I have had PN since 1/294 (just "celebrated" my 20 years this year!) and it has been markedly worse over the past two years or so.

The question I have always wondered about is employment. I feel like I am caught between two worlds - in pain where some days seem like pure hell at work (stress makes my PN far worse), yet not in a condition where SSN would likely ever approve my claim.

I got this lovely disease at the tender age of 24, and I have three little angels that I fret over not being able to provide for.

If SSN is so hard to get approved for, how are my fellow PN'ers making ends meet (if not working)?

Please forgive me if I am being too personal, but I truly am clueless after all these years about this subject. The days are so very bad of late that I genuinely don't know what to do. My wife is recovering from a breast cancer diagnosis in late 2012, and the last thing I want to do is ask her to now go out and be the primary breadwinner, but after 20 years this PN is starting to get the upper hand on me and making my life nothing short of miserable. Like I am prone to saying, it does not take vacations or weekends off. It is ever present.

I truly wish each of you the best in your journey with this. I pray that our scientists come up with that true breakthrough drug in the next five years for all our sakes.