While psychologists have speculated from afar about President Donald Trump's mental instability, a psychologist said his manic episodes and the need for constant attention is making Americans anxiety-ridden and in need of mental health care.
According to a psychologist who spoke with Politico, Trump's distinctive brand of "provocation, brinkmanship, and self-drama," is leading to what she calls "Trump Anxiety Disorder" that is affecting even those who don't follow politics.
Jennifer Panning, the psychologist from Evanston, Illinois, who coined the malady, explained it as marked by such symptoms as “increased worry, obsessive thought patterns, muscle tension and obsessive preoccupation with the news."
According to a therapist Cynthia Baum-Baicker, who is treating a couple whose sex life has been undermined by conflicting opinions about Trump, the president -- as an omnipresent figure -- looms darkly over everyone's lives.
“Authority figures represent the parent, [so] President Trump seats in the seat of parent for all Americans,” explained Baum-Baicker. “So now, my ‘father figure’ is a bully, is an authoritarian who doesn’t believe in studying and doing homework. ... [Rather than reassurance] he creates uncertainty.”
Trump's deleterious effect on peoples' mental health isn't just affecting liberals --even conservatives are having anxiety issues.
"Conservatives are hurting, too,” Washington D.C. psychotherapist Elisabeth Joy LaMotte added. “I view this anxiety as collective in a very strong sense. They’re hurting in part because they feel they don’t have permission to share their real views, or they feel conflicted because they agree with things that the president is doing but they’re uncomfortable with his language and tactics.... And they feel alienated and isolated from friends and family who differ from their views, as if there’s not permission to view it in a different way in D.C.”
“Human beings hate two things,” contributed New York psychiatrist Michael Dulchin about Trump's unpredictability. The ability “to look to the future and think you don’t have enough energy to succeed and live up to your expectations. The other is to not be able to predict the environment.”
He then added the two put together have only one result: “Anxiety and depression.”
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