A psychotherapist on Fox News this weekend claimed he’s witnessing a huge hike in Donald Trump-related distress and anxiety among patients who attend his practice.
New York City-based Jonathan Alpert stressed at the start of his “Sunday Briefing” interview with anchor Peter Doocy that so-called “Trump Derangement Syndrome” — the partisan insult that top Republicans often like to lob at anyone who dares to criticize anything about the president ― is not a real medical diagnosis.
But the emotional fallout that some of his patients are experiencing, which is linked to their fury with Trump, is very real and something he is “deeply, deeply concerned about,” he said.
“We see great division in families and friendships broken up over how someone may feel about Trump,” noted Alpert, who last week penned an essay for The Wall Street Journal in which he admitted that “no therapist would render such a derogatory and partisan diagnosis, but I’ve seen it in my practice.”
“What I’m seeing is symptoms that in many ways mirror other disorders,” Alpert said on Fox. “So, people are highly anxious, they’re angry. They can’t sleep. One person even said she couldn’t possibly enjoy a family vacation as long as Trump is out there. These are hallmark features of any disorder that I treat every day of the week, and we should really be concerned about this.”
