Daniel S. Sokal Psychotherapy and Counseling

The key need, "...stable, nurturing and loving interaction with their parents" To an unexpected degree, the study of the children of the Great Depression followed a trajectory of resilience into the middle years of life, wrote Glen Elder, the author of that research. Brenda Volling, a psychology professor at the University of Michigan and an expert in social and emotional development, said one takeaway is that Depression-era children who fared best came from families who ov...ercame the economic fallout more readily and who, as a result, were less hostile, angry and depressed. To that end, what infants, toddlers and other children growing up in the Covid era need most now is stable, nurturing and loving interaction with their parents, Dr. Volling said." https://www.nytimes.com//he/Covid-toddlers-playdates.html

My colleague Justine Carino's great new podcast! Thanks for letting me be a part of it!

A beautiful tribute to the possibility of lovability and value.

Great post from a psychoanalytic group I’m in on the triggers of these overwhelming times! Thanks Michael Benn! The coronavirus crisis is the embodiment of the phenomenon that Freud called Das Unheimliche (The Uncanny). In this state, the person is tossed out of their sense of being at home, of being master of their fate. Freud gives the poignant example of a nighttime moment on a train when he sees an unfamiliar old man mistakenly entering his compartment, only to realize t...hat he is seeing his own reflection in the mirror of the small bathroom whose door has swung open from the jolting movement of the train. He describes the strangeness of the elderly face in the mirror as an uncanny moment in which the wrinkles of old age indicating impending death unraveled the threads of the illusion from which the self’s sense of immortality is woven. The coronavirus is certainly a major jolt to our train carriage. The familiar and safe has become unfamiliar and threatening. Physical stability is violently cast in doubt. Getting together with the people close to us is defined as dangerous. Life as we thought we knew and understood it has turned its back on us, and nothing may be taken for granted anymore. See more