Hi Tammy,
I haven't replied here before because I simply didn't really know what I could bring to you.
It is so hard when we are being pressured from all sides and when, financially, we really don't see that we have a choice in the matter.
I think you do really need to see if your doc can help you get through this particular hurdle. The thing is that there is no quick fix and we can't keep taking extra pred etc. if it is just to get through a day, or a few, or a month... At some stage we might need to reevaluate where we're going in life.
There may also be an element that your disease can be better controlled. Then again, there may be an element that you haven't been listening to your body (yep I'm amazed to at how you have kept going) and that there is such an accumulation of fatigue that it is making your disease even worse than before.
Two years ago I was in much the same situation. I had already reduced my work time down to three days a week (which was just enough to get by financially) and I was constantly being pressured to accept just one more day, one half day, one assignment... and so it went on and on.
I had told people I wasn't well, I mean hey, they kept telling me I looked awful but NO, they just didn't get it that when I said unwell, I didn't mean a cold that was going to get better and then I'd be fine.
I had just finally got a diagnosis and I had got that because my disease activity had just decided to explore a whole new universe, that of difficult to control and totally impossible to struggle through.
In the end, I just literally, simply couldn't do it. I had a three day intensive course with a student I knew well, who was thankfully very understanding and I just couldn't do it...I struggled and yawned and brain blanked my way through then called work and said "that's it I'm off!!!" My docs had been pressuring me to stop for ages and I did, I had to, there was no other option. Only then did people truly realise that I was actually ill. After all, before I had complained (or rather stated, I'm not much of a whiner :lol

but had kept going and my students hadn't complained (er nope, I had been working with many for many years and they had become almost friends - also, I used to give my last ounce of me, gave my all until nothing was left).
Of course, at first, I thought that after a couple of months rest I'd be OK. I wasn't but I am a whole new kind of OK. I actually feel that I have a life now. I live rather than "survive" and I can enjoy life and my family. Before everything was based around just trying to keep going and get through another day. NO FUN at all.
I don't know, some things to mull over. You're going through a hard time with a lot of anxiety and a lot of stress but sometimes these hard times force us to think, step back and reevaluate life.
love and hugs :hug:
Katharine