Christine McDevitt, MS, OTR/L is the founder of Farfalla Integrative Health and a licensed occupational therapist with over 25 years of experience. She provides occupational therapy in the Philadelphia area, working with adults who want to function better in daily life despite persistent physical, cognitive, or emotional challenges.
You’re welcome to schedule a brief phone call or video chat to discuss your situation.
What if it didn’t have to be so hard to get through the day?
Many people who seek out occupational therapy notice that daily life still feels harder than they think it should after receiving appropriate medical or mental health care to help with symptoms such as:
- chronic or persistent pain
- fatigue or low energy
- movement limitations
- difficulty with attention or organization
- anxious or discouraging thoughts
- sleep disturbances
- sensory overload
While you may have made progress with treatment and gained helpful insights, that progress doesn’t always translate into being able to do the things that matter in your life as easily or well as you’d like.
In some cases, symptoms continue to interfere with specific areas of daily life even after appropriate care.
You might still find that:
- It takes more effort to stay focused on tasks at work.
- Keeping up with responsibilities at home is physically or mentally exhausting.
- You avoid certain activities because they either feel overwhelming or you’re concerned about how your body will respond.
- You can manage some parts of your day well, but struggle with others.
Sometimes these challenges show up most in specific activities or situations rather than across your entire day.
Why Daily Life Can Still Feel Difficult
Your everyday activities require more from your body and mind than you may realize.
Tasks like getting ready in the morning, working, managing your home, or engaging in social or recreational activities all place demands on your physical capacity, energy, attention, and emotional regulation.
When those demands exceed what your body or mind can currently handle, even familiar activities can start to feel hard or exhausting. This can create patterns where certain situations consistently feel overwhelming.
This can happen even if you are doing everything “right” and have made progress in other areas of your health.
Occupational therapy helps you improve the fit between what your life requires and what your body and mind can currently manage. This helps tasks feel more doable.
You don’t have to figure it all out on your own.
What Is Occupational Therapy (OT)?
Occupational therapy is a healthcare service that helps you find solutions to participate more easily and fully in the activities that make up your daily life. These activities, often called occupations, include things like
- managing a household
- caring for yourself or others
- working or going to school
- driving
- maintaining effective routines
- engaging in meaningful social or recreational pursuits
Rather than treating a diagnosis, occupational therapy addresses how physical symptoms, cognitive demands, emotional patterns, and environmental factors interact to affect you and your daily life experiences.
OT looks at how challenges show up in real-world situations and helps you find ways to function better so you can successfully do the things you need or want to do.
Occupational therapy is different from physical therapy or psychotherapy and can be an excellent complement to both.
Rather than being concerned with only physical measures or developing insight, the focus in OT is on doing daily activities more effectively so you have greater quality of life in the areas that matter to you.
How Occupational Therapy Can Help You
Occupational therapy helps bridge the gap between improvements in symptoms and being able to have a meaningful, satisfying life.
By improving the fit between your strengths, current challenge areas, and what your life activities require for successful completion, OT can help make it easier to do the things that are most important to you.
Depending on your needs, occupational therapy can help you:
- Structure your day to help your routine work for you instead of against you.
- Reduce pain or fatigue during household, work, or recreational activities.
- Increase your physical or mental tolerance for doing things outside of your own home.
- Enjoy socializing with friends and family again.
- Feel less overwhelmed during tasks that require more focus and attention.
- Establish habits that consistently optimize your health, sleep, and well-being.
- Engage in other specific activities that are meaningful to you but not on this list.
This is your life. You choose the focus areas.
We then work together, considering your strengths and unique circumstances, to move toward the outcomes you want.
Over time, many people notice that they feel and function better more consistently and with less effort.
Occupational therapy can be used alongside other forms of care and can play an important role when symptoms persist despite appropriate treatment.
OT is not a replacement for medical, psychiatric, or emergency services.
What To Expect During Occupational Therapy Sessions
At Farfalla Integrative Health, OT sessions are client-centered, interactive, and always mindful of your safety.
The focus is on understanding how your challenges show up in your normal daily life and finding sustainable ways to help you complete those life activities as easily and effectively as possible.
Initial evaluation
The initial evaluation is typically 75 minutes long. During the evaluation we will:
- assess your symptoms, physical and cognitive status, and emotional patterns and discuss the environments where your daily activities take place.
- clarify your daily responsibilities, current challenges, and the factors that make certain tasks feel hard for you.
- develop a plan for our sessions together that’s grounded in the specific real-life outcomes that you’d like to work toward.
Follow-up sessions
Follow-up sessions each last up to an hour and can include one or more types of interventions.
During follow-up sessions, depending on your needs and goals, your therapist may work with you to
- analyze and adapt your tasks, routines, or environment to better match your capacity so it’s easier to get things done
- incorporate practical techniques that make the most of your strengths so you can better manage household responsibilities, work, and social situations
- address physical symptoms that interfere with daily activities using body-based treatments (including myofascial release and acupressure) as appropriate
- develop strategies to regulate emotional responses or manage cognitive difficulties in situations that you find challenging
- create a customized home program so you keep making progress outside of session times
For more information, see frequently asked questions about occupational therapy.
Meet Your Occupational Therapist
Occupational therapy services are provided by Christine McDevitt, MS, OTR/L, founder of Farfalla Integrative Health.
Christine is an occupational therapist with over 25 years of experience treating adults with a variety of diagnoses across multiple clinical settings and cultural contexts. She is licensed in Pennsylvania and New Jersey.
Christine has advanced training in complementary approaches that inform her clinical perspective. She always considers the unique demands of each person’s life and teaches strategies and techniques that are realistic, adaptable, and sustainable long-term.
How Occupational Therapy Fits Within Farfalla Integrative Health’s Services
Farfalla Integrative Health offers multiple services designed to help people feel like themselves again. Occupational therapy is one of these services and is subject to healthcare regulations and state licensure laws.
To comply with Pennsylvania law, a prescription from your doctor is required to begin OT services.
Sessions are available:
- In-person at the office near northwest Philadelphia in Lafayette Hill, PA.
- Via telehealth to residents of Pennsylvania and New Jersey using secure video conferencing.
- On-site (e.g., at your home or workplace) – These visits may be possible on a case-by-case basis depending on your location.
All OT services are provided by Christine McDevitt, MS, OTR/L under a formal occupational therapy plan of care.
When appropriate and if desired, additional methods such as EFT, acupressure, or myofascial release may be included in an occupational therapy plan of care while making sure that we respect licensure law and scope of practice issues. Services are not automatically combined, and no modalities are incorporated into your care without your consent.
Insurance & Payment Information
Occupational therapy services at Farfalla Integrative Health are provided on a private-pay basis.
Farfalla Integrative Health does not participate directly with insurance networks. If you have out-of-network benefits on your insurance plan, you may be able to submit claims to your insurance company for possible reimbursement.
How To Get Started
If you think occupational therapy at Farfalla Integrative Health might be a good fit, you’re welcome to take the next step that feels right for you.
You can:
- Explore the website to learn more about starting OT.
- Reach out by email (christine@farfallaintegrativehealth.com) if you have a specific question.
- Schedule a 20-minute phone call or video chat to discuss your situation and any questions or concerns you may have. This call is simply to see if we might be a good fit. There is no pressure or obligation to schedule services.
- Start the scheduling process online if you’re ready to move forward with an OT evaluation.