs FDA approved for migraine prevention, but there are about 100 medicines used to prevent migraines. For a list, see here. If my pain were well under control, I should be able to handle the other things that come my way; the added visual and aural stimuli seem to increase my pain levels, but hopefully we (my doctors and I) could figure that out as well.
Concerned friends and family ask me all the time when I'll be able to get back to work - unfortunately, I don't know any more than my doctors do. It's a lot of trial and error right now. Many preventative drugs require a 3 month trial, so it's slow going at times.
On this Labor Day, I am grateful for those who work - and continue to hope that this time next year, I'll have rejoined the workforce, and be feeling up to working a 40 hour week again.
Please visit the blog carnival at How to Cope with Pain. I'm excited to read the other entries!
The information posted here should not be viewed as medical advice, but as my experiences.
Labels: blog carnival, pain issues, working
link | posted by Emily at 7:00 AM
