Ask HN: How should one work with severe chronic pain? 6 by ArlenBales | 7 comments on Hacker News. I'm in my late 30s and live in California. My health has been on a downward spiral for the last six years. I have severe musculoskeletal chronic pain throughout my body, particularly around the cervical spine, shoulders, and hips. This physical pain makes concentration extremely difficult. It has become so challenging that I quit my software engineering job of 10 years a couple of months ago due to my inability to focus on the work required. Severe chronic pain is probably similar to severe ADHD in terms of how it affects productivity, except that attention loss is caused by your body constantly sending pain signals. There are no drugs that I have found to help, at least not ones that don't cause significant harm to the body in other ways, such as opioids. Unlike ADHD, severe chronic pain is not legally considered for disability, despite its impact on effectively performing job...