The critical importance of psychotherapy has become especially clear during the Covid-19 pandemic. In the US alone at least 209,600 have died, according to a New York Times database on October 5th, 2020. Those can be dry statistics that create numbness as we spin the daily news. Yet these seemingly empty numbers reflect the deaths of babies, adolescents, young and old and their families who feel the unbearable pain of loss in their hearts. There are the many thousands of people who became ill and had to isolate without loved ones either at home or in the hospital while they suffered through pneumonia and worse.

Our President and his wife were confirmed positive for Covid-19 on Oct 2, 2020. Due to his falsifications regarding risks, disseminating misinformation about the disease, his refusal to implement safe practices, which include wearing a mask, and social distancing, rather he promoted activities that encouraged others to congregate in close proximity defying all established safe practices. He thumbed his cocky nose at scientific evidence resulting in disastrous consequences.

Lives are not statistics as each person has a story: regardless of age or circumstance; their lives are held hostage by a disease with, for some, lifetime effects. Or death. Now the President, flaunting his stupidity, has been bitten by the venomous snake of his own making.  There will again be a coverup, lies and deceit as to progression of events leading to his Covid-19 diagnosis. All his corrupt practices we have endure but in the face of the pandemic, his lies have costs us everything.

Psychological Pain of the Pandemic

There has been extreme stress throughout his presidency that have added to the effects of the pandemic: the extreme isolation that endures month after month; the fallout of loss of jobs, loss of institutions we counted on; the feeling of chaos has heightened. Research cardiologists at the Cleveland Clinic have referred to “broken-heart syndrome as “stress cardiomyopathy” and have found significant increase during the pandemic: from 1.7 percent pre-pandemic to 7.8 percent between March and April 30., 2020. The symptoms of stress cardiomyopathy are chest pain, and shortness of breath that can mimic a heart attack. (AARP Bulletin, September 2020) Please consider psychotherapy to help you weather the extreme stress of our situation.