Neuroscience-Informed Care for Persistent Physical Symptoms
Somatic Symptom Disorder (SSD) is a condition in which one or more distressing physical symptoms become the focus of disproportionate thoughts, feelings, or behaviours that interfere significantly with daily life. In DSM-5-TR, SSD is explicitly not defined by whether symptoms can be medically explained, many people with SSD have real, identifiable medical conditions. What defines the disorder is the pattern of distress and response.
Modern neuroscience shows that physical symptoms are actively constructed by the brain through predictive processing of interoceptive signals. When this predictive system becomes biased (toward expecting and detecting threat), symptoms intensify and multiply. Evidence-based psychological treatments target this loop directly.
Our clinicians offer specialized care for adults navigating SSD, integrated with medical care.
Common Challenges We Support
- Persistent pain, fatigue, GI, cardiopulmonary, or neurological-type symptoms that dominate daily life.
- Catastrophic thinking about symptom meaning, "this must be something serious."
- Body-checking, symptom monitoring, and reassurance-seeking loops that paradoxically amplify symptoms.
- Avoidance of activity, work, or social contact driven by symptoms.
- High health anxiety and repeated medical visits without lasting reassurance.
- The mood, anxiety, or trauma dimensions that often ride alongside SSD.
- The exhausted and frustrated relationship with the medical system that many clients arrive with.
Our Approach
Sessions begin with a shared, accurate map of the brain-body predictive system that generates and maintains symptoms. For many clients, this framework, on its own, changes the felt sense of symptoms and reduces the fear that fuels them.
From there, treatment combines:
- CBT for SSD: targeting catastrophic thoughts, symptom-related beliefs, body-checking, and avoidance.
- Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT): shifting from symptom elimination to values-based living, well-suited when symptoms are longstanding.
- Interoceptive exposure and mindfulness-based approaches: retraining the predictive system that amplifies bodily signals.
- Emotional Awareness and Expression Therapy (EAET): when trauma history or high emotional suppression are part of the picture.
- Pain neuroscience education: as a foundational shared model, especially when pain is prominent.
We coordinate with your medical team and take physical symptoms seriously as physical symptoms. This is not "it's all in your head" work in the dismissive sense.
Who This Is For
This program is appropriate for:
- Adults with a diagnosis of Somatic Symptom Disorder, Illness Anxiety Disorder, or bodily distress presentation
- Clients navigating persistent physical symptoms alongside high health anxiety
- Clients whose symptoms have not fully resolved with medical treatment and who want a modern, mechanism-based psychological approach
- Clients whose symptoms overlap with chronic pain, FND, or post-concussion syndrome
Getting Started
An initial consultation will include a review of your symptom history, medical workup to date, and current life context. From there, your clinician will map the driving mechanisms and outline a treatment plan.
This page describes our general approach. Treatment is individualized and coordinated with your medical team where appropriate.