I have no answer whatsoever to your question, but I am so sorry you had such a very hard day. No wonder you slept so well:( God bless you for having the strength to get through it!!!! I hope you feel better:)

When I first went back to work, I slept from the time I got home from work until the next morning. I was exhausted. I think my most intense fatigue was the first few weeks back to work full time. It does get better but it takes time. It took a couple of months to really start to feel sort of normal. It's just kind of an up and down process initially.

I'm afraid there's no solid answer as everyone is different. It took me a few weeks of working to stop getting so winded on my walks through the city to work. The anxiety took more than that! You have a pretty physical job though so there's no telling! Listen to your body and rest when needed. Pushing too much might set you back and slow things in the long run.

Hello!

I was diagnosed in January too with with massive bilateral PE and started going back to campus/work 4wks after. I typically do 4-6hr days, 2 or 3 times a week, when I feel up to it. Hopefully your boss understands. I think there is no definitive answer as everyone is different and it depends on the job. Luckily my work time is flexible and has me on the computer or at a microscope, but I have only did my first 8hr day last Friday and I was really exhausted. Though it probably doesn't help that I have to walk upstairs lugging my oxygen and bags.

As for strength I honestly feel worse after walking up stairs to my office 6 weeks post PE than I did 4 weeks after. And it's hard to tell if my strength improved when I'm so up and down even throughout the day. Just a bit of a warning, my knees recently started hurting and my pain returned which sent me to the ER early last week so I think it's better to take it easy and not push yourself. I read some people wait months to go back to work but that's easier said than done especially when you have people that rely on you or if you risk losing a job.

Hope you feel better!

Thank you all for your replys.

chipsanddip the sleep was great but my body was in more pain when i woke up then before i went to sleep. God bless you also love and thank you.

rmb im glad to hear it will eventually get better i know its different for everyone but to know it will gives me hope that this is not forever. I will keep pushing forward and do a dance when i feel better haha. thanks

JuliesLife yes i know what you mean about the anxiety. When i was just standing in one place holding a box of gloves and a cup of meds i started to feel lightheaded and weak in the knees and my heart started to pound i knew if i didnt take a break it was gonna get worst. Yes im nervous that my job i love so much may be something i have to put on the back burner and find an office job for a few months. I not sure what to do i realy am not sure. i dont want to slow things more thats for sure. Thanks for your advice hun i really appreciate it.

I wish i was able to work more my office has been calling me to take more shifts but im just not there yet as far as my strength. I really wish i was.

Today i woke up with a horrible headache. It took forever to go away. So again i declined the offer to pick up a shift today.

I have to take care of my son so i know i have to get back out in the field I really need to try to figure this out soon.

KellyPA28 i understand exactly what your saying i dont want to lose my job and i do have to take care of my home. And i am sorry you have to experiance this also its horrible.

It seems to be that im very tired also. I mean walking from my car to the office was a lot. One patient needed help in the wheelchair it almost made me pass outtrying to help her.

I wish everyone great health and happiness and i wish no one had to deal with this illness. I will continue to push through and get back to me...

Again thank you all for your replys.

It definitely was a struggle for me for a while. It took me 4-5 months to get back up to a full work schedule, which (at the time) was a 9-hour day on my feet.

Is there any chance that you can pick up partial shifts? I mean, can you work 2-3 hours each day, maybe covering parts of the day that are particularly busy? When I started back to work, I only did four hours, but I did them over the lunch hour when we were usually short-staffed, since people were taking their lunches. I worked up from there, gradually increasing my hours as I felt better.

Hope you find a solution that works for you!

TossNTurn i wish i could do that. But my Job is not set up like that.

My office is not forcing me to work and i can choose which days i want to work right now but if i work i have to take whats avaliable now if there is an shift available that is only 2-3 hours i can take it if no one else gets it before me.

My boss said because i was working 77 hours a week before if i take on twenty hours a week i can file for unemployment for the rest and see what precentage they will give me until i can get back to my fu schedue. I been thinking about it but not sure if thats what i want to do..

Im also getting ready for school i was supposed to start this past janurary but i was in the hospita with the pe. I dont know what to do..

Thanks hun im trying to figure it out.

One thing to remember: you're not going to feel like this forever. I think it's a very delicate balance between taking it easy and pushing yourself, and going too far either way can affect you. I'm not encouraging you to work yourself silly, but for me, based on my experience, I felt it was better for me in the long run to deal with the work fatigue than to put off work too long and be that much farther behind, in my mind. So you just have to assess what you can do, what you're up to doing considering you also have a child to care for. It's a lot.

You can also put school on hold as well. I guess what I'm saying is to try not get too overwhelmed by all of it. It's impossible to make any kind of judgement about what to do when you're worn out.

Isn't there a type of family leave that you can take which is intermittent? That the company needs to accommodate around what you are able to work, even if it is a few hours a day rather than full shifts? It's been awhile since I've been in the work force, so maybe things have changed, but I had a bad back injury at one time and couldn't sit for the amount of time I needed to work through a full day, so one of the options they gave me was getting intermittent family leave (I can't remember if that's what the exact name was or not). It ended up we were able to work around things another way, so that's why I don't remember more about it, but maybe that would be worth looking into?

Unfortunately, finding our balance after PE is hard, but I tend to personally agree with rmb, I preferred staying busy and pushing myself, but definitely you have a lot on your plate, so you need to be reasonable with yourself too. I wasn't working secularly at the time I had PE, but I had an infant and a very precocious toddler and considering the very constant care they needed, as well as that I was obsessively particular about keeping my house clean, it was not too different from having a job. In fact, I often wished I worked instead of having two little people physically hanging on me at all times while I did my work. Anyway, I could have gotten more help, I had people offering to take my kids for me so I could rest, and others who offered to come and clean or cook or do whatever I needed. I can't say whether it was physically the best decision or not, but I know that emotionally, I NEEDED to be back to normal as much as I could be. Now looking back, I know that there are some times I should have taken advantage of occasional help, because I really wasn't physically up to everything I was doing. But at the time, it was what I needed, to push myself to take care of my own responsibilities.

The level of fatigue which you describe does not sound surprising to me. From the time my husband left in the morning to when he got home, it was usually about ten hours, and everything was on me during that time. And the first month at least, I slept from the moment he got home to the next morning. Even at that, by the time Friday got there, I was so completely physically spent I could barely make it through the whole day. Then, I'm not exaggerating, I slept the entire weekend, day and night, with only brief intervals awake, like maybe an hour at a time. I look back now and don't know how I managed it. In fact, most every day, I'd be practically in tears, thinking I couldn't possibly manage another day, yet tomorrow was inevitably coming. But somehow we all got through it.

Like rmb said, the way you're feeling now isn't permanent. The improvement can seem imperceptible at first, and sometimes we have setbacks when we've done too much, it's just part of the process of figuring out how much we can take at the time. I think it would be good to get some rest, be clear-headed, and think yourself seriously and talk with your husband about what are realistic expectations for you right now.

Over time that horrid fatigue diminishes. Everything considered, I am glad, though, that I pushed myself too. It was so hard physically, but I think that ultimately I was better emotionally because I was too busy to be depressed or anxious, I just had too much to do to think about it. And I think our bodies are also so good at responding to give us what we need, I think that staying as busy as possible helped with the physical recovery as well. But there were definitely some things that needed pulled back on for a time, like I typically do a good deal of volunteer work, but it was basically about a year before I could have any substantial part in that again. For a period of time, things get pared do to 'What do I NEED to do' and I had to temporarily sideline things which weren't necessary.

Thank you all for all the replys.

Got a chance to speak with my boss and i am now working mon-thur 10am-12pm fri-sat 10am-2pm sun off and i think this is going to be ok for now hopefully.

Today was the first day working the short shift and even though i was still very tired when i got home i think i will be ok.

Hopefully i dont need to stay on this shift for long. Im not sure about school yet dont want to put it on hold any further. I want to get that started so im gonna go and talk to the school and see what i can do to atleast start part time.

Thank you all for your advise it helped alot.

Hi SpecialC, Im going back to work in two days after my PE diagnosis.
Im afraid if I can survive 8 hour shift being on my feet. I am pharmacy tech., I will let you know.
Good luck

I want to add I been off from work for 4 weeks. I wonder if its enough! Sorry I didnt explain myself correctly.

Flora911, I hope you can get back to your regular schedule. I would love an update as to how your doing and how your first day went. Please just remember going through an pe is very tramatic on the body and dont get to hard on yourself.

Try to remember that if it gets hard speak up and judge for yourself what you want, need, and can do.

Love and rockets and i wish you well and im cheering you on hun.

Keep me posted your going to do just fine hun.

SpecialC I'm so glad you were able to work things out with your boss. That schedule sounds reasonable and doable at your point in recovery. I hope it will work out well for you!

I think it's different for every person. It also depends on the severity of your embolism and how much damage it caused. For me I was in the hospital from Mon-Wed and went back to work on Saturday. I too felt the same symptoms you described after working an 8 hr shift. I was in so much pain that I had to go to the ER. I took the next two days, rested, and went back to work. I took things slowly, told my supervisors about my problem (provided me with security in case I needed to step out or leave early), and only worked 6 hr shifts. I've found that pushing myself slightly is helping me recover. I haven't had much pain and I feel like my body is building up endurance and getting used to being back at work. 8 hr shifts are still tough and I find myself exhausted afterwards but I know my body is going to get there. I think you have to push yourself slightly and your body will respond. But definitely talk to your doctor about it.

Side note: Whenever you feel pain use a heating pad on the area. Works wonders. Definitely helps me deal with the pain I feel when I get home from work.