For teens and adults in Louisiana

Counseling for Medical Trauma + Chronic Illness

Medical issues can be exhausting for your body. But they can be equally exhausting for your mind.

 

When you’ve experienced a health scare, it can feel like your whole world is turned upside down. Managing multiple trips back and forth the doctor, organizing your at-home pharmacy (i.e. your medicine cabinet), scheduling your life around energy crashes or flare ups. It all starts to be too exhausting. You crave “normal” and want so badly to find relief.

YOU FEEL LIKE YOUR ILLNESS CONTROLS YOUR LIFE

➯ You feel like a “burden” because you cannot contribute as much as you would like - so you become a chronic people-pleaser terrified of making mistakes

➯ You live in fear of new pains and mystery body aches appearing out of no where

➯ You think to yourself “I’m too young to be in this much pain” or “I thought I’d have so much more time before I’d have to worry about my health”

Therapy for medical issues can help you feel in control again of your health and your life

Hi, I’m Dr. Victoria Rodriguez

I help teens and adults in Louisiana just like you work through fear about your health and your body being “not just right” so you can feel safe in your body again.

LEARN MORE ABOUT MY APPROACH

How therapy for medical trauma can help

Your body is your first home, and you deserve to feel safe in your home. Individual therapy for medical trauma works around your body’s needs, not against your needs, to create a life that works for you no matter how you’re feeling physically. You will learn to accommodate your needs without shame and guilt holding you back.

➯ Feel confident enough to go to restaurants with friends and travel to new places while honoring your body’s pain or energy levels

➯ Find freedom from fear about a new diagnosis

➯ Practice coping tools to expertly navigate the medical system without anxiety

➯ Address stress levels to reduce inflammation - potentially decreasing chronic pain

➯ Learn to let go of your perfectionism and find peace in your imperfect body

WHAT WE MIGHT WORK ON

➯ Preparing emotionally for major surgeries or procedures

➯ Addressing your anxiety around medical appointments

➯ Honoring your grief from a diagnosis

Feel supported through your medical journey   

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

  • Medical trauma, or medical PTSD, works a lot like other traumatic events - your brain learns to expect terrible things to happen because of the scary experiences you’ve had with an illness, an accident, or a procedure or hospitalization. You might feel anxious when going to appointments or find you can’t stop worrying about your health or your body. Therapy for medical trauma can help you feel at peace even after a scary medical event.

  • Managing a chronic illness can be emotionally draining - it takes so much energy to navigate medical systems and weather the flare ups. I think of chronic illness as complex medical trauma, meaning there might not be one event that caused the trauma, but rather all the small traumas of managing a chronic illness add up over time. Therapy for chronic health issues can help you feel in control even during the most painful parts of managing a chronic illness.

  • If you manage chronic pain, you probably understand all too well how complex an issue pain can be. It can seem to come out of no where and it can be difficult to identify triggers or ways to relieve pain. Medical research has long identified the connection between trauma/stress/grief and chronic pain (specifically through the phenomenon of inflammation). In therapy, we can focus on reducing stress to manage pain levels, identifying pain triggers, reducing fear around pain, and accommodating your body during flare ups.