Le groupe comme enveloppe psychique en temps de pandémie et de barbarie au Brésil

Abstract

Context

The context experienced by the Brazilian population in 2020 was, and has remained, one of precariousness regarding health, economics, and politics. A platform was created in March of that year, where more than 4200 psychologists voluntarily registered to provide online assistance to healthcare professionals on the front-line of the combat against COVID-19. The project also included support network for these psychologists.

Objectives

This article aims to present and discuss one of the modes of support offered by the platform: the “elaboration groups” by showing the constitution of their psychic envelope.

Method

This article takes the form of a case study based on the concept of psychic envelope developed by the theories of Anzieu, Houzel and Ciccone. For the purpose of this analysis, the scenes of two groups were brought together, one coordinated by two coordinators and the other by one. The main objective of the groups was to provide a space where the participants could discuss and think about the clinical experience they were having in the project.

Results

We can distinguish three moments in the history of the groups: a first one, of formation, during which the psychologists arrived trying to create contours and exchange, but in a desperate and rigid way. However, the capacity developed by the groups to welcome what everyone had to say allowed the creation of an extremely affectionate bond between the participants. A second moment, when the recognition of the importance of the encounter with the other and the recovery of individual capacities generated a return to culture and to the social pact. And finally, the moment when the groups were coming to an end, which served as a ritual in the process of mourning the “life” that each person had lived, allowing the release of each one's libido for the constitution of new life projects.

Conclusion

We noticed that the notion of who was the real patient of the platform tended to get lost, as the psychologists also relied on the network to cope with their anguish. Two tasks were thus fulfilled: the one initially foreseen of support to the assistance given by the psychologists to the healthcare professionals; and another, of a psychic envelope sufficiently firm and elastic to allow a quantum of drive connection necessary to survive and dream.