Dr. Ingela Thuné-Boyle
Health Psychologist
Online Therapy

Living with a chronic illness means navigating challenges that reach far beyond physical symptoms. Fatigue, pain, unpredictability, and the ongoing need to adapt your lifestyle can create a heavy emotional and psychological burden. Over time, many people begin to feel isolated, anxious, or overwhelmed, not only by their symptoms, but by the constant impact their condition has on their routines, relationships, and quality of life.

There is a particular kind of suffering that arises not only from physical symptoms, but from the invalidation of those symptoms. Many people living with chronic illness or undiagnosed conditions find themselves in a distressing limbo: feeling profoundly unwell while repeatedly being told by doctors that they are fine because their test results fall within normal ranges. This experience of being caught between undeniable symptoms and an absence of medical validation can be de

In recent years, a troubling trend has emerged in the online presence of some healthcare professionals: the mocking of patients and their conditions on social media. What might seem to a doctor like lighthearted banter, professional critique, or debunking of pseudoscience can, in fact, come across as dismissive ridicule of people’s suffering. Terms such as “adrenal fatigue,” “chronic Lyme,” or “mitochondrial dysfunction” often become punchlines, shorthand for what some profes

For many people, especially those living with an invisible or poorly understood condition, seeing the doctor can feel like an empty, even humiliating experience. At its best, medicine has always been a collaboration built on inquiry, listening, and the belief that every symptom tells a story worth investigating. Yet today, particularly for those with chronic, complex, or invisible conditions, appointments can instead feel like empty rituals; brief, dismissive, and devoid of g

Living with chronic illness often requires a level of self-advocacy that goes far beyond what most people experience in healthcare. It means repeatedly explaining your condition, asserting your needs, correcting misunderstandings, and sometimes challenging authority. When the stakes are your health, dignity, and quality of life, speaking up for yourself is not optional, it’s essential. And when something goes seriously wrong, making a formal complaint is sometimes the only wa

'Medical trauma' refers to a patient's psychological and physiological response to a negative or traumatic experience in a medical...