We were lucky to catch up with Erica Rodas recently and have shared our conversation below.

Erica, appreciate you joining us today. Was there a defining moment in your professional career? A moment that changed the trajectory of your career?

Setting the scene. I was 3 years into what initially was my dream job. A private practice in Manhattan working with women with breast cancer and chronic pain. A supervisor who for the most part gave me the freedom to practice how I wanted. A history of chronic low back pain that spanned nearly 8 years, and that I finally felt I had ‘managed.’ A new relationship that felt safe, exciting, possible. I was doing yoga, meditating, going to acupuncture, eating ‘well’, and all the things that felt supportive. And then a pelvic pain appeared that was unlike any other pain I’d had before.

It was unlike any other pain because it impacted my sense of womanhood and self in a way that back pain, or shoulder pain, or elbow pain, hadn’t. I was met initially with confusion from my peers: ‘but you haven’t even had kids yet?’, maddening advice from a provider: ‘maybe you just need to masturbate more?’ and a shocking realization that this was an area of the body that I had not been equipped to really know. How my medical training, and my experience as a woman in our culture, had left out this vital education – when it came to the relationship I had with my female body, and the power in those places. How our bodies connect us to our sense of self, creativity, and vitality in a way that we’d been turned away from. How they are ours to reclaim.

And that in all the talk of ‘managing’ symptoms, ‘fixing’ bodily problems, we’d missed the whole shebang. The pulse of the thing, the spirit of it all. The ways our bodies express — and the things we’re here to say. A year later, I launched Rubia.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Rubia is a space for women’s stories, feeling, remembering. To reclaim and remember your body as your own – and to know your body as a connection to your reason for being here, your art.

I support women in virtual and in-person sessions, group circles, as well as teach at the university and community level. In a session, I may work with someone around a particular event (eg a birth story, diagnosis, miscarriage, abortion, medical treatment) that was never fully witnessed – or walk with a woman back towards her self in the rhythm and language of her own body – in unravelling the stories we’ve learned in shame about what it means to be a Woman.

I like to think I am a bridge between more traditional healthcare and spiritual practice. Between a certain rupture or challenge and the possibility or creativity you long to express. In my nearly 10 years as an occupational therapist, I will never see your body as ‘broken’ or something to fix. Rather, a well of wisdom – a collection of your own experiences – that is all part of your craft, your voice, your art.

Rubia is the kind of women’s healthcare I always longed for. A space that acknowledges the physical, emotional and spiritual parts of you. A place to rest, shed the story, lay down the thing you never wanted to carry. To radically believe in your body’s ability to heal. And to let Life surprise you with what’s next. To walk head held high, hand on heart, within the things that make you feel alive.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

Part of the reason I’m able to speak to this idea of ‘relationship with body’ so intimately is because my body and I have been through it. Over a decade of some kind of chronic pain, disordered eating and exercise patterns as a teen, a real shame and (dare I say) hatred around my breasts. 14 years of hormonal birth control. A certain amount of numbness when it came to my sexual partners. An identification with being ‘too sensitive,’ ‘anxious,’ or ‘too much.’

And yet, 38 years into living in this body, I can firmly say she was protecting me in all of it. So many years living in this body, she’s still here. Every ‘symptom’ was an expression of her own language. Every feeling of weakness or ‘too much’-ness something I was carrying that was not even mine.

Today, I have a profound sense of love for this body. To know that there is nothing I could meet that would eclipse her own power. She is a part of everything I do. I love her for the way she has led me back to my writing, my creative expression, my ability to dream, my fierce vision for what our relationships with our bodies can really be. It’s something that is accessible for all of us when we know how to start. To stop thinking of it as something ‘only your [doctor / expert / therapist] can know’ and to know how to build practices and a Life that can really support YOU.

Once we move through some of the grief, the rage, the shame here, there is so much joy, playfulness and creativity on the other side.

If you could go back in time, do you think you would have chosen a different profession or specialty?

A mentor of mine once said, when in OT school, ‘[with your degree], you’re basically getting a pass into this whole field. What you make of it from there is your own.’ 12 years ago, the OT field felt a beautiful place to channel my interests in chronic pain, movement, psychosocial aspects of pain, this idea of the ‘whole person.’ I returned to school after 4 years of working in non-profit and wellness, so it felt very intentional in that way. And, there are aspects of the field in practice that don’t support these same aspects – specifically in caring for ‘the whole person’ and practitioner wellness. Still, I appreciate the lens it has given me in working with the body – and into curating my own framework and perspective.

Working with the female body is it for me. I would choose it 100 times over. I do love writing. But, my body feels very connected with my ability to express that. So, the different expressions my professional path has taken – clinic to private practice to hospital to my own business – all stem from that same love.

Contact Info:

• Website: ericarodas.com
• Instagram: @rubiawithericarodas
• Other: Substack (to return in coming months): https://thiswombofyoursrubia.substack.com/

Image Credits
Alexis Peterson Photography Sami Hobbs, Her Inner Wisdom