If at any point in time you've watched the news, glanced at a newspaper, or opened your social media and said: "I wish this election was over already," chances are you're probably not alone.
Regardless of who you stand for in this election, we are tired.
We are tired of being so divided on key issues, we are tired of not being able to see eye-to-eye on ethics, and we are tired of watching our candidates attack each other personally instead of politically.
Like many people who actively despise the way this election has devolved, I cannot wait for the day in November to take place, and to be decided once and for all. I cannot wait until we can finally say that Trump is not, and should never be, our president - definitively and without question. I cannot wait for our news outlets to stop being plagued by his dirty, harmful, and shocking quotes and I long for the day our debates do not turn into "who-can-talk-louder" matches.
Unfortunately: This is only the beginning.
We may stop Trump from ever setting foot in the Oval Office (and I pray we do), and we might stop him from ever running for office again, but as a nation: we have already lost to him.
Regardless of the outcome in November, we have shown that there are people among us who will stand for nothing, and who will fall for everything. We have shown that as a nation, a significant number of us are willing to endorse racism, sexism, misogyny, xenophobia, and all the things we have claimed to fight against as a free, developed, and enlightened nation.
No matter how this process ends, there is an immigrant child somewhere in this country who knows that there are people everywhere who don't want him here and who have said vicious and hateful things about his very existence. There is a little girl who can only comprehend snippets of what she overhears when her parents watch the news, who will still be left with the unsettling realization that men in power believe they can do anything they want to women, and get away with it. There is a Syrian refugee who doesn't know much English, but knows that his life holds as much value as a Skittle does to the man who is even being considered as a leader and representative of the country he fled to in search of something more.
So yes, Trump may not win the election that will occur in one short month. But the hate, the fear, and the corruption that he has exposed will haunt America for years to come. Preventing him from running this country is a battle we have to win; convincing generations of people to come that we value women, diversity, and honesty in this country? That is a war we have only begun to fight.
