There there, it's only a game

A MONTH FROM now, life will be bleak. Postworld cup and Wimbledon will be like the week after Diana's funeral, or January 4th; after the excitement, all that is left is the litter, the decorations flapping sadly in the rain and the dreaded sinking feeling. The stranger on the train or in the pub who was temporarily a kindred spirit to share your joy and pain reverts to an aggressive, malodorous moron. The world is unfeeling again.

Sarah, 31, had to go on anti-depressants after Euro 96. "I was late for the semi-final but I got a lift from a guy in a pool hall, who completely understood how desperate I was. There is that shared understanding on such occasions. Afterwards we got the bus back home because there was no room for extravagant gestures ever again. Every single bay window I passed people had their heads bowed in grief. "I had counted on Euro 96 sustaining me for the summer but afterwards I could not get motivated about anything. I didn't go out. There was a disbelief that it was over after all that." After a few weeks of emptiness she went to the doctor who found it "quite plausible" that her troubles should have been kicked off - as it were - by the loss against Germany.

"There are studies showing that once a college team wins something, the number of students suddenly wearing the team shirt on campus rises," says Professor Michael Argyle, Emeritus Professor at Oxford Brooks University and Author of The Psychology of Happiness. "People like to bask in the glory - even if they weren't that committed before. They get a high from the feeling of everyone being involved. Of course the problem then is the low afterwards."

One way to cope with the return to normality is actively to seek out the emotional in something else, soon. Like planning a February weekend away after Christmas. After all, post-World Cup, there are still test matches to lose, the anniversary of Diana's death to indulge in. I even managed to well up for Katrina and the Waves in the Eurovision song contest. Sarah began to recover when the world cup qualifiers started. But she would have been happier if she could have found something to grasp on to sooner. Social Psychologist Dr Peter Marsh, Director of the Social Issues Research Centre explains that we need to create excitement because our lives lack the old-fashioned thrill of survival. "People like to put their emotions on the line. Investing in England's fortune in football, or the cricket provides us with an excitement in our rather risk-free lives." Professor Michael Argyle suggests that we should look away from emotional adrenalin rather than writing the month off for the World Cup. Take up a regular hobby involving music, movement and well-intentioned other people; I go country dancing twice a week." I think it could work wonders for Gazza. There are three approaches to periods of high national emotion. Pick the most appropriate one.

1. MAIDEN AUNT

Cut off emotional feelings entirely. Don't get up and you can't get down. Look at cheering people with the sound turned down to see how silly it is. Rationalise constantly.

Pros: If Tim Henman gets out in the first round, you will not feel a personal sense of loss. Better still, you can go to the supermarket when it's empty.

Cons: You will never feel love for an overweight sweaty drunk stranger in a heaving bar.

2. EMOTIONAL HYSTERIC (Gazza option)

The first notes of the Wimbledon music and you start feeling weepy. You can bathe yourself in emotion and while you feel bereft when the great moments are over, you can throw yourself into the next time. You have to feel low to feel the great highs.

Pros: You're sucking life's rich juices and emulating Ernest Hemingway's bullfight passion. Currently the fashionable option, since lack of emotion equates with personality dysfunction; you can gain support from your fellow hysterics who can all wail together in mutual understanding.

Cons: It didn't do much for Hemingway.

3. THE HYPOCRITE

The hot and cold position. At the Edgbaston test last year where England trounced the Australians I was in Barmy Army stand, singing obscenities and Jerusalem in one great communal love moment. At the next test we started doing badly again, so I ceased to care and started planning a holiday instead.

Pros: You can gain maximum benefit from the highs and ignore the depression.

Cons: can be hard to pull off and you quite rightly risk being sneered at by the true fans.

The Life Doctor invites questions on health and lifestyle dilemmas. Write to: Eleanor Bailey, Life Doctor, Ganton House, 18-22 Ganton Street, London W1V ILA