Emotional Moment Research Articles

The Union That Shaped the Confederacy: Robert Toombs and Alexander H. Stephens

One was a robust charmer given to fits of passion, whose physical appeal could captivate women as easily as cajole colleagues. The other was a frail, melancholy man of quiet intellect, whose ailments drove him eventually to alcohol and drug addiction. Born into different social classes, they were as opposite as men could be. Yet these sons of Georgia, Robert Toombs and Alexander H. Stephens, became fast friends and together changed the course of the South. Writing with the style and authority that has made him one of our most popular historians of the Civil War, William C. Davis has written a biography of a friendship that captures the Confederacy in microcosm. He tells how Toombs and Stephens dominated the formation of the new nation and served as its vice president and secretary of state. After years of disillusionment, each abandoned participation in the government and left to its own fate a Confederacy that would not dance to their tune. Davis traces this unlikely relationship from its early days in the Georgia legislature through the trials of secession and war, revealing how both men persevered during the war and developed a deep animosity for Jefferson Davis. He then chronicles their postwar lives up to the emotional moment when Toombs stood eulogizing his long-time friend at his funeral, just four months after Stephens was elected governor of the Georgia they had loved as much as one another. Drawing extensively on primary sources, including Stephens's voluminous letters and Toombs' widely scattered papers, Davis tells how two men of different temperaments remained friends, out of step with all but a few and occasionally even with each He concentrates on their Confederate years, when the fraternity they shared had its greatest impact, to show how they embodied both the strengths and the weaknesses of the Confederacy. While there are biographies of each man, none convey the significance or the depth of their friendship. Davis shows us how they loved the South as it once was, the Union as they thought it ought to have been, and the Confederacy of their dreams that never came to be. They lost all three, but through five decades of crisis, they never failed each other.

La palabra en las maternidades: una aproximación a la psicología perinatal

El reconocimiento del recién nacido como un ser interactuante con el medio físico y humano que lo rodea, implicó cambios en las conductas de los equipos de salud , a cargo de las unidades de internación neonatal. Los conceptos de interacciones precoces, de apego, de díada, de vulnerabilidad maternal, competencias conductuales del recien nacido, y su utilización reciente en el desarrollo de la psicología perinatal, marcaron una transformación en el enfoque de los distintos profesionales involucrados en el proceso del nacimiento. Por un lado, podemos decir que la medicalización del acto del nacimiento en la sociedad occidental ha permitido disminuír el riesgo morbi-mortalidad materno-neonatal. Pero, este progreso se ha realizado a expensas de la expresión de la emoción en esos momentos. La introducción del campo psicológico durante el período neonatal es un campo nuevo del conocimiento. La historia nos muestra que en distintos períodos y culturas existían amuletos, brebajes, y otros elementos asociados a lo mágico que se utilizaban para conjurar el riesgo de muerte para el niño y/o la madre en el momento del parto. Todas estas prácticas ocupaban de alguna manera, el lugar de la palabra, en un momento difícil y de gran intensidad emocional: el momento del nacimiento. Sera necesario atravesar todavía un largo y dificil camino para que la psicología perinatal pueda recuperar el espacio histórico de las antiguas matronas y tomar la palabra en las maternidades, sabiendo que el escenario principal es ocupado por el cuerpo de la madre, primero y por el del niño despues. A través de nuestro trabajo cotidiano en la maternidad, junto a pediatras y neonatólogos hemos comprobado que la palabra emerge a partir de que el psicólogo mismo “pone el cuerpo” junto al de la madre, al del niño y al equipo médico. Y es la palabra la que contribuye a facilitar la dimensión emocional de la maternidad e ubicar al niño en el encadenamiento histórico familiar, posibilitando su “nacimiento psicológico”.

1388 The patient-held record: An aid in the management of cancer patients in a gynaecology department

In an attempt to improve communication to cancer patients with regard to their illness, a project was started in May 1993 in our Gynaecology Out-Patients Department (OPD). Our aims were the following: (a) to improve the autonomy of the patient (b) to enhance the role of nurses in counseling (c) to improve communication between in- and out-patient department Analysis of the communication process has resulted in the development of a Patient-Held Record, containing a written condensation of all consultations. Communication between professionals and patients was improved by introducing checklists for the purpose of counselling. The communication between the in- and out-patient department was aided by the introduction of structured referral notes. Results The information given at the OPD to cancer patients usually has far reaching consequences and occurs at a highly emotional moment. It is therefore quite understandable that the information given by the doctor is usually not completely understood. Many patients will want further information regarding their disease soon after leaving the consulting room. The introduction of the Patient-Held Record enables them to read the information provided at a time of their own choosing and thereby reducing their dependence. Adding checklists will enable health professionals to ensure that the information given is complete and complies with the recent introduction of legislation on professional conduct. Communication between health workers is greatly improved by structuring the written notes. A postal survey was held amongst the first 80 patients with regards to their experience in the use of the Patient-Held Record, the findings of which will be presented.

The Fourth Interdisciplinary Congress on Women

Over 2,000 delegates from 104 countries answered the Roll-Call in the Hunter College auditorium, led by Keynote speaker Jeanetta Cole, President of Spellman College. Beginning with Algeria and Argentina, down the alphabet she went and delegates rose to their feet to proudly represent their countries. It was an emotional moment for me as I stood to represent Lebanon.

Anniversary Address

To one whose working life has been in large measure focused upon our Society, and whose thoughts have been often enough drawn to it from remote parts of the world and sometimes in strange circumstance, the presentation of his first Anniversary Address is an emotional moment. I say that in all deliberation. For the most part I do not much believe in emotion; I prefer hard outlines to my thinking and regard sentiment as a rare and perilous indulgence. If I indulge now for an instant, you will I hope infer a gratitude, deeper than I care to say, to you who have entrusted me with your presidency and have so crowned a career of long and (I trust) reasonably faithful service to the discipline for which we stand.