“Understanding Grief, better than everybody, believe me”
[A modest office set. One leather chair, a small side table with a tissue box, a motivational poster that says "HEALING" in gold letters. TRUMP sits facing camera, wearing a white coat over his usual suit. A nameplate on the desk reads "DR. TRUMP, Grief Therapist, The Best One."] TRUMP: Hello, everyone. I'm Dr. Trump, and I want to talk to you today about grief. Very important topic. Tremendous topic. People are saying it's the most complex emotional experience a human being can go through, and they're right. They're absolutely right. I've studied it, I've read about it — I've had people brief me on it — and I can tell you, I understand grief better than anybody. Better than Freud. Better than Jung. Honestly, better than everybody. [TRUMP adjusts his coat. The nameplate falls off the desk. He ignores it.] TRUMP: Now, the first thing you need to know about grief — and this is clinically established, this is real psychology — is that grief is not one feeling. It is a process. A beautiful, complicated process. Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, great woman, very smart, not as smart as me, but smart — she identified five stages. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. Five stages. I call them the Five Tremendous Stages. I may have trademarked that. We're looking into it. TRUMP: Let's talk about denial. Denial is when the loss first hits and your brain says, "No. This is not happening." And that is actually the brain protecting itself. It's a coping mechanism. Your nervous system is buying time so the full weight of the loss doesn't crush you all at once. Very smart system. The body is incredible. I have always said the body is incredible. People tell me that all the time. [TRUMP leans forward slightly, voice softening — almost genuine.] TRUMP: Then comes anger. And people feel ashamed of the anger. They think — why am I angry? What does anger have to do with losing someone I love? But anger is grief with nowhere to go. It is love that has no destination anymore. That is not a weakness. That is the enormity of what you had. Okay? That's important. Write that down. [TRUMP points at camera.] TRUMP: Bargaining. This one is — look, this one gets me, I'm not going to lie. You start making deals. With God, with the universe, with yourself. "If I had just called more often. If I had just stayed. If I had just done one thing differently." And I will tell you something — as a therapist, and as a deal-maker, some of the best deals I have ever seen — the bargaining stage is the mind searching for control in a situation that was always beyond your control. You are not to blame. That is not weakness, that is your brain trying to negotiate its way out of pain. Totally natural. Clinically normal. TRUMP: Depression. This is not the same as clinical depression, although that can happen too, and if it does, please — please — talk to a professional. But grief depression is the quiet stage. The world keeps moving and you are standing completely still. You are integrating the reality of the loss into your actual life. It is slow. It is heavy. It is supposed to feel that way. [TRUMP pauses. Fixes his tie. Something almost human flickers across his face.] TRUMP: And then — acceptance. Not that it was okay. Not that you are over it. Acceptance just means you find a way to carry it. You make room for it. The grief does not get smaller — you get larger around it. That's what the research shows. That's what I've seen in this office. Many people, great people, they come in here broken, and they leave — still carrying it — but walking upright. That is the goal. Walking upright. [TRUMP stands, straightening his coat with great authority.] TRUMP: So if you are grieving right now — and many of you are, I know this — you are not broken. You are processing. And processing takes time. Give yourself that time. Nobody tells you that enough. TRUMP: I'm Dr. Trump. I'm the best at this. Take care of yourselves. [The motivational poster slides off the wall behind him. He doesn't turn around.]