Can you work productively on pain killers?  

Typically anything that says "MAY CAUSE DROWSINESS" is going to put me on the floor. I don't know why my system gets so screwed up by them. It could have something to do with the blood-sugar problems, IDK.

What she's feeling is entirely normal. Different people have different tolerances to different medicine. Vicodin is pretty high-level things. Seems weird they would give that to you for bad cramps, but still. It can definitely have that affect on people.

When I had my teeth extracted (had two teeth extracted two separate times) I was put on Lortab/Hydricodone and that knocked me out. I was unable to do anything until I stopped the medicine. It made me so dizzy and nauseas that I ended up sleeping all day because I felt so drugged up that I literally stumbled when I walked. I tried working after the day after the second one because they had asked me to, but my manager took one look at me and sent me home. He had the same reaction to it and told me to go back to bed because there was no way he was letting me clock in. As he describes it, he "couldn't even find the floor".

Now, I can work when I'm taking pain killers. Soon as the pain was bearable, I switched to extra strength tylonol and I didn't have any problem at all. It really just depends on the pain killer. I have a low tolerance, so lots of pain killers give me problems.

That is pretty normal. Painkillers can mess you up. That's why you can't operate heavy machinery on them. Normal painkillers like Aspirin, and ibuprofen are okay, but be wary of the prescription ones. Only use them when you need them.