I'm embarrassed to admit it,but I am terrified to get a job. Truly terrified. I used to be smart, alert, quick. I was climbing the ladder at my job and got a masters degree.
Now I feel stupid most of the time. My brain still works, but it works really slow. I can complete tasks over several hours that used to take several seconds. I get frustrated more easily because of the inability to get things done or because I have to work so hard to get them done when I used to just take for granted that I could do it.
For the last year I've been lucky enough to be working from home doing a job a friend referred me for (I work for my friend's friend), but it has never been a lot of money and now the work has slowed down and I haven't even worked in two days. My husband has been great and supportive, but he doesn't make enough money to run the entire house on his own. I have to have a source of income.
I don't know what to do. Every job description I read I think, "well, I can do that, but it'll be really hard and take me a long time and my boss will think I'm stupid," or "I can't do that." I look fine, and no one understands the toll this takes on us when our brains are as tired as our bodies.
What do you all do for work, and are there any "good" jobs out there for people with fibro that is bad enough to destroy their career but not bad enough to get them SSI benefits?

I can really relate to your post. I recently started a part time minimum wage job in retail. Not high stress. No multi-tasking. I can stand up or sit down, they even set a computer monitor up high for me. I just can't tolerate sitting at a desk all day. I have had 4 days of training and I am still not able to memorize. before fibro hit, I was making 45,000 a year as a manager of a lucrative business. Now I am on SSDI and at my last job, a simple switchboard operator and scheduler, I had a full notebook of cheat sheets because i couldn't remember how to do my job functions. A sat next to a woman who helped me all day. She was just wonderful. I thought i had ADD and got on meds, but they just made me speed. then the fibro hit like gangbusters and i couldn't work for 3 years; still don't know if i can work, just trying it out. So I am making another notebook and rereading it each day while i am off in the hopes that i can remember it. I am also trying vitamin b12 and b complex and some other ones for memory, that i can't remember :) There are about 10 or so supplements out there, i just hope it doesn't take long for them to kick in. One was Gingko for brain fog. I haven't gotten it yet, but it's next on the list.

I hope everything works out for you. I know i was sure that i wouldn't be able to find a job that i could actually do, and it IS minimum wage, but i gotta tell you it feels so good to be working again.

I can relate to your job hunting worries. I had what I thought was a good job also. Was a manager, climbing up the latter, then one day they called me in and said I didn't fit in any more and fired me. I have not been working for 4 months. Now that I am looking back on everything I am still upset about it but, like you guys I had lists and cheat sheets for a job I had been doing for years. It is worse since i have been at home. I have to write everything down that I want to do or calls to make because I forget. I have been looking for a new job but, I am scared that I can't doo the multi tasks as quick as I did before. Like you I want to do a good job. I have never been fired and have always worked and had good reviews. It is flustrating. My husband is very supportive, but it is something about being indepent and not relying on him for sole support. I did a bigger garden than we usually do and have been selling veggies and stuff, but, that is a fraction of what I was making before and it is harder than working at a "job". I like it because I always have liked doing that stuff, but it is painful. My husband likes me being at home but I feel that he knows I am forgetting stuff. He is contantly reminding me of stuff. I have to make a list of the bills that are due each month and cross them off when I pay them so I don't forget. Because tomorrow I will be wondering if I paid that and I can't remember. That is hard for me because I have done accounting for 20 years.