. . .to tune out all that I can of the pre-election coverage. I woke up at 3:00 in a rage about Trump, about the morons who support him, and about Republicans who let him get away with his bullshit. Laid awake for over an hour fuming on this and then woke up this morning exhausted and cranky. It’s bad enough that it invades my daytime hours, causing me to rant and vent and jack up my blood pressure, but when it wakes me up at night, it’s just too much.
So while I’m going to vote for Clinton, and probably work for the campaign at some point, for the sake of my health I’m going to stop reading election news (and even headlines, if I can avoid them), watching the national scare-tactic news, and avoid political discussions, including the ones on this board. I can’t add anything new, so it just becomes ranting and I’m mentally worn out.
Yeah, I know: so fucking what, right? Well, it is MPSIMS, so deal with it. Or send it to the pit and have a pile-on.
Amazing…this happened to me just three nights ago (Thursday night)! I slept fewer than three hours, because I was so worried about Hillary’s declining poll numbers, and obsessively checking the Dope (plus some fivethirtyeight, etc.).
I’ve had about ten crappy nights of sleep in the past six months, but always for other reasons: sick, or traveling, or jetlagged, or had to do some critical work I was behind on – but election jitters? That was a first – and, I sincerely hope, a last. So totally not worth it. It will take me a week to fully recover, with lost productivity and life enjoyment in the meantime.
Let’s promise right now we’ll take all this a little more lightly from now on! C’mon, Chefguy, we can do this!
Welp, I don’t think there ever was a dumpster fire like this when you were younger. :dubious:
But yeah, it’s probably best to cut off reading about the election by, say, 5 PM. For the same reason that you shouldn’t eat really spicy food right before bedtime. As soon as you get horizontal, it will return on you.
I’ve been half-wondering if there are shrinks around here that specialize in election anxiety. Unfortunately, this isn’t abstract to me. One of the candidates has a policy that would be ruinous to my family. I’m walking around with a lump in the pit of my stomach.
I suspect that I also have an undiagnosed mild form of PTSD from my Vietnam days, as I have incessant anxiety dreams. This aptly-named ‘dumpster fire’ doesn’t help, and it makes me nearly incoherent with rage. My wife is a news junkie, so I’ve started absenting myself from the room when the national news is on. I’ve also suspended my reading of the New York Times and skip any article in the local paper that has the name Trump in the headline. I will also skip the debates, as I suspect it will be a shit storm that will result in me hurling something at the TV. We’re going to an election night party, so I’ll catch up then. Honestly, it’s a relief to disengage.
I don’t watch any of it on TV. I read the NYTimes and Washington Post and this board. And even this limited exposure leaves me sputtering in rage and disbelief.
Frankly, I think the only historical event/news story that was as scary as the prospect of a Pr-s-d-nt Tr-mp (I can’t type it out) in terms of anticipated potential effect on my personal life was the Cuban missile crisis.
I guess this is how a lot of conservatives have been feeling, after having been convinced that Obama was going to take all their guns, enforce Sharia law, etc. - the difference, of course, is that none of those were ever legitimate threats, while Trump is legitimately DSM-IV material.
But after 8 years of paranoia, it’s no wonder they mistake Trump for a sane candidate.
I sincerely believe that Clinton is going to smash Trump in both the vote and electoral totals, because the voice of the outraged morons whose world no longer exists has been amplified all out of proportion to their real voting numbers.
I sincerely believe that Clinton, as a general type, is the President we need if not the President anyone much wants or likes.
I sincerely believe 2017 is going to be a major “WTF were we thinking!” year for the US.
…because I *have *to.
It’s too bad the old science fiction idea of “cold sleep” hasn’t been perfected yet. I think a lot of people would cast their absentee ballots, go to the Cryo-Sanitarium, and say “Don’t wake me until November 9.”
(Or possibly, “Depending on the outcome, maybe don’t wake me back up at all.”)
Hm. They really can induce comas these days, can’t they? Some unscrupulous anesthesiologist could make a mint, here!
I stopped paying attention to this election about a month ago. It wasn’t making me furious or giving me nightmares, I just decided I’d been hearing about this *(&^% election since last July and I was sick of it. Call it “election fatigue” if you will.
So I quit reading articles about it, in print or online. I zone out or change channels when it comes on TV. If it comes up in discussion I change the subject or excuse myself.
I made a similar decision last week. There’ve been too many nights lately when I’ve woken up at 3 or 4 in the morning and had to read for awhile to get my mind off it and hope I could go back to sleep before it was time to get up anyway.
This is weird. I too have experienced sleep loss over this Pres. election. Thing is, I’ve never lost sleep over an election before, but for some reason this one has me worried in a way I haven’t before.
Yeah, I’m having to do this, too. Yesterday is just spiraled into a bit of depression-style numbness.
It got better after the DNC. And I held out until the health scare (despite Clinton releasing even more health reports showing she was fine.) I don’t just get scared, usually. I get angry.
There’s nothing I personally can do about this, given my situation. (I mean, I’m in Arkansas). So I have to try and let it go.
Bumping this thread just so we can reminisce for a few minutes about September-October 2016 and its parallels to now. (Discourse alerted me to this thread in its “suggestions.”)
