Can We Hug? The vibrancy and vicissitudes of patients in person: Sifting through the rubble of Covid

Abstract

ABSTRACT This article sets forth how the dual influences of the shared emotional trauma of the pandemic plus the structure of the two dimensionality of remote analytic work led to triumphant first meetings when we returned to an in-person setting. I deconstruct the cascade of assaults on our lifestyles and our psyches resulting from the forced lockdown during the Covid pandemic. The paper braids together two unexpectedly affecting experiences of meeting in-person in 2022 and 2023 against the backdrop of the pandemic. One was with an individual patient and the other was with a class of advanced analytic candidates. I describe how, at long last, having the opportunity to meet our patients, students, and colleagues again elicited profound and overwhelming feelings, from anxiety and self-consciousness to delight and joy.