I have an extremely bad sore throat that isn't strep or anything that can be cured with a pill. Does anyone know anything that might give me some relief?

IM SORRY THIS IS SO LONG!!!!! You can skim it and I think you’ll get the gist.

My boyfriend was sick last week and is still sick now. All I have is a sore throat though which I’ve had since Wednesday that pretty much keeps getting worse. It is honestly one of the most painful things I’ve ever felt. It hurts SO bad that I usually have to hold on to something around me when I’m about to swallow. Example also, it’s 6 AM and I’m in so much pain that I can’t sleep. I’m drinking tea and it’s doing nothing because the pain I feel when I swallow is completely overriding any benefit the tea might have.

Anyhow, I went to the doctor yesterday. It was negative for strep throat and anything else that they could give me a pill to cure. It’s just a normal virus that has to run it’s course she said. She said the best thing to do was just take 600 mg of ibuprofen at a time, and I did that yesterday and it helped significantly. The first time it worked right away while the second time it took about an hour. The problem with this is though, right now for example, my stomach is empty so I can’t take anything. And my throat hurts so bad (so bad that when I swallow I almost vomit and gag) that I can’t eat anything solid to get food in my stomach so that I can take the damn pills.

This just doesn’t seem normal to me, but I’ve gone to a doctor, what else can I do?

To top this all off, I just got home to Pennsylvania for the first time in 5 months. I’m having people over tonight which I’ve had planned for a while, but I don’t know how I’m going to do that when I’m in so much pain that I’m on the verge of tears every hour of the day. I’ve tried taking droppers full of ecinachia which did nothing. Gargling saltwater did absolutely nothing but make me gag way more than it should have. Tea hurts to swallow, soup hurts to eat, I don’t know what to do. I’ve been awake for an hour now and to top it all off the past 5 nights I’ve been sick I’ve gotten shitty sleep and been woken up often by my throat and also had to get up early. last night should have been the first night I could sleep the whole night through, but my throat is so bad that it’s preventing that.

Do you have any suggestions? And god, i’m sorry this is so fucking long, but I feel like it’s all important. I’m supposed to be going to maine Tuesday and I don’t want to feel like a human piece of shit by then, but I’m fresh out of ideas on how to make this better. All I want to do is sit and cry. Boo hoo.