In a climate of fear and isolation that equally affects us all, therapists are now being asked to help clients deal with the practical challenges of self-isolation in a time of danger and heightened anxiety. Just when human beings need support and belonging more than ever, social distancing and self-quarantining cut us off from others.

Individuals with histories of abandonment, abuse, rejection, neglect and failed attachment face an additional challenge: COVID-related isolation inevitably evokes childhood emotions and memories of the past, increasing the sense of painful aloneness.   Without adequate social supports, the client can only look to the therapist for connection. But the therapist feels equally helpless to help clients overcome the sense of being unwanted and unwelcome.

This webcast addresses how to help clients struggling with the isolation imposed by COVID to take in the support they do have, to understand the painful loneliness as feeling and body memories, and to transform the felt sense of being ‘outside looking in.’   

At the conclusion of this program, participants will be able to:

• Assess the impact of threat on the autonomic nervous system
  
• Describe the relationship between human connection and decreased stress
  
• Compare situational emotional responses versus implicit memories
  
• Explain the term ‘social engagement system’
  
• Describe uses of social engagement to help clients alleviate feelings of loneliness and isolation