Five detoxing tips for Trumpers coming down from post-election high
When the dog catches the car
Jeffrey Denny
Dear Dr. Jeff:
It was the thrill of my lifetime when President Trump won his third election in a row, this time by an historic landslide like nobody has ever seen.
Since the election I’ve been up all night having fun triggering the libs online with hilarious comments like, “How’s all that wokey-transie they-them stuff workin’ for ya?”
I love how America proved I’m smarter than these elite, coastal, college Democrat smarty-pants. I’m leaving my TRUMP sign up forever in case they pass through town in their EVs desperately seeking charging stations and vegan barbeque. LOL
At Thanksgiving dinner, just to have a little fun with my snowflake Democrat relatives, I bowed my head and prayed Trump’s holiday message, “Happy Thanksgiving to all, including to the Radical Left Lunatics who have worked so hard to destroy our Country.”
Of course the lefties couldn’t handle a little humorous political commentary. They got huffy, left the table, went home and blocked me on social media.
That’s their problem. They’re the haters. Losers need to suck it up.
What worries me is the thrill of victory and owning the libs seems to be wearing off. I’m starting to feel hollow inside and losing my passion for making people I care about and complete strangers feel bad. It’s what got me up in the morning for almost 10 years. What should I do?
Dr. Jeff replies:
Don’t worry, what you’re feeling is completely normal.
The most important thing is to not hate yourself, even if you experience joy in hating others. It’s not your fault. That’s your psychological damage talking.
Like children who’ve opened all their Christmas presents and suffer disappointment when there’s no more, it can be emotionally devastating even for adults when you get everything you want.
The DSM — Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — calls this feeling DCCS, or Dog Caught Car Syndrome, when people achieve their goals and have no idea what to do next.
You feel you personally won the election, like when your football team wins. Even if you did little but put up a yard sign and express fighting words online with a cowardly anonymous pseudonym to avoid repercussion. Perhaps you voted, but you probably were too busy to get out or pick up a phone to canvass for your candidate.
Victims who demand the death sentence for perps in order to heal often are still left feeling unhealed. That’s because vengeance — the proverbial eye for an eye—leaves everyone blind. Our souls and religious teachings don’t love schadenfreude. Deriving pleasure from the misfortunate of others can leave us anxious and depressed.
To get on a healthier path, in addition to changing your diet from DoorDash Chick-Fil-A to kale smoothies, consider this five-step detox program:
1. Get off Fox News
Like fentanyl pushers, the #1 cable network that admitted it lies to you for money will keep on feeding your outrage addiction against fellow Americans who disagree with you.
Anger at “the libs” gives you a shot of dopamine, which makes you feel good, although it can cloud your judgement. But like any drug, when it wears off, you can experience withdrawal symptoms similar to those reported by cocaine addicts, including anxiety, panic attacks, depression, sweating, nausea, generalized pain, fatigue, dizziness and drug cravings, as the website PsychCentral warns.
Quitting Fox will be hard. Try a form of electroconvulsive aversion therapy by watching MSNBC or PBS, listening to NPR or reading real journalism like The New York Times.
2. Pursue other interests
Liberals may suggest you try deadly extreme sports such as free solo rock climbing, high altitude mountaineering, base jumping, Squid Game Pickleball, Gladiator Mahjong or Seppuku. Or strolling the devastated urban neighborhoods you see on Fox while loudly expressing your opinion about the people who live there.
Instead, try getting off X and Truth Social and spending more time with family. Especially the libs. Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. No pain no gain!
3. Read books
As the dictionary — itself once a book — says, these objects are written and printed works consisting of pages glued or sewn together along one side and bound in covers.
They’re often stacked in “libraries” (buildings containing collections of books you can borrow) you’ve never visited but want the government to censor nonetheless.
Certainly, reading books is harder than being fed what you already think by Fox personalities paid millions to convince you that, for instance, Bidenomics made you poor, as they buy lavish third vacation homes.
Books about how our government works can also help you keep up with immigrants you hate who pass the citizenship test.
And yes, many if not most books worth reading are written by libs to indoctrinate you into socialism and open your mind to objectivity.
But reading can also help you take the Matrix red pill — same color as the MAGA hat and electoral map! — and question if your media really is fair and balanced, most trusted, real news, real honest or just political propaganda.
4. Give to the less fortunate
Sure, even as Jesus urges, it’s hard to send even a penny of your hard-earned Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid or other government subsidy dollar every American gets that remains after the Biden-Harris inflation and big government liberal taxes.
It’s especially hard to be generous to lazy welfare people living large off the sweat of your labors. And the libs have canceled your First Amendment free speech rights to say who you’re talking about.
But if you have a pension or retirement account, Biden made you 50% richer. Even if your media says the stock market jumped because Trump is coming back, even if it jumped well before he came back.
In any case, giving could produce enough dopamine to replace your Fox outrage addiction like methadone does for heroin addicts.
5. Hold government accountable
You hate Washington more than anyone. But as the old saying goes, you broke it, you bought it.
Your responsibility to govern is bigger and harder than ever, since you now own the entire government, the executive, legislative and judicial branches.
So, like MLB great Juan Soto knows as he signed an historic $765 million contract, winning is just the beginning. You have to keep winning to be the GOAT instead of a goat.
And avoid whining how the libs are keeping Trump from winning. That’s loser talk.
You’re the best patriot ever. You want to make America greater again. So get off your duff, roll up your sleeves, work with your fellow Americans, and do it. It’ll make you feel better than hating.
Jeffrey Denny is a Washington writer, not a clinical therapist.
