New study from Denmark: Men suffer more health consequences from separation & divorce…

Thursday, September 14, 2023.

A breaking study from Denmark suggests that men tend to suffer a decline in their physical health after a separation or breakup of a relationship that results in them living alone.

• Researchers discovered that when men live alone for extended periods, it results in measurably higher levels of inflammatory markers in their blood, which is a definite indication of declining physical health.

• The more relationship breakups men experience, and the longer they live alone, the higher the levels of the inflammatory markers that will migrate to their bloodstream.

Women manage to have a different experience after a separation, breakup, or divorce…

As I’ve mentioned in my post on nagging, women are far more social and interactive when they’re going through a rough patch.

Women, when feeling lonely, are far more likely to seek out support from friends and family, and this social impulse protects their nervous system from the risk of inflammation.

They don’t show the same physical decline after a separation or divorce.

That’s probably due to the pro-social response to feeling isolated that women are socialized to model. Women are reliably more likely to seek out the company of other humans to soothe their nervous system.

The conclusions come from a Danish study of almost 5,000 middle-aged people who were tracked for over 20 years.

I love large, longitudinal studies as they often result in intriguing findings.

Professor Rikke Lund, study co-author, explained the results:

“Both living alone for more than six years and experiencing two or more breakups increase the risk of high inflammation in men, but not in women.

Here inflammation refers to chronic tissue irritation and not conditions caused by virus or bacteria.

And here men are especially vulnerable.

We need to consider introducing special initiatives targeted at men who suffer breakups or live alone for a period of years.”

Chronic inflammation is an indication of health issues, explained Professor Lund:

“Chronic tissue irritation in the body is associated with a number of diseases, including arteriosclerosis, dementia and increased mortality.

We also know that a minor, but long-term CRP increase is associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease, and such an increase is also seen in this group of men.”

But don’t remain in a devitalized, bad relationship either…

On the other hand, men should no try to endure relationships in which they are belittled or emotionally abused with contempt. A sh*tty marriage can be just as damaging to both your body and mind as loneliness.

However, we know that it’s quite possible to live serene solitude provided you remember to pursue occasional social contacts to break the isolation.

It is men who tend to be worse at seeking out social contact, which may help explain the results of this study, said Professor Lund:

“Elderly men and women demonstrate pervasive, but very different patterns when it comes to seeking out social contact.

Women are far more prone to seek out the company of other people than men.

This may be the reason why women who live alone have a lot of social contact, while men who live alone can be less likely to seek out company.”

Final Thoughts

This study is a little different in that it focused on a decline in physical health, which often is a trailing concern in mental health research, behind, well, mental health..

I suspect that a sense of internalized failure, and subsequent rumination might be setting up a cascade of poor sleep, poor self-care, and the creeping nature of bad habits.

Men who are leaving relationships might benefit by entering a “selfish period” of extreme self care. But that’s typically not what happens, unfortunately.

Be well, stay kind, and Godspeed.

RESEARCH:

Davidsen K, Carstensen S, Kriegbaum M, et al. Do partnership dissolutions and living alone affect systemic chronic inflammation? A cohort study of Danish adults. The Journal of Epidemology & Community Health 2022;76:490-496.

The study was published in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health (Davidsen et al., 2022).