In general, the situation’s complexities and hardships are compounded with respect to one’s close family members or friends in a high-risk group. The more we stay away from our at-risk loved ones in order to protect them, the more they are subject to the dangers of loneliness. Two participants reported initiating a support and therapy group for people in high-risk populations. Their forced isolation created a powerful need for emotional discourse, and in some cases technology proved to be a solution (also see section on Technologies, below). These groups include the group facilitated by Orna and Daniella with women over 80 in their local community, and Orly’s group for stoma patients. In both cases, the therapists are themselves members of the community in question. Orna and Daniella stated that the participants in the older-adult group they facilitate stated that “loneliness is more of a threat to us than Covid.” I was so moved by this declaration that I chose it as the subtitle of the entire issue.
In summary, the Covid-19 experience reflected in this study appears to be a non-realistic experience that combines loss of control, fear, anxiety, and stress, as well as potential loneliness, a threat that increases for members of at-risk populations. In general, Covid-19 fundamentally disrupts people’s lives. The experience reflected in participants’ descriptions certainly evokes a sense of “shattered lives.”
The Technologies – Zoom, WhatsApp, Video, etc.
All the practitioners who appear in this issue addressed the use of technology in their psychological practice during Corona times. Even the interviews for this issue were conducted on Zoom. Even though most participants mentioned various difficulties they encountered in the use of technology, which are discussed in the section on Challenges for Patients and Therapists, the transition to a virtual platform was relatively easy for them because they all had some experience with the Zoom platform prior to the Covid-19 pandemic.
It is important to note that all participants, including myself, are connected to the Professional School of Psychology, where Dr. Haim Weinberg established a distant learning doctorate program for Israeli students and initiated the use of the Zoom platform as a basic methodology for learning and experiencing group work (Weinberg & Rolnick, 2019). As a result, participants’ experience with remote treatment and learning modalities was much greater compared with the general population of practitioners in various fields of psychology.
Social distancing, which has been forced on everyone in Corona times, created an enormous need for intimacy in general, and emotional intimacy in particular. Primarily Zoom, but also other virtual platforms such as WhatsApp video, and even telephone calls, became everyday means of communication in general, including for individual and group therapy. Some people continue to resist the use of these technologies even more than six months after the outbreak of the pandemic (I will elaborate on this point below), yet most people have successfully transitioned to virtual platforms. In the absence of other alternatives, these are an excellent solution for addressing the communication-related issues of the Covid-19 experience, and especially the ensuing loneliness. Orly summed up this point as follows:
I keep on repeating this sentence to myself, that in times like these it is not the smart person who survives and not the strong person, but rather the person who is able to respond to change quickly and effectively. This group, and Zoom groups in general, offer a relatively rapid solution to the changes, and people really don’t have to remain alone. [they can and should] create their [own] interactions.
