Letter from Philadelphia by Harvey Schwartz
I’m noticing that my relationship to the experience of self-disclosure is being affected by this health crisis we are all in the midst of…
Letter from Bilbao by Cristina Escudero
Thank you for the valuable ideas you are sharing in this space. I appreciate it so much. It gives me a lot of support to do my job. Thank you for the generosity and time that you are taking now in sharing your experiences. In this post, I want to limit my ideas to the topic of technologies and treatment. Two weeks ago, I found myself in a very different and new scene. As I have had no experience in remote treatment, I have tried to do my best to maintain a psychoanalytical frame…
Letter from Pittsburgh by William F. Cornell
I am heartened that we have this shared space for the days and weeks ahead. I have been at my office for four days now and have worked with the majority of my clients by phone or Skype, although a significant number have chosen in-person sessions. We have modified our office setting to make this as safe as possible. I feel somewhat fortunate in that part of my practice for some time now has been on the phone or Skype…
Letter from New York by Michael Diamond
The president stubbornly and arrogantly persists in directing his own personal reality show, which in fact exposes an ongoing assault on reality itself and on the public’s intelligence. Our protests and resistance often situated in the public squares and streets of American cities, large and small, have been taken away…
Letter from Guadalajara by Carmen Cuenca Zavala
I have been reading most of the emails I can from all countries, and it helps me to feel accompanied in difficult moments, as well as it helps me to think about and to elaborate upon an experience that perhaps is overcoming us and is totally new.
Letter from Buenos Aires by Juan Pinetta
It is very interesting how this conversation is holding us all together, for in this state of affairs, our sense of safety is taxed to the limit. Even children who are the age of my daughter are dying. The situation is worrying. So I wonder: What remains of the thinking apparatus in times of catastrophe when we must make catastrophic changes?
Letter from Jerusalem by Yehuda Fraenkel
The magnitude of emotional load together with ethical and clinical questions puts us in a total “terra incognita” state. I think that the need for coherence in external chaos is indeed universal, yet to us are both a demand and praxis of psychoanalytic practice engaging intrapsychic chaos.
Letter from Beirut by Rosemarie Nassif
I am a candidate from the Lebanese association. As you may know, the last six months have been very hectic in Lebanon: first, the revolution movement…
Letter from Birmingham by Lee Ascherman
There is much to be disturbed about. We are socially isolated while surrounded by reports of death, risk to life by an invisible assailant, and countless tragedies compounded by mismanagement and blame. We are not sure our hospitals will be available to provide care if we or loved ones need it. Compounding all this is an economic crisis of depth and unclear duration.
Letter from Genoa by Cosimo Schinaia
Some days ago, I received a phone call from a friend of mine who is a doctor of general medicine. He wrote that he appreciated my essay on coronavirus posted on IPA´s website but that it is not too useful for him. The doctors in the hospital and in the medical offices are at risk of falling into a serious burnout…
Letter from Toronto by Stefania Baresic
As we do the holding for our clients in this time of confinement, accelerated changes, tragic losses, and fear, someone must hold us as well, being a loving partner who offers a hug at the end of day; or we must have a spiritual practice that calms and grounds our breathing or a community like this one, whom I can imagine silently and attentively listening. It has been a difficult two weeks…
Letter from New York by Joseph A. Cancelmo
The coronavirus pandemic has rocked our world as we knew it, bringing visceral waves of anxiety and fear and unspeakable, unbearable loss in its wake. For many of us, our way of life, our livelihood, our intimacies, and our social connections have been relegated to the phone and the internet—digital lifelines of virtual contact in which the very medium of connection can accentuate the distance, the loneliness.
DISORDERED: Conversations about mental health and society by Rachel Brown
Disordered was a collaborative, participatory street art project designed to destigmatize mental health challenges like depression and anxiety, and reframe health as a societal issue. The project took the form of conversations, stickers, signs, and a mural in public spaces around New York City. Through a combination of social practice and guerrilla strategies, Disordered intervened in public places, creating a space for personal interactions about the connections between mental health challenges and societal issues. It pushed ideas about how our history, culture, political, and economic systems affect our health in order to inspire personal, social, and political transformations.
UNDERSTANDING, CHARLOTTESVILLE by Jared Russell
For the previous issue of ROOM, I contributed a piece that argued against the idealization of tolerance, diversity and understanding that I see so many in the psychoanalytic community currently engaged in. I’m aware that some readers…
IN THE LAND OF MAKE BELIEVE: THE NEW TRUTH THAT GETS RID OF LOSS by Coline Covington
A patient in her early thirties recently admitted that she hadn’t voted, yet again…
‘CAN YOU SEE ME?’ PSYCHOANALYSIS AND SOUL-BLINDNESS by Carlos Padrón
In the epigraph, Jimi Hendrix’s poetic alter-ego expresses skepticism in regard to being seen and heard. Does he pose a question: “Can you see me?”; a demand: “Can you see me!”; or perhaps a plea: “Can you see me…please”?…
A VIEW OF THE ELECTION FROM THE OUTPOSTS OF OLD AGE by Janet Fisher
An eighty-four year old woman who has been in therapy for years for chronic anxiety has a satisfying and still thriving career, a solid marriage…