Arthritis & Your Mental Health

Released April 22, 2025 

PODCAST OPEN:      

You’re listening to the Live Yes! With Arthritis podcast, created by the Arthritis Foundation to help people with arthritis — and the people who love them — live their best lives. This podcast and other life-changing resources are made possible by gifts from donors like you. If you’re dealing with chronic pain, this podcast is for you. You may have arthritis, but it doesn’t have you. Here, learn how you can take control of arthritis with tips and ideas from our hosts and guest experts.

 

This episode of the Live Yes! With Arthritis podcast is brought to you in part by Kenvue.

 

MUSIC BRIDGE

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Hi. Welcome to the Live Yes! With Arthritis podcast. I'm Dr. Stephanie Rosado, your host for this episode. I was diagnosed with osteoarthritis, OA, as a young adult, collegiate and professional athlete. And I've been volunteering with the Arthritis Foundation since 2021. Today, we're talking about mental health.

 

High levels of stress, anxiety, depression are all linked to chronic conditions like arthritis, which makes maintaining good mental health a top priority. In fact, more than 22% of adults with arthritis reported symptoms of anxiety and more than 12% reported depression, according to the CDC. In this episode, we'll explore the arthritis mental health connection, how it affects quality of life and overall health, and discuss treatments and therapies that can help decrease levels of stress, anxiety and depression for all those with arthritis. Today, I'm joined by Destiny Davis, a clinical rehabilitation counselor at the Chronic Illness Therapist. Destiny, welcome to the podcast.

 

Destiny Davis: Thanks for having me. I'm excited to be here.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: So, let's get into it. Destiny, tell us a little bit about yourself, your expertise and experience with arthritis.

 

Destiny Davis: Yeah. So, like you said, I'm a clinical rehabilitation counselor, and that just means that my master's degree was focused on helping people with mental and physical disabilities either gain, regain or maintain employment despite their disabilities. I have a background in a wide range of disabilities, and chronic pain is one that I also live with myself. So that was kind of what kept me interested in working with this population.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: That's awesome. Such a needed area. Let's get into some of those mental health concerns. We know that mental health plays such a huge role in our overall health, often a bigger role than is often given credit. Why do you think mental health is so important, especially for those with chronic conditions like arthritis?

 

Destiny Davis: I always want to be so clear about the bi-directional nature of anxiety and pain and illnesses because I think a lot of people go to the doctor and will often hear, especially before they get a diagnosis, when no one can find anything yet and tests are coming back normal, or maybe they're abnormal, but they don't really have an answer yet. That, in and of itself, is really stressful. And then to hear that your pain is being caused by anxiety, which is a common message, is really devastating.

 

It just kind of makes you almost shut down entirely. I just want to be really, really upfront about that. Like, when we're talking in this conversation about mental health and chronic pain, or arthritis and autoimmune conditions, the stress itself doesn't cause any of that. Now, stress and chronic high cortisol, chronic anxiety, chronic depression — there is a negative impact on our pain when we have chronic mental health conditions or experiences. That's first and foremost.

 

And after that, I think it's important to talk about when you have anxiety or when you have depression or when you have any kind of mental health condition, there's always so many different factors that go along with what's causing it. And then it can also increase your pain. So, we just want to be careful with the language around making people feel like it's their fault if their pain is bad; it's not. The pain often causes an anxiety flare-up, can cause a depression flare-up.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: I love you making that distinction. I'm sure a lot of people can resonate with those experiences at health care appointments. For me, my mental health was preventing me from taking care of my physical health, like the unhealthy patterns of thinking, not taking care of my grief, made me push harder to exercise. It prolonged my decision to retire from sports and kept me in constant flares and swelling. I think that's also something to highlight, like how not taking the mental health part into consideration can also have very real, physical consequences besides pain, because you're putting your body through undue stress.

 

Destiny Davis: Yeah, exactly. I was just at one of the Arthritis Foundation's Connect Groups last week. We were talking about learning to listen to your body and listen to your pain. And I gave an example of a runner who decided, in the middle of a flare-up, to go and sign up for a 5K, because they were like, "I'm not going to let this take over my life."

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Ooh, that sounds like somebody I know. I'm not going to say it's me, but it sounds like somebody I know. (laughs)

 

Destiny Davis: Yes, I think it's such a common experience. And I gave two examples in that talk last week, because there's that side of things. But then there's also those of us that will limit our activity more and more and more because we're so scared of the pain. So, it's trying to find a balance, and that's where acceptance and commitment therapy comes in because this particular therapy is mainly about figuring out basically what's important to you.

 

It sounds so simple, but that means we're looking at all of the societal messages that you're hearing from birth to now. What you think you should do versus what you want to do versus what's right for you, depending on your future goals. There are so many different layers that we're looking at when we're just asking this simple question of what's important to you. And then we figure out ways to get your life closer and closer to that, despite the pain.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: I think we hit on a lot of big mental health concerns. Is there anything else you'd like to add that we didn't touch on yet as we move into those identity and sense of self constructs?

 

Destiny Davis: No, I think this is a good transition. And then within that, I'll be bringing up as well just a concept of co-regulation.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Well, let's dive into it. How does sense of self and identity happen or transpire when hit with an arthritis diagnosis and/or while you're navigating flares? And what does that mean as far as mental health?

 

Destiny Davis: Most of us will describe who we are as what we do. So, you described yourself as being an athlete and that, you know, what does that mean to be an athlete? Typically, that means I'm competing. That means I'm running, that means I'm playing ball. There are these actions that are involved in that. What we want to instead start to look at when we're doing this work individually, to kind of get this: What is your identity truly on the inside?

 

What makes you an athlete even when you can't run, even when you can't get to the competition? Then we start to look at the values of an athlete: discipline, consistency, strength and all of those things. You might only know them as strength means lifting X amount of weight, strength means running X miles. And now we're looking at the strength that it takes to get through each day. The strength that it takes to go to the doctor's office when you really don't want to have that appointment. The strength it takes to just wake up in the morning. And that can be a hard shift to make.

 

It's not as simple as, like, just kind of replacing the thought and now, all of a sudden, you're good to go, you realize you're strong every day, and that's all that. No, there's a lot of grief involved in the work. Working through that grief, allowing for that grief to unfold and to be expressed and hopefully have people around you that can validate that with compassion and kindness and acceptance, and to not rush your process at all with the grief. So, yeah, that sense of identity is the most important thing. Because who we are is one of the core questions. It's one of the most basic questions any of us are ever going to ask ourselves.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Yeah. I resonate with everything you just said. I definitely went through identity crisis, like strict of this thing that I felt like I embodied and didn't start moving through identity crisis or getting past it until I addressed each stage of that grief cycle. A big misconception is that kind of you work through grief and you're past it. No, it's a cycle. You go back.

 

And sometimes you falter, and then that cycle starts over. So, I think it's very important to validate that for our listeners today. That it's not just a linear path, like you said. You have to work through; it's muddy, it's messy. So ,thank you for validating that and for sharing your expertise around that.

 

Destiny Davis: I would love to know, if you are open to sharing: What got you through some of those grief moments? Was it your community? Was it your doctors? Was it something else?

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Social support was definitely a big piece of that. Finding the Arthritis Foundation was a big piece of that. I found people that understood my experience. That started the process. And to your point, finding other ways to be an athlete, right? Like, no, I'm not on the basketball court anymore, but I found adjacent activities that gave me that sense of competitiveness or that just brought up a lot of those emotions and feelings and affirmations that I got while participating in basketball. So, you hit home on a lot of things that I went through. It took me way too long to get through it. I'm glad that we're talking about it. And hopefully we can help people move through those stages a little faster.

 

Destiny Davis: Yeah. Well, fun fact: One of the classes that comes up in my mind over and over and over again from grad school was sports psychology. And I never played sports, so I know nothing about sports, but that class was so eye-opening because the same techniques that you use with an athlete — like mentalization, visualization, the coaching that happens that you could probably be a lot more specific about than I could be — is the same type of coaching that you need to use when you live with a chronic illness.

 

Not necessarily a competition, but more like a challenge of something that you're working towards, like you're always working towards. Even when you win first place or, you know, you get the gold, there's always still more to do after that in sports. And the same thing with your chronic illness. There really is no endpoint. I guess at some point you might stop playing sports if there's an endpoint there. But, like you just said, the mindset shifts. It becomes something different. And that's exactly how I see living with a chronic illness.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: And I'd argue that sports is across the lifespan, right? Like, OK, yeah, you retire from this sport, but then you still find a way to stay active. It's imperative for your mental health, your physical health. I'm also a part of another organization, which is the Alliance of Social Workers in Sports, sports social work, and they focus on sports across the continuum and how sports can be a very good thing for development of individuals and also to help them cope, to live well. But also how this nature of sports can really breed some unhealthy behaviors, right? Like, that “go hard or go home,” push, push, push, push, push until you can't anymore. That push, push, push mentality from sports didn't serve me well once I got diagnosed. So, I had to reel that back.

 

Destiny Davis: That’s so important. I didn’t play sports, but when I first got sick and started experiencing all this chronic pain, dizziness, all of these really odd symptoms, that was what I did. I was pushing, pushing, pushing to cure. So, it was like, “What next diet can I do? What exercise can I do? What herbs and supplements?” It was literally at one point — when I was kind of down this rabbit hole of research and was seeing what other people were doing, and they were doing stuff like hyperbaric chambers, which was, like, a thousand dollars for 10 sessions — I was like, “Well, if that's what needs to happen for me to heal, I guess I’m not going to heal because I just can't do that.” (laughs)

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Yeah. And that's that part of grief, that's that bargaining stage, where you're like, "If I just do this, if I just lose 10 more pounds, if I just whatever, I'll be better," right? And it's not really realistic or healthy. And we're back to that mental health cycle of poor patterns of thinking leading to poor behaviors.

 

PROMO: Get tips to help you take control of arthritis and put your mind at ease with the Arthritis Foundation’s free e-books. They’re packed with trusted information from the experts on all kinds of topics. See the full menu at arthritis.org/ebooks.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Let's move into talking about treatments. What are the best mental health treatments for people with arthritis?

 

Destiny Davis: I'll start with saying the best treatment is the one that works for you, which isn't very helpful if you haven't been through a few and you don't know which one is best for you. But there is a lot of research on acceptance and commitment therapy and chronic pain. Some people say CBT for chronic pain is the gold standard. Both are phenomenal. It just depends on which one resonates with you more.

 

I find with CBT, cognitive behavioral therapy, we are actively kind of challenging your thoughts and helping you kind of figure out what thoughts work for you. That's when we kind of will label a thought as maladaptive or not working. And then we're going to try to help you find the thought that just feels better for you. That then allows you to kind of do the things that you find important to be doing.

 

And acceptance and commitment therapy is just slightly different in that, instead of trying to challenge the thoughts, it's more, like, we don't have control over our thoughts at all. So, just let them be there, but don't let them drive the bus. So, we’re going to feel them; they’re going to kind of be in the background. I might have this thought of, "I can't do this anymore." And previously, that might have landed me for a week in bed, because it was like, "What's the point? I just can't do this anymore."

 

Through all of the skills that we also teach in all of these therapies — mindfulness, grounding, looking at things through a social justice kind of lens, examining where you learned what you learned — then we kind of learn these skills to help ground us and do the thing that's important to us, even if we have that thought. So, it no longer matters if I got rid of the thought or not, because the actions are going in my favor.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Thank you for elaborating on all of those. And I'll add a little bit just from my own lived experience. I am a social worker by training. However, I am not clinically licensed. So, I just want to say that before I dive into different types of therapies. I do actively participate in therapy and have experienced a wide variety of therapies.

 

My approach to it is that I take something from each one, like I've done DBT and CBT and, like, reframing my thoughts. And thinking about my thoughts differently, or my situation differently, has been a game-changer. That is very hard to do, and it's taken years of work. It's a continuous process. Mindfulness is not just yoga, sitting, and sitting still, and quietness. It's bringing attention to your body, bringing attention to what you're feeling, your pain levels today and making modifications based off that.

 

And so that works for me. Self-talk has been such a big one. As an athlete, you know, you're very critical of yourself. So, learning what healthy self-talk looks like. Acceptance and commitment therapy, accepting that I have this chronic disease that I'm not going to get rid of. I just want to encourage our audience, too. It's OK if a lot of different therapies work for you or certain aspects of different therapies work for you as well. It doesn't just have to be one.

 

Destiny Davis: That's exactly it. Yeah. It's really interesting. I practice somatic experiencing; it's growing a lot right now. You'll hear people online, like especially coaches and things like that. They'll say, "Nothing worked for me. You know, I did CBT for years until this somatic experiencing, and now all of a sudden, like, it…" And I'm, like, "Actually, I would argue that CBT probably set the foundation, and maybe there was something that clicked after years and years of that. And then with somatic experiencing, something felt different, and it kind of opened the floodgates, and now everything is clicking."

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: I have not heard of somatic experiencing, so can you define that?

 

Destiny Davis: Definitely. Somatic experiencing is basically paying attention to your body, learning to pay attention to what's in here: the core foundation. Somatic experiencing does have a lot of techniques. One of them is called pendulation, in which I might guide a client to notice a part of their body that's really uncomfortable. And I'm with them. We're co-regulating. I can explain that in a minute, but we're in it together. And then we kind of move into a part of their body that's much more comfortable, and we'll kind of go back and forth between the two. And when you do that, you tend to notice a reduction in the pain in the area that was uncomfortable.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Oh, OK.

 

Destiny Davis: The theory or the underpinning of somatic experiencing is that when you pay attention to something, it changes. And that is kind of what we're looking for. We're not looking to cure, we're not looking to get rid of; we are looking to just change the relationship with what's happening inside.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: I see. That makes a lot of sense. Thank you for elaborating on that. I guess I'm familiar with that idea. I just didn't know that was the word for it or the terminology for it. I've heard you mention co-regulation a couple times now. Do you want to dive into that?

 

Destiny Davis: That's probably one of the most important pieces and probably one of the hardest. Because if the people around you are not validating and comforting and kind of giving you the emotional needs that you have in the middle of a pain flare-up, or just a normal day as well, then co-regulating can't happen. But co-regulating is when you are feeling something really, really difficult, you're having a hard time. The best example would be with a toddler. So, your toddler is just melting down because there's no more red popsicles. (laughter)

 

You can tell them that there's no more red popsicles. They might even understand and believe you, but it doesn't matter. They're freaking out, and they want the red popsicle. And my job as a parent is to get down on their level, look them in the eyes, because being higher than them doesn't make them feel better. I'm doing all of the things with my body and my words and my tone of voice. I'm tapping into my calm, and I'm lending my calm to my child. And I'm using parent-child example here, but our friends can do this for us, you know. To have a friend that says, "I'm so sorry you're hurting." And, "Hey, let's go watch a movie and laugh," if that's your thing, right? You're connected. It's like, "Hey, I'm in this with you. I feel this, but I'm calm right now because I'm not experiencing this," right? And so, I can lend you my calm.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: I love that, “lending your calm.” Honestly, my partner has been the biggest advocate, and I would say co-regulator, in my dealing with arthritis. Like literally lends me their calm. Oh, you better coin it. Patent it.

 

Destiny Davis: Yeah, I will say… Let me caveat. In somatic experiencing, we do talk about lending our nervous system. And so, I just switched it a little bit to “lending my calm.” (laughs)

 

PROMO: Want to help grow our movement and conquer arthritis as a volunteer? There are lots of ways to get involved with the Arthritis Foundation and make an even greater difference. To get going, check out arthritis.org/volunteer.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: We are getting into caregiving, family dynamics and how they can play a big part in our mental health. You talked about co-regulation. How else can we cope with some of these challenges, especially as we consider how family members may contribute?

 

Destiny Davis: I think using technology to connect with other supportive circles, like whether it's through the Arthritis Foundation's Connect Groups or other support groups, being around other people who aren't even in your family, and you're listening to them through such an unbiased lens. Sometimes when it's our family, we have a lot of these past experiences that can get caught up in our mind, and we might not take their advice, or we might not really hear them the same way. So, sometimes having a little bit of distance between you and the other person, and to hear they also have arthritis and they're also going through it and here's what they learned.

 

That's like... It's so powerful. I find it's a lot more powerful most of the time to hear somebody else's experience. Where you can kind of then decide if you want to take it or not, rather than somebody directly telling you, "Hey, this is what I think you should do." A lot of us shut down in that. Sometimes we are looking for direct advice, but if it's not the right exact advice, it tends to just completely fall flat. Whereas, when you're hearing someone else's story, it's a little bit easier to kind of take bits and pieces of what applies to you and what doesn't.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Yeah. So that's one coping strategy, right? Like, finding your people, finding that social support that helps you feel validated and accepted and all the things, right? So, let's discuss resilience and other coping strategies. What are some of the ways we can build resilience and learn to cope on our own, maybe when we don't have that social circle around?

 

Destiny Davis: I'll give one little caveat before I give kind of other more tangible tips, but if you don't have that in your immediate community, look for it in books and TV, and use your visualization to when you're by yourself. It can sound really cheesy, but I promise you it works. When you are really tapped into, like, a character in a book or on TV, and you say, "What would they say right now if they saw me suffering?" The character, you know? We know it's fake, that's OK. We know it's not real.

 

And then you can, hopefully over time, internalize some of those messages, because we really do need to see things to learn them. But aside from that, some other kind of concrete skills, or making sure, is: If you are the type of person that's highly anxious — especially if you're competitive, or if you are always on the go, or you kind of always need to be producing something in order to feel worthwhile — it’s so, so important that you have downtime every single day, even if that's five minutes before bed. And that's why meditation — I’m actually not a big meditator, and it's not my go-to coping skill…

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Same. (laughter)

 

Destiny Davis:

But the reason why it is pretty popular, I would say, is because it can be like that only time during the entire day that you give yourself a moment. It's why your best ideas come to you in the shower, because you're not doing anything else, your mind is clear, you're not looking at your phone. And so, you've given yourself that time. For me, it's an Epsom salt bath. Like, if I don't take four of those a week…

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: I love that you have it down to a number. Like, “I need at least four to be OK.”

 

Destiny Davis: I do. And it's funny you mentioned your partner, like my husband, too. He tried to get me to take Epsom salt baths 10 years ago when we met. And I was like, "You want me to sit down in a tub for 20 minutes with nothing to do?" Like, that's impossible. I need to be up, I need to be moving. (laughter)

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: That's hilarious.

 

Destiny Davis: Little by little, I figured it out. And now like, yeah, “You can't take my bath away from me each week.” (laughs)

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Something that we didn't talk about or touch on yet, but that lends itself to what you were just speaking about — setting that time aside for yourself — is that sometimes that can feel like a sacrifice. And maybe a sacrifice that you're not willing to make because you feel like, "Oh, if I take this time for myself, oh, I'm leaving my family." Or "I'm not being the best mom, I'm not being the best partner," whatever it is.

 

So, when arthritis forces us — because sometimes it does — forces us to make sacrifices — whether that's with time or taking certain medications or having to go to the doctor or when we schedule our appointments — when you have to make those sacrifices, what do you think some of the unanticipated consequences, negative or positive, that can have on our mental health? And do you have any advice for dealing with it?

 

Destiny Davis: When we don't take that time, we end up resenting the people around us. So, I just ask myself, "Do I want to resent my family, or do I want to risk?" The fear is that they're going to resent you for taking time away. So, “What do I want to do? Take care of myself so I can show up really good when I'm with them, and risk that maybe they resent me, but likely they won't, because I'm showing up so much better than I would without that time?” Or “Do I want to just guarantee that I'm going to resent them because I have no time to myself?” Sometimes it's just as simple as asking yourself that over and over again.

 

If you haven't spent a lot of time with yourself alone, you might be scared of the thoughts that might come up. The memories you might have. And that's where, of course, therapy comes in. But taking that time for yourself is not selfish in the slightest.

 

Dr. Stephani Rosado: When you're alone, and you don't have all of this sensory input and all these stressors and things going on around you, you can really start to identify negative and positive thoughts that are happening — and maybe what they're connected to, what your triggers are, in those moments, and what could be leading to some unhealthy thoughts or even good thoughts. You can reflect on, "Wow, that really brought me joy today."

 

Destiny Davis: Absolutely.

 

PROMO: Over the past seven decades, the Arthritis Foundation has invested over $500 million into scientific research, advancing arthritis treatments while pursuing a cure. Progress is being made every day, thanks to the contributions of people like you. Learn more about our research initiatives at arthritis.org/science.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: So, Destiny, before each episode, we post a question on social media. For this episode, we asked: When you feel anxious or depressed, what helps you rebound? So we'd love to get your thoughts on a few of these responses. The first one comes from marijorios, and they said, "Journaling and affirmations are a big part of how I stay grounded and motivated."

 

Destiny Davis: I think the caveat I would give to anyone who's not yet a journaler or does affirmations is just to make sure you're not trying to take on an affirmation that totally does not resonate with you and it's something that you think you should be saying to yourself. If you can't see that positive affirmation as being true for you, then you've got to find something to be a little bit more neutral before you can work your way up to a very positive belief.

 

Sometimes affirmations can sound like: “I believe my body is always healing.” We can at least try to absorb a belief around, “My body is working for me every day.” “My body is strong enough to do X, Y and Z.” Whatever is important to you. It's a little bit more neutral rather than, like, a far-fetched idea.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Yeah, it’s realistic. Instead of saying, “My body is healed.”

 

Destiny Davis: Exactly.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: It's probably not because, you know, you have a chronic condition that probably doesn't have a cure and, in my case, osteoarthritis, but I can say my body continues to carry me. Or something like that. The next one comes from denisegraeffitness. They said, "I work out. It's empowering."

 

Destiny Davis: Another caveat — I love to just give nuance in everything (laughs): When you're working out, again, it has to work with your body. It can't be something that you're doing because you feel like you should or it's what you feel like you used to be able to do. It's more about learning to listen to your body, moving your body in a way that genuinely feels good.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Yeah. I love that. For me, it was like: Being an athlete, I had to find some other form of physical activity. So, finding something that worked for me is, and was, very empowering. The next comment comes from kimgallen1, they said, "I tell myself and truly believe that I am exceptional. I am an exception to the rule. And every step I take defines me in this way. Every move I make is exceptional, remarkable and noteworthy."

 

Destiny Davis: Yeah. I think it's important to find these phrases that work for you that are going to help you do the next best thing, because that's really all we can do. And if reminding yourself that you're exceptional is what gets you there, then we’ve got to keep doing that.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Love it. Deborah_andio said, "Whenever I feel anxious or depressed or just exhausted from living with joint pain over 30 years, I find solace in journaling my thoughts, praying for and thanking God for the people in my life. And I also like channeling my energy into blogging. Writing helps me process my emotions, while prayer brings me comfort and reassurance. I also focus on helping others through my content and sharing my experiences, and offering support can be incredibly fulfilling. This combination not only lifts my spirits, but it also creates a sense of connection and purpose, reminding me that we're all in this together."

 

Destiny Davis: We actually have research to show that when somebody in a support group starts to become more of like a helper in the group rather than the one seeking support, there's something that shifts inside of them, and it feels more fulfilling than when we’re in the “being helped” role. That doesn't mean we shouldn't ever be in that role. We absolutely need to be in the role of being helped sometimes. That's a part of the journey. But then at some point to have somebody else, a newer person, where you're a little bit further along, when you can help them, it just feels really good.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Yeah, I think that's that human piece. We all want to feel like we have something to offer, like we can help someone else. I think that's a very… just human and besides what the evidence says, right?

 

Destiny Davis: Yeah, yeah.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: We all want to feel like we have a purpose in this world. And helping others is a very powerful purpose. So, to close each episode, Destiny, we typically share our top three takeaways from the episode. I'll start with you and ask you what your top three takeaways are, and let you know that I always cop out on this and I always just share one usually because I just have one that I really want to share.

 

Destiny Davis: First, identity work is probably one of the most important things that you can do when you have a chronic illness of any kind. You can do that through journaling, through therapy, through talking with your friends and family and support groups. So many ways to do that. Two is to remember to meet yourself where you're at. Whether it's figuring out a new exercise or positive affirmations or going to the doctor and figuring out what next treatments you're going to have.

 

Meet yourself where you're at. Don't try to push too hard, but don't stop doing everything as well. We’ve got to pace ourselves and do a little but not too much. And three: Just community always is going to be probably the biggest thing that you can do. I think I said the other thing was the biggest thing, but this is the biggest thing. (laughs)

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: It's OK. They're all important. And it ties really well to the one takeaway I want to share, because I just love it, and you really need to coin this: Find people that can lend you their calm. That has been such a game-changer, it sounds like, in your journey and in my journey.

 

So, that brings us to the end of this wonderful episode. Destiny, thank you for being here, sharing your expertise and lived experience. Before we wrap up, do you have anything you'd like to share with our audience?

 

Destiny Davis: I just want people to know that I do have a podcast as well. So, if you're listening to this and looking for another episode to listen to: The Chronic Illness Therapists podcast. I interview other medical professionals who specialize in chronic pain and illness. The intersection of lived experience and evidence-based is really important and rare. So, I try to interview other medical professionals who have that lived experience.

 

Dr. Stephanie Rosado: Awesome. Well, for our listeners out there, for more arthritis resources to help you live your best life, please visit arthritis.org. Thank you for joining us today.

 

Destiny Davis: Yes, thank you so much for having me.

 

PODCAST CLOSING:

The Live Yes! With Arthritis podcast is independently produced by the Arthritis Foundation. Gifts from people like you make our podcast and other life-changing resources possible. You can donate at arthritis.org/donate. This podcast aims to help people living with arthritis and chronic pain live their best life. For a transcript and show notes, go to arthritis.org/podcast. Subscribe, rate and review us wherever you get your podcasts. If you subscribe through Spotify, leave a comment on their platform, letting us know what you think about this episode. And stay in touch