Letter from Buenos Aires by David Rosenfeld
Dear all, Here in Buenos Aires / Tango city / We are working / By telephone / And Skype / With patients / The country will be / Confined / I repeat / All the country will Be Confined…
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…
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…
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…
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…
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…
Letter from San Francisco by Drew Tillotson
It is difficult here in San Francisco. We are officially in “shelter in place” mode, encouraged to remain at home. We expect our situation to be similar to what Italy has gone through. We’re told the onslaught is a matter of time, not if, but when.
Letter from Lombardy by Pina Antinucci
Hello, everyone, I am writing from Lombardy, and the picture I have is of frightened young people who are impatient to get rid of the obstacles to their self-created lives, because they are afraid of becoming helpless…
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.
Letter from Istanbul by Ümit Eren Yurtsever
During the past five days of analysis, I can say that the patients have lost the line between fantasy and reality. They no longer can tell the difference. They have lost the concept of interior and exterior. They say they are living in a home..
Letter from Bethesda by Marc Nemiroff
The pandemic is terrifying, and I often dissociate intentionally from the danger. It is exhausting to be constantly, unchangingly aware that there is an enemy out there; it is really there. It is invisible. It could kill me and the people I love. Some days, I am on Zoom until my eyes can’t see and my head feels caught between two cymbals, like in an old…
Letter from Fontainebleau by Gianpiero Petriglieri
I spoke to an old therapist friend and finally understand why everyone’s so exhausted after video calls. It’s the plausible deniability of each other’s absence. Our minds are tricked into the idea of being together when our bodies…
Letters from Milán, Kassel, London and Warsaw
Dear friends, dear all. I’m from Milan. I’ve been living in isolation since the end of February. Now, it’s almost a month. I’m seeing patients through Skype—all of them, including the one previously on the couch. No direct contact. They pay through the internet as well. Patients are now tired. Some of them are afraid to lose their jobs. Some have already lost them. They do not see the end of this nightmare. Children stopped going to school…
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.
Letter from Moscow by Irina Sizikova
I am a psychoanalyst from Moscow. Moscow has become empty. I’ve never seen Moscow in this condition. We now live in uncertainty and isolation. I do not have experience with remote analysis. As of this week, I have needed to reorganize my entire working schedule…
Letters from Cape Town and San Francisco by Ronald Davies and Alice Lowe Shaw
I work privately and in our public health system—where most of our patients come from severely impoverished backgrounds—where therapy can be framed as being psychoanalytically informed.
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…
Letters from Rio de Janeiro and Basel by Laura Ferreira and Joachim Küchenhoff
Thanks for this space! I hope you’re doing well with all the restrictions. I have two thoughts: First, we are dealing with the fear of death, this fear of annihilation, which is experienced differently for each of us and must be especially mobilizing for those who are in the high-risk group. Generally, for the older generation…
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…