Being newly diagnosed with a chronic illness brings on a whirlwind of emotions. From learning about your condition, to doctor’s appointments and life changes. Not to mention, feeling the affects of your illness. The truth is, there are many experiences that you are likely to have as a result of living with a newly diagnosed chronic illness.

Many people don’t anticipate developing a mental illness while coming to terms with their medical health, but it’s far more common than you might imagine. NIH concurs, stating that “people with other chronic medical conditions are at higher risk of depression.”

Adding mental health therapy to your ongoing health plan can improve all health outcomes over time.

Here are 7 ways therapy can support you or your loved one when you’re newly diagnosed with a chronic illness.

1 – Feel Supported Before and After Diagnosis

There are a variety of reactions one can have after newly diagnosed with a chronic condition. Receiving a diagnosis of a chronic illness is big news. There’s a lot of information to come to terms with once a diagnosis is confirmed. And it’s understandable that one needs support to fully move forward with that new reality. Therapy helps to provide you and your family with expert support along the way.

A chronic illness diagnosis impacts your life in many ways, including changing how you see yourself, altering how you interact with others, and shifting how you approach important areas of your life. Your loved ones may not always know how to support you when newly diagnosed, which makes the need for professional support even greater.

Speaking with a therapist helps you explore what all these changes mean for you and prepares you to take action.

2 – Immediately Feel Seen and Understood

Chronic illness specializing therapists have experience working with people sharing similar health diagnoses as you. That means we’ve heard many firsthand stories of how your specific chronic health condition has changed other people’s lives, giving insight into how the illness may affect you.

With that being said, another benefit of therapy is building an immediate relationship with someone who can understand and have compassion for what you’re going through. Chronic illness therapy as a specialization means that we have been formally trained to understand the relationship between chronic conditions and mental health. This unique knowledge places us in a better position to help you move forward with confidence.

It’s important to note that treating the impact of your chronic illness and mental health is not a traditional training model in graduate school. However, most therapists can help normalize how hard it is to live with the “unknowns” in life: making plans when you don’t know the future, facing new limitations and even struggling to explain yourself when asked why things are different for you.

We also understand how hurtful stigmas and labels around chronic conditions can be (i.e., “attention seeking,” being “lazy” or “dramatic”). Therapy helps to remind you how much your experiences are valid and are worthy of compassion – not judgment.

3 – Work to Overcome Medical Trauma when Newly Diagnosed

Another major benefit of therapy after newly diagnosed is working through your history of traumatic, stressful and unsupportive experiences relating to your health. Specifically, medical trauma is “a set of psychological and physiological responses to pain, injury, serious illness, medical procedures and frightening treatment experiences.”

Unresolved stressful experiences about your health can lead to long-term health problems. So it’s beneficial to understand how your medical experiences leave a lasting impact on you and your loved ones to move forward.

Common medical experiences that can contribute to medical trauma are:

1. Stroke
2. Heart attack
3. Near death experiences during medical treatment
4. Feeling ignored when receiving medical care
5. Emergency surgical procedures
6. Frequent hospitalizations
7. Being told your health symptoms are only due to a mental health condition
8. Sudden intubation including COVID-19 treatment
9. Adverse reactions to medications or treatments
10. Experiencing long-term symptoms without answers/diagnosis/treatment

All of these experiences have the potential to bring on high levels of fear, leading you to have negative opinions or feelings about the medical community and treatment moving forward. Therapy helps you work through those experiences after newly diagnosed so you can confidently advocate for yourself in the healthcare system.

Addressing medical trauma in therapy also prepares you with a plan when you feeling anxious during medical appointments.

Here are some tips to follow if you think you are in a toxic relationship with a medical provider.

4 – Discuss Your Feelings Outside of Friends and Family

Another key benefit of therapy after newly diagnosed receiving support talking about the hard, complicated feelings away from friends and family. Now don’t get me wrong, friends and family can be an amazing support when living with a chronic condition. In fact, research suggests that you’re more likely to experience better health outcomes with family support.

But, at the same time, there are limits to the support your loved ones can offer when you’re chronic condition that potentially affects their lives as well.

Here are some common limits talking with friends and family about your diagnosis:

1. They may not understand your chronic illness or situation as you need them to.
2. Your loved ones could be having a hard time grieving the news of your diagnosis without making you feel guilty.
3. Many loved ones expect you to “feel better” or “be cured” after starting treatment (not understanding that your condition is chronic and ongoing).
4. Loved ones can mistake you openly talking about your condition as complaining.
5. They don’t always know how to help.
6. You may feel pressure to mask/cover up how you really feel to avoid upsetting your loved ones.
7. You feel unsupported by your loved ones or have strained relationships with them.
8. You have a hard time explaining why you can’t do something, even when you could do it in the past.
9. You feel guilt when you need to cancel plans.

These moments often make people feel even lonelier over time as you figure out how to coexist and maintain these relationships. For many, it’s hard to keep certain relationships going when you notice signs that your relationships are unsupportive.

It’s beneficial to speak with a therapist about developing and keeping healthy boundaries with your loved ones after newly diagnosed. Therapy gives you the opportunity to speak up without the pressure of filtering how you feel or hiding your feelings. And we also can help you cope with the experiences your loved ones are having as a result of your condition.

Also consider how you can include your loved ones in the therapy process to work through some of these challenges. Your therapist can offer this support when you feel ready.

5 – Learn to Accept Your Diagnosis After Newly Diagnosed

It’s normal to have a variety of feelings and experiences when recently diagnosed with a chronic illness. A common difficulty that you may have after receiving your diagnosis is figuring out how to accept and come to terms with the news. An essential benefit of therapy after newly diagnosed with a chronic illness is receiving support in navigating that acceptance process.

What exactly does it look like for you to accept your chronic condition? What does this mean for you moving forward? Does accepting your diagnosis mean that you are “over it” and unbothered by it?

I admit that I asked these same questions when diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis in 2019. You can read more about my personal experience here. One thing I’ve personally learned about accepting your chronic condition is that acceptance does not mean that you feel good about your condition or are unbothered by it. Instead it means that you are acknowledging you have the condition and are open to figuring out how to live with it.

There are many things that change for you after diagnosis, including its effect on your body and how you approach the rest of your life. Working with a therapist that specializes in chronic health conditions can help you make sense of your experience, grieve the news and all the changes that come with it, cope with the intense emotions you feel and learn how to move forward.

6 – Gain Confidence By Discussing Your Chronic Illness with Others After Newly Diagnosed

Have you ever experienced weird moments of trying to figure out how to talk about your chronic condition with other people? Me too.

Talking about your health is one of the most common issues that come up when living with a chronic illness. Having the conversation or bringing it up when necessary can be a really confusing thing to do, but it is an important skill to learn during your journey.

This is a great topic to explore and work on in therapy. You and your therapist can work together to figure out the best times for you to bring up your diagnosis or health-related needs (or simply keep it to yourself).

Let’s face it. As overwhelming and annoying it can be to talk about your personal health, it’s sometimes necessary so that your needs are met. There will be times when it’s not the most convenient or helpful for you to discuss it, and that’s okay. Therapy help to meet your needs through all discussions about your newly diagnosed health condition.

Things to consider when deciding to talk about your health condition:

1. How do you gently express what’s going on in a way that other people can understand?
2. Is this a moment where discussing your personal health is helpful for you and the people you’re talking with?
3. How do you bring up newly diagnosed health issues and questions with your medical providers?
4. What happens when people disagree or don’t seem to care when you inform them of your health condition?
5. Do you have to share such personal information? (The immediate answer here is “NO.”)
6. What if you don’t feel comfortable sharing your diagnosis or needs yet?
7. How can you share as little information as needed to meet your needs (and not drain your energy in the process)?

These are all valid questions that deserve attention, answers and a plan. Therapy can support you in talking through different scenarios from the past, present or future so that you feel more prepared. This can build self-confidence and help others around you learn how to show up for you moving forward.

Here is a checklist of topics to discuss with your medical provider after being diagnosed.

7 – Learn Strategies to Manage Your Mood and Newly Diagnosed Health Symptoms

One of the most challenging parts of living with a newly diagnosed chronic condition is learning how to live with constant or unpredictable onset of health symptoms. These health symptoms can significantly impact your day, requiring more recovery time and taking a toll on your mood, self-esteem and relationships.

Therapy teaches you new strategies to mentally and physically cope with these symptoms. These strategies are typically recommended for use alongside the treatment plan you make with your medical team. Studies have shown that those who practice healthy mental and physical coping skills after being newly diagnosed show better health outcomes including, “inner peace and satisfaction” within two years of consistent practice of the skills.

Coping strategies can help improve your mood, decrease the intensity and alleviate some of your chronic health symptoms. You and your therapist will explore, collaborate and practice strategies that are a good fit for you so that you can confidently use them when alone or with loved ones outside of sessions.

Read more to learn how your chronic illness can affect your mental health.

Here are some other important blogs that can get you started after you or a loved one are diagnosed with a chronic illness:

1. What to Do After Diagnosed with a Chronic Illness
2. 5 Things Not to Do After Diagnosed with a Chronic Illness
3. Coping with Your Parent’s Illness Without Falling Apart
4. 6 Things to Consider when Adjusting to Life with a Chronic Illness
5. How to Know if Your Teen is Struggling with their Chronic Illness

Next Steps for Adjusting to Life with a Chronic Illness

I help individuals and families living with newly diagnosed chronic illnesses. Therapy is a powerful tool that helps people find meaning even after receiving a chronic health diagnosis. Although the journey with a chronic condition is hard, therapy can make it more bearable by providing tools to support yourself as you make the major life adjustments.

Whether you’re looking for one-on-one, family or group counseling, I’d love to help. You can schedule your first appointment with me by booking a free 15-minute consultation.

Alicia Dorn

MS in Mental Health Counseling from Johns Hopkins University. CBT (cognitive behavioral training) and ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) with specific attention to anxiety, depression, trauma and behavioral challenges. Mindfulness-Focused Therapy training. Clinically, I have worked inpatient at Kennedy Krieger Institute, various outpatient mental health clinics, clinical manager at a substance abuse clinic, public schools in Anne Arundel county MD and in the Maryland juvenile detention systems. If you need a personal therapist, a therapist for your teen or family counseling, please reach out. I offer a complimentary consultation to see if we’re a good fit to work together.

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