Treating anxiety disorders with an online psychologist in Paris during coronavirus confinement

Treating anxiety disorders during confinement with a psychologist

In recent weeks, the coronavirus epidemic has shaken
the entire world. We have already highlighted it in an
article on stress and anxiety, this period of
generalised confinement can awaken a certain number of psychological symptoms among which anxiety disorders are particularly represented.

If this term "anxiety disorder" is questionable, as it contributes to the change of the medico-social field, or to this obsessive neurotic tendency to question theories that work, it has the merit of shedding light on the pathological dimension of the symptom: anxiety disorders are characterised by being excessive and lasting.

For example, the coronavirus epidemic is not without causing a certain anxiety which, like a signal, invites us to follow safety measures to avoid getting sick or contaminating others. Likewise, the professional difficulties caused by confinement can just as much awaken anxiety and stress which, once again as a signal, can help us mobilise our organism to reorganise itself and to create new solutions.

But unlike this signal which allows the human organism to mobilise itself to dance with reality - the expression is from Fernando de Amorim - Freud revealed that anxiety could also be the signal of a danger which would come from within, or from our intrapsychic life.

It is this anxiety connected to our unconscious fantasies which is represented in our symptoms, particularly in anxiety disorders.

Freud noticed very early on that this excessive and repetitive dimension which manifests itself in the symptom is precisely what characterises the fight against unconscious desire. It is this pathological characteristic (excess and repetition) which is found in anxiety disorders, whether they are listed:

1) In the current European classification (ICD 10)

- Specific phobia
- Social anxiety disorder
- Anxiety disorder, generalised
- Panic disorder with or without agoraphobia - Post-traumatic stress disorder
- Obsessive Compulsive Disorder

2) In the current North American classification (DSM-5)

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- Obsessive-compulsive disorders, other associated disorders - Anxiety disorders
- Disorders associated with stress and trauma

If many of these symptoms are characteristic of obsessional neurosis, by classifying symptomatic phenomena also testifies to the preponderance of obsessive functioning among psychologists and psychiatrists. This neurotic tendency to make lists and to isolate psychologically (here the different symptoms) rubs shoulders with the error of reasoning which consists of believing that anxiety disorders can be treated with medication or brief therapies.

However, it is not because medication treatments or suggestive techniques (CBT, Sophrology, relaxation, hypnosis, etc.) can have a short-term effect on anxiety disorders that they cure them.

On the contrary, as the symptom is the expression of an unconscious conflict, any technique which does not take into consideration the psychological cause of the anxiety disorder cannot truly resolve it: it only delays treatment and it even happens that the treatment itself becomes the symptom (addiction to medications, creation of new obsessive rituals to be scrupulously respected every day, etc.)

This confusion in the medico-social field between the resolution of the symptom and its displacement has serious consequences, both for the patients suffering from anxiety disorders and for social security. We have already described it in an article on the abuse of the medico-psychological field, in recent publications and we will discuss it up later because the influence of these policies are, in this period of health and ecological crisis, more than ever relevant.

To conclude, psychological symptoms are treated by revealing through words the intrapsychic conflict that underlies them thanks to the method of free associations.

It is therefore by meeting a psychoanalyst, whether a trained psychologist or psychiatrist, that the patients of anxiety disorders will be able to treat them.

At a time of confinement linked to the coronavirus and for those who cannot meet a psychoanalyst for various reasons, it is indeed fortunate that it is possible to start psychotherapy online with a psychoanalyst, in Paris or elsewhere. For those who wish to find an online psychologist in Paris, do not hesitate to contact me directly by telephone.

Treat anxiety and stress with the help of a psychologist online or in Paris 9

Traduit du français par Olajumoke BALOGUN