Illustration by Kursat Unsal /Shutterstock.com

LETTER FROM BRAZIL

I started my psychoanalytic learning and political activism in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It was the spring of 1981, a time of turmoil and search for personal and collective freedom. I migrated from Brazil to the United States in 1990 with my husband, daughter, and all twenty-four volumes of the Brazilian edition of the works of Sigmund Freud.

Photo by IHH Humanitarian Relief Foundation | Azez, Aleppo.

WAR AND PANDEMIC IN ALEPPO by Mohamad Kebbewar

Danger during the war in Aleppo was marked with sound and smoke. During the pandemic, danger is boundless. It can be everywhere and anywhere. The most fashionable and well-off person can carry the virus and pass it on to me, while on the other hand, an armed person walking next to me on the sidewalk could be harmless. The invisible danger is what makes the virus lethal. In war, if the sound is far away, then I can assume I am safe.

Photo by Matthew Roth

FIRE AND ICE IN PORTLAND by Raphael Ogusz, Maryam Omidi, and Omer Leshem

Portland protesters armed with leaf blowers and cardboard signs face off with masked federal agents sporting fatigues and riot gear—guns, truncheons, and shields. Orange tear-gas clouds plume up from the tarmac as the agents grab protesters and hurl them into unmarked cars. These are images typically associated with far-off, war-torn countries ruled by authoritarian regimes—not democratic governments. But in less than six months, some of the most toxic elements of the US national psyche have risen to the surface, denuded by the global pandemic and bull-horned across the country by the divisive and belligerent rhetoric of the White House.

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LETTERS FROM LOCKDOWN by Tiffany Chu

Last week, I dug up a box of my parents’ old letters. They were written before my parents were married, while my mom was still in Taiwan and an ocean away from my dad in the United States. A surprising number of the letters were in English; the writing is stilted, and it’s clear that English is neither of my parents’ first language, but the mundane recounting of their days felt somehow both endearing and sacred. Holding the tangible artifacts of my parents’ courtship in my hands, I imagined for the first time the twentysomethings they were when they wrote those letters.

Graphic by ADELART/ Shutterstock.com

Letter from Pittsburgh by Miriam DeRiso

Yesterday, my phone rang early in the morning. The voice on the other end of the line whispered, with strain, “I’m sorry. I came home for spring break, and I won’t be returning to Pittsburgh for a while. I don’t know what we can do. Is there anything we can do?”

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Letter from New York by Kate Muldowney

I thought I’d share some thoughts I wrote earlier today. By way of explanation, I started my career as a young social worker at the outset of the AIDS crisis in the United States. These weeks have so reminded me of those early days of AIDS: the fear, terror, and confusion. After working in pediatric HIV in the Bronx for eight years, I was able to travel to visit schools and orphanages in East Africa numerous times. I witnessed firsthand the destruction that HIV…

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Letter from Paris by Julia-Flore Alibert

I would like to share with you my short experience doing video sessions with children from ages four to fifteen during this troubled period. I still work in my office, which is in a part of my home, so they can see me and the office on the video. Most of the children have chosen to continue the therapy. I tell the parents to let their child stay in a quiet room alone…

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Letter from Seattle by Adriana Prengler

In the Seattle suburbs (where I live), people stay at home, as in most cities in the world, except for outings for groceries, to the pharmacy, and for walks or biking on trails. My state (Washington State) has not officially declared a lockdown yet, even though there are many infected and many fatalities, especially among the elderly. As many others have described, I initially consulted with my patients about the possibility of continuing their treatment…

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Letter from Jerusalem by Viviane Chetrit-Vatine

Since last Monday, I have been working by phone, going through my regular schedule. All my patients in analysis are very well and responding to this situation. My patients who were in face-to-face psychotherapy are discovering how speaking on the phone allows them freer expression. But obviously this mean of communication…

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Letter from Bucharest by Daniela Andronache

In Romania, the coronavirus has only sickened less than three hundred (tested) people so far, and nobody has died until today. Our population seems to understand pretty well the recommendations of going out only for strict necessities. And yet, over these last couple of weeks, in the sessions with all my patients, I have begun to immensely appreciate the life experience…

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Letter from Krakow by Bartosz Puk

It’s so good to be able to communicate with you on the current difficulties and all the matters concerned with COVID-19. I have been working in my consulting room in Kraków, Poland, for the last week and plan to continue with my patients by telephone or online. I do my best to consider this an opportunity to become closer to my patients. I think we both come into contact with something through the “contact barrier” or thanks to the contact barrier and the virus.

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Letter from Paris by Bernard Chervet

Paris is empty, very empty. Very strange. But it is even possible to feel a beauty in this emptiness! I have never seen Paris this way and in this state. Since Tuesday, we have lived in a complete confinement, “lockdown.” We have to stay inside our houses, without permission to go out. We need a certificate to go out and buy our food.

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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…

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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…

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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…

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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?

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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.