Breast Cancer Recovery

Somatic mental health care and trauma-informed bodywork

Cancer sucks.

Let’s help you get better faster

Recovery after cancer can be complicated.

Surgery can leave you with stiffness, scarring, pain, numbness, and risk of lymphedema.

Chemotherapy can cause brain fog, fatigue, and numbness.

Radiation can cause new problems with pain, skin changes, and more long after treatment ends.

There’s also the mental side of things - integrating changes into your body image, learning how to trust your body again, and coping with the trauma of going through a cancer diagnosis and treatment.

Some people experience more of these problems than others, but everyone deserves healing care that includes their whole self.

hand gently touching the water surface

Treatments offered

  • Using a gentle light touch, we improve the flow of the lymphatic system. Benefits include preventing or managing lymphedema, reducing inflammation, enhancing immune system function, managing pain, and relieving stress. Lymphatic massage is safe during all stages of cancer treatment and survivorship.

  • Reduce chest tightness and stiffness with myofascial release, lymphatic drainage massage, soft tissue mobilization, axillary cording release, cupping, and scar massage.

  • Reduce chemo brain by helping the brain clear waste products using a combination of lymphatic drainage and craniosacral techniques.

  • Find strategies and supports that allow you to function better even when your brain feels less reliable.

  • Learn to live with your fatigue by pacing yourself. Make strategic choices about what you do and how you do it, so you can do the things that matter most to you.

  • Body-based mental health care to heal from the grief, trauma, anxiety, and stress that can come along with a cancer diagnosis. Repair your relationship with your body in a safe, affirming setting.

  • Process the overwhelming fear, helplessness, stress, and loss of security that can come along with a life-changing diagnosis and treatment.

Hi! I’m Mara Levy MSOT, OTR/L, CLT-LANA, SEP

That pile of letters means that I’m a licensed occupational therapist, a certified lymphedema therapist, and a somatic experiencing practitioner.

I’m a cancer survivor myself, and I know some of the ways cancer can affect a person’s whole life firsthand. I’ve been involved in breast cancer care and lymphedema treatment since 2013, and I’ve seen people through their whole journeys from just after diagnosis to years into survivorship.

Check my bio to learn more about me. If you’re wondering whether I have experience with your particular situation, feel free to contact me.

Mara Levy in a rainbow necklace looking up at the camera

Logistics

For hands-on care, schedule a “Bodywork” appointment type.

Appointments are $195 for a 60 minute session or $270 for a 90 minute session.

10 visit packages available at $1750 for 60 min sessions and $2400 for 90 min sessions

A limited number of sliding scale appointments are available.

Insurance is not accepted, but you can use your FSA/HSA.

A superbill can be provided if arranged in advance.

Your odds of getting reimbursed by insurance may improve if you have a doctor’s referral that says “occupational therapy” and the medical diagnosis I’m treating.

Appointments are at an ADA-compliant office suite in downtown Silver Spring, MD just north of Washington, DC.