“Show me your credentials!”

I have been a nurse practitioner for over twelve years but have lived in a body with faulty connective tissue my whole life! I think my diagnoses add to my credibility and make me a better practitioner. True, I am an advanced practice registered nurse (APRN) with board certification (BC) as an Adult Clinical Nurse Specialist (ACNS), but I am also a person who knows what it feels like to struggle with a chronic illness (or three!). Like many of you, I had decades of injuries and chronic pain and often felt dismissed by doctors. I was deeply entrenched in the conventional medical system working as an advanced practice provider for Neurosurgery at a level 1 trauma center, and even I couldn't find a nearby provider to pursue a more complete answer to my chronic nagging symptoms. I was fortunate that I had the means to travel to a specialist 4 hours away. Finally, at 42 years old, I was diagnosed with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and soon after, Thoracic Outlet syndrome. 

With my symptoms validated, I knew that I was meant to reshape what it meant to care for complex, multi-system conditions like EDS. Admittedly, the official 2017 diagnostic criteria are nuanced and specific, but it's not brain surgery (and I would know, because I have assisted in that, too!). After nearly 10 years in Neurosurgery, I left the hospital for a smaller, integrative, and regenerative clinic for spine conditions. In 2024, as that clinic was closing, I was inspired to take the leap and build a new practice that would be quintessentially advanced practice nursing: heart-led and patient-focused. I pair heart and brain, conventional and integrative, but most of all, I believe my patients while holding space for a better, healthier future for all of us. 

My goal is to build a clinical resource and networking hub for EDS and hypermobility care in Austin, TX (and beyond). Towards this goal, I am partnering with friends and colleagues that I have met along my journey. Christie Cox, now a board-certified Patient Advocate, is a champion for the under-recognized syndromes, and author of "Holding It All Together when You're Hypermobile: Achieve a Better Life Experience with EDS, POTS, and Joint Instability". I recruited her to work with my patients to help foster their own understanding of their medical story. Together, she works with patients to optimize the presentation of their symptoms and history to craft an easily digestible "one-pager" for providers. All of us have endured some form of medical trauma or gas-lighting, so I believe it is important to start with a clean slate and a positive reflection, while still honoring the odyssey we all travel.