Painful Lessons from a Pinched Nerve

My back problems started in high school while playing volleyball. I tossed the ball in the air and motioned my left arm to slap it with my hand and send it flying over the net and within the boundaries. As soon as the hand gave a high five to the ball, my lower back on the right side (me lefty) gave out.
Since then, back pain plagued me. I learned all the tricks for dealing with it, preventing it, and coping with it. My back thought it needed to give me a new challenge and add a new chapter to the back saga.
It woke me up two nights in a row and hurt so much that a slight movement forced me to muffle a scream to avoid waking up the whole household. Obviously, this problem won’t go away in one or two days yet I need to keep the work going.
Of course, you must take care of yourself or else the problem drags on and the work piles. So work with the problem rather than against it. First, I made an appointment to get pain relief solutions while attacking the problem head on. After all, medicine only offers temporary relief.
Freelancers should have a laptop in addition to their desktop so they can work anywhere. When illness or pain sneaks in, they can say, “HA! I can just move to the sofa or bed to get more comfortable and get my work done. Nice try!”
This may not work when the pain comes from the flu. That just plain knocks out the biggest and healthiest athlete. At least, with the flu — you know the worst will pass within a couple of days. Just sleep and take care of yourself. Email your clients — one word should be enough if you can barely type: “Flu.” I think we all know that means a person will be out at least a day or two and understand. Speaking of flu, got my flu shot today while at the doctor’s.
Ack. my back took a turn when I tripped. Time to pull out the big guns (my laptop) and get comfy. How do you deal with situations when it makes it harder to get work done?