American voters suffer increased anxiety due to 'election stress disorder'

With barely a week to go before Election Day, Americans are freaking out. The polls are tight, the rhetoric is high, and while Donald Trump is a well-known quantity, with his voters and supporters keeping their cool as the final days of this years' long election cycle unfolds, progressives, Dems and the Kamala camp are growing desperate. A report out from NPR shows that 53% of Americans are having such high anxiety over the election that they are avoiding even talking about it. 

A story out from the Wall Street Journal quotes progressives as saying there aren't enough weed gummies to get them through to November 5. And the Washington Post put out an infographic on Instagram to essentially tell Dems to take deep breaths as they fend off existential levels of anxiety. It's even got a name: election stress disorder.

A survey out from AMFM, a residential mental health treatment system, provided an analysis of 2,000 Americans and found that 22% of those surveyed said that coverage of the election was having a deleterious impact on their mental health. 42% said that they were worried their guy would not win come Election Day, another 54% were worried about what would happen after the election and 57% feel that the negative messaging has played a role in making them stress out. Arizona mental health group LifeStance Health said that a survey they conducted revealed that this year's general election has become a "significant source of stress and anxiety."

That survey, however, showed that those who fall within the Gen Z and Millennial generations report electoral stress at 64% and 54%, respectively. Of those surveyed in the Gen Z age group, 44% said that they actually have altered their life choices as a result of the current political atmosphere in the US. They've decided to put off marriage, children, higher education, or relocating because they are freaked out about what's going on politically.  

The Wall Street Journal interviewed voters who are using drugs and alcohol to cope with their increased stress levels due to the election. Writer Molly Ball writes that for many, this election season has felt "less a regular democratic exercise than a national panic attack, a twilight clash that could end democracy for good." People she spoke to, on both sides of the political divide, are sure that if their guy doesn't win the country will fall apart, democracy will come to a screeching halt, and the country will flounder under the leadership of the other guy. 

The Kamala Harris campaign, and the Joe Biden campaign before that, have been pushing this messaging ad nauseam—and it hasn't started with this election season or even with the one before it. This kind of doom and gloom rhetoric goes back to the election season before that one, to 2016, when the Democrats became so fatalistic about a potential Trump presidency that then-Dem contender Hillary Clinton was manufacturing false evidence to show that Trump was colluding with the Russians to steal the election. Trump's campaign was considered a joke by Democrats, high on 8 years of Barack Obama's leadership and, as the tables turned and Hillary was defeated, they pivoted to the same strategy they are still employing now—saying that Trump is literally Hitler, a fascist, white supremacist, neo-Nazi, dictator. 

A poll conducted by the Wall Street Journal shows that a full 87% of voters believe the nation "will suffer permanent damage" if the candidate they prefer does not attain the White House. 57% of Kamala voters are "frightened" of a Trump win. No one now living can remember a time when the country has been more politically divided. An election cycle that began right after the 2020 general election ended is soon to come to its own close. Both parties have been pushing their messaging to the hilt and it's taking its toll on Americans.

The Washington Post has advice for those who are struggling with their anxiety, and not just anxiety but with loss. The outlet recently declined to endorse Kamala Harris; perhaps they feel that she won't win, that her loss would be their loss if they backed her more vociferously than they already had. "Anxious about the election?" They say, "Here's how to survive it."

"None of us can single-handedly fix our broken politics," they assure readers, "But every one of us can start building our own emotional resilience to face this political moment."

"Realize that we can tolerate loss," they say, encouraging readers to "monitor our addiction to political news" and to "explore the spiritual literature on loss." This is the crux of the conversation about anxiety and the election. For far too many Americans, politics has replaced religion, culture and everything else. Politics has an outsized place in the hearts, minds and souls of American voters, causing intense anxiety when they fear things won't go their way. 

But in this election, the message, not just from campaigns but from voters, is clear: everyone thinks the character of the nation is on the line.