ps sorry for bad spelling and grammar, just coming down from one now. 

At the top of the Medications section is a message about Tips for suffers. Explore...

Melatonin is an inexpensive OTC item which has modest benefit but worth a try: 9-mg each night.

Call your largest local hospital and see if they can suggest low/no cost clinics, either within the hospital or your community.

If you can find a doc this way, print out the the following and ask the doc for a trial run. The advantage is this is an effective med to abort CH and it's fairly low cost (on a per dose basis) compared to many of the other options.
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Headache 2001 Sep;41(8):813-6 

Olanzapine as an Abortive Agent for Cluster Headache.

Rozen TD.

Department of Neurology, Jefferson Headache Center/Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, Philadelphia, Pa.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate olanzapine as a cluster headache abortive agent in an open-label trial. BACKGROUND: Cluster headache is the most painful headache syndrome known. There are very few recognized abortive therapies for cluster headache and fewer for patients who have contraindications to vasoconstrictive drugs. METHODS: Olanzapine was given as an abortive agent to five patients with cluster headache in an open-label trial. THE INITIAL OLANZAPINE DOSE WAS 5 MG, AND THE DOSE WAS INCREASED TO 10 MG IF THERE WAS NO PAIN RELIEF. THE DOSAGE WAS DECREASED TO 2.5 MG IF THE 5-MG DOSE WAS EFFECTIVE BUT CAUSED ADVERSE EFFECTS. To be included in the study, each patient had to treat at least two attacks with either an effective dose or the highest tolerated dose. RESULTS: Five patients completed the investigation (four men, one woman; four with chronic cluster, one with episodic cluster). Olanzapine reduced cluster pain by at least 80% in four of five patients, and TWO PATIENTS BECAME HEADACHE-FREE AFTER TAKING THE DRUG. Olanzapine typically alleviated pain within 20 minutes after oral dosing and treatment response was consistent across multiple treated attacks. The only adverse event was sleepiness. CONCLUSIONS: Olanzapine appears to be a good abortive agent for cluster headache. IT ALLEVIATES PAIN QUICKLY AND HAS A CONSISTENT RESPONSE ACROSS MULTIPLE TREATED ATTACKS. IT APPEARS TO WORK IN BOTH EPISODIC AND CHRONIC CLUSTER HEADACHE.

PMID 11576207 PubMed

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Olanzapine has a brand name of "Zyprexa" and is a antipsychotic. Don't be put off by this primary usage. Several of the drugs used to treat CH are cross over applications, that is, drugs approved by the FDA for one purpose which are found to be effective with unrelated conditions--BJ.
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You could start the Melatonin today as you begin the ESSENTIAL search for afforable health care/docs.

About work: yes, many of us work easily once we get the attacks under control--or if you are lucky, perhaps your attacks come at night??? when they won't disrupt employment.

But also start to educate yourself. Start with the OUCH site, buttons left, the PDF article below, and get the full version of this article---




Cluster headache.
From: Multimedia File Viewing and Clickable Links are available for Registered Members only!!  You need to or (Orphanet Journal of Rare Diseases)
[Easy to read; one of the better overview articles I've seen. Suggest printing the full length article--link, line above--if you are serious about keeping a good medical library on the subject.]

Leroux E, Ducros A.

ABSTRACT: Cluster headache (CH) is a primary headache disease characterized by recurrent short-lasting attacks (15 to 180 minutes) of excruciating unilateral periorbital pain accompanied by ipsilateral autonomic signs (lacrimation, nasal congestion, ptosis, miosis, lid edema, redness of the eye). It affects young adults, predominantly males. Prevalence is estimated at 0.5-1.0/1,000. CH has a circannual and circadian periodicity, attacks being clustered (hence the name) in bouts that can occur during specific months of the year. ALCOHOL IS THE ONLY DIETARY TRIGGER OF CH, STRONG ODORS (MAINLY SOLVENTS AND CIGARETTE SMOKE) AND NAPPING MAY ALSO TRIGGER CH ATTACKS. During bouts, attacks may happen at precise hours, especially during the night. During the attacks, patients tend to be restless. CH may be episodic or chronic, depending on the presence of remission periods. CH IS ASSOCIATED WITH TRIGEMINOVASCULAR ACTIVATION AND NEUROENDOCRINE AND VEGETATIVE DISTURBANCES, HOWEVER, THE PRECISE CAUSATIVE MECHANISMS REMAIN UNKNOWN. Involvement of the hypothalamus (a structure regulating endocrine function and sleep-wake rhythms) has been confirmed, explaining, at least in part, the cyclic aspects of CH. The disease is familial in about 10% of cases. Genetic factors play a role in CH susceptibility, and a causative role has been suggested for the hypocretin receptor gene. Diagnosis is clinical. Differential diagnoses include other primary headache diseases such as migraine, paroxysmal hemicrania and SUNCT syndrome. At present, there is no curative treatment. There are efficient treatments to shorten the painful attacks (acute treatments) and to reduce the number of daily attacks (prophylactic treatments). Acute treatment is based on subcutaneous administration of sumatriptan and high-flow oxygen. Verapamil, lithium, methysergide, prednisone, greater occipital nerve blocks and topiramate may be used for prophylaxis. In refractory cases, deep-brain stimulation of the hypothalamus and greater occipital nerve stimulators have been tried in experimental settings.THE DISEASE COURSE OVER A LIFETIME IS UNPREDICTABLE. Some patients have only one period of attacks, while in others the disease evolves from episodic to chronic form.

PMID: 18651939 [PubMed]
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The benefit of these materials is that they give you a tool to discuss treatment options with a doc, they give you a good idea of what a good doc should be using for your treatment.

Finally, stay around and read. Here is where you find knowledge, sharing, support for isolation, self-pity, and fear are killers.

What country are you in?

              Potter

samusaran wrote on Nov 18^th, 2010 at 4:10pm:

  Horseshit.

              Potter

I use the Imitrex nasal spray ONLY for the real bad hits. There is an art to it.dont take a big snort just a little sniff. You should not taste the med. If you do then it is in your throat not your nose and then needs to go thru your system like a pill. If I use it correctly it will abort a bad hit in 10/15 mins(for me). If your nose starts to run a bit take little sniffs. My nose during a hit DOES NOT get congested so the spray works very well for me.

Thank you Mikstudie, I will try Melatonin. And if you dont mind what are shadows? I keep seeing that? Is it that feeling I get of creeping up on me before the hits?"Like a constant feeling I have in my head" For me imitrex makes my heart go insane and then I get really nauseaus and even extra dizzy on top of what i all ready was. All though it did knock out the headache. The other effects made it pretty rough.

Update, Took the hit and went and saw doctor finally. I got my oxygen!!! And imitrex nasal spray for the really bad ones. But they gave me the nasal tube type. How do I get the mask? Thank you!

Sam, Imitrex pills are not really an effective abortive for CH. They take too long. Imitrex is not really a preventative medicine. You need Imitrex injections. They come in a little plastic carrier with two vials and an injector. You keep and reuse the carrier and injector, replace the vials as you use them up. All of that is very expensive though.

O2 can be a good abort. It doesn't work for everyone and different people need different O2 levels for it to be effective. It's definitely a low cast and very helpful therapy.

-Chris