The following article by Kali Holloway was posted on the AlterNet website July 17, 2017:
There is no way to sugarcoat the fact that Trump has helped stoke some of the ugliest aspects imaginable. But there are voices of sanity and many helpful things we can do.
The day after the 2016 presidential election, therapists around the country reported a surge in clients emotionally devastated by the shock and disgust of Donald Trump’s win. Several psychologists recounted meeting with patients who compared the jarring effect of the election to the psychological blow of 9/11.
Tracey Rubenstein, a Florida-based social worker, told JTA that in the months following Trump’s victory, “80 percent of her clients would cite the election and its aftermath as a new source of fear, sadness or anxiety in their lives.” Psychotherapist Enrico Gnaulati wrote that he was “inundated with clients using therapy time to process their shock, disbelief, dismay, and outrage.” This June, the New York Times spoke with psychologist Robert Duff, who said the political climate is “a topic of conversation and a source of anxiety in nearly every clinical case that I have worked with since the presidential election.” Four decades of practice didn’t prepare psychologist Sam Menahem for the outpouring of grief he saw following Trump’s triumph, which affected patients more extremely than any other election he recalled. “I’ve never seen anything like this,” Menahem told JTA, “never.” Continue reading “Trump Trauma Is Real and Affecting Many. We Need to Be Brave and Fight Back”