Loneliness Bad For Your Health... sigh...

[SoloRocket]

http://www.mnn.com/health/fitness-well-being/stories/why-loneliness-is-bad-for-your-health

Woke up earlier today and overheard this topic on the TV about lonelieness. Apparently, loneliness is bad for your health and is tied to "hardening of the arteries (which leads to high blood pressure), inflammation in the body, and even problems with learning and memory."

Also from the article in the link...

"In one study, Cacioppo and Steve Cole of UCLA examined how the immune system changed over time in people who were socially isolated. They observed a change in the kinds of genes that lonely people's immune systems were expressing. Genes overexpressed in the loneliest individuals included many involved in immune system activation and inflammation. In addition, several key gene sets were underexpressed, including those involved in antiviral responses and antibody production. The result is that a lonely person's body has let its defenses down to viral and other invaders. [7 Personality Traits That Are Bad For You]

"What we see is a consistent pattern where it looks like human immune cells are programmed with a defensive strategy that gets activated in lonely people," Cole told LiveScience.

Here's why: The immune system has to make a decision between fighting viral threats and protecting against bacterial invasions because it has a fixed fighting capability. In lonely people who see the world as a threatening place, their immune systems choose to focus on bacteria rather than viral threats. Without the antiviral protection and the body's antibodies produced against various ills, the result means a person has less ability to fight cancers and other illnesses. Those who are socially isolated suffer from higher all-cause mortality, and higher rates of cancer, infection and heart disease.

In addition, loneliness raises levels of the circulating stress hormone cortisol and blood pressure, with one study showing that social isolation can push blood pressure up into the danger zone for heart attacks and strokes. It undermines regulation of the circulatory system so that the heart muscle works harder and the blood vessels are subject to damage by blood flow turbulence. Loneliness can destroy the quality of sleep, so that a person's sleep is less restorative, both physically and psychologically. Socially isolated people wake up more at night and spend less time in bed actually sleeping, according to Cole and Cacioppo's research."

This all kinda hits home for me and feels a little depressing too. I been mostly isolated for a couple years now and learned when I was in highschool that I had high blood pressure. I don't drink or smoke. I've never had problems with my weight. I'm only at 145lbs right now. I been regularly going to the gym for over a year now(running, playing basketball, lifting weights) and my blood pressure is still high for someone in their 20s with no weight problems.

It's not something that my parents had problems with before so it wasn't passed down. From the last summer I lost close to 20lbs, and feel like I am in better shape than I was in back school. Last week I ran a mile nonstop and that felt good. I just feel like I shouldn't be dealing with the hbp anymore, but I still have that slight issue with my it to go along with the sleep, and even memory problems. I thought with the hbp that it was maybe what I was eating(too much sodium in my diet possibly) but learning about this... maybe it was loneliness after all.

 

[Fvantom]

can we at least get prescription friends if its a health thing?

 

[Sci-Fi]

Ha, I like that idea. Prescription friends.

That's an interesting article, not sure I agree with everything said in it but still interesting. Some points I could relate to.

 

[CassandraFaye]

Its a interesting idea. I know that depression can take a physical tole so I don't see why loneliness couldn't/wouldn't do the same.

 

[Ak5]

Loneliness does take it's physical toll on us. Over millennia, we have been social creatures. It was imperative to live in groups in order to survive. I'm not surprised.

 

[AFrozenSoul]

how many of these people worked out and ate healthy? Also what do you define as social interaction? I go out to the gym, and to the grocery store and to anime conventions. Is that social interaction? :/ to be honest this is a stretch. Yeah I can see how social anxiety can raise Cortisol... but stress can do that in general. I mean why not say that having a job is bad for peoples health? Oh I know, why not say that meeting new people is bad for people. The stress from wondering if they carry a disease is killing us.

-_-... needless to say I do not buy this crap. It is WAY to generic for me to really believe it. I mean if social interaction raises your Cortisol, then avoid it. Problem solved. As for cancer and stuff. You know that is linked to poor health in general. There are plenty of social people who get cancer.

 

[aribeth]

Came across this article the other day...

Loneliness Linked to Death, Disability
Studies Show That People Who Live Alone or Feel Lonely May Have Worse Health
By Brenda Goodman, MA
WebMD Health New
Reviewed by Laura J. Martin, MD

June 18, 2012 -- Living alone or simply feeling lonely may raise a person's risk for a decline in health, two new studies show.

The studies, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, are some of the largest to date to support the idea that being isolated from friends and family affects the quality and length of a person's life.

For the first study, researchers followed nearly 45,000 adults aged 45 and older who had heart disease. About 19% of people in the study said they lived alone. People who were on their own were significantly more likely to die during the four years of the study than people who didn't live by themselves. And it appeared to be a phenomenon that crossed cultures since people in the study hailed from 44 countries.

The risk of dying was highest for middle-aged adults. People who were 45 to 65 years old and lived alone were 24% more likely to die during the study than people in the same age group who lived with spouses or roommates.

By way of comparison, having type 2 diabetes has been shown to increase a heart patient's risk of dying by about 40%, says researcher Deepak L. Bhatt, MD, MPH, a cardiologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston and an associate professor at Harvard Medical School.

"This should send up a little red flag that maybe this patient needs a little bit more attention," he says. "Maybe we need to be a little more careful that this patient really does go to fill their prescription," or gets to regular checkups or is able to buy and eat healthy meals, Bhatt tells WebMD.

Other researchers agree that loneliness is an important but perhaps underappreciated risk.

"If we can actually target this, I think we have the potential to make a lot of difference. By actually engaging with your patients and talking about this, it makes a better alliance," says researcher Carla M. Perissinotto, MD, MHS, a geriatrician and assistant clinical professor of medicine at the University of California at San Francisco.

Tracking the Impact of Loneliness on Health

In the second study, Perissinotto and her team followed more than 1,600 seniors older than 60 for six years, from 2002 to 2008. Study participants were asked if they felt left out, isolated, or if they lacked companionship.

Forty-three percent of people in the study said they felt lonely at least some of the time. Nearly 63% of people who reported loneliness were married or had a partner.

People who said they were lonely were 45% more likely to die during the study than people who didn't feel isolated. Nearly 23% of lonely people died, compared to 14% of people who said they didn't feel lonely. That risk remained even after researchers adjusted their data to remove the influence of other factors known to affect life expectancy, such as depression, income, age, and race.

Loneliness was also tied to a greater likelihood that a person would have difficulty doing basic daily activities such as walking, climbing stairs, eating, bathing, or dressing.

Perissinotto, who makes house calls to her elderly patients, says she was surprised at the big impact of loneliness.

"Finding the association was a little bit sad," she says, because it made her realize that her patients who reported being lonely were at even greater risk of decline.

"I have a patient who's been losing weight," she says. "She has resources, but she doesn't enjoy eating anymore because it's not a social experience. She's lonely and she says it straight out: 'I'm lonely.'"

Perissinotto says, in this case, getting her patient to eat regularly will depend not just on a getting her a meal, but on making sure there's a person there at mealtimes to engage her in conversation.

But loneliness doesn't always cause health problems. Sometimes, physical problems can bring on loneliness.

Perissinotto says she has another patient who's still mentally sharp, but has trouble climbing the stairs of her apartment building so she rarely gets out of her house to meet other people.

Getting Help for Loneliness

Beyond individual cases, previous studies suggest that there are myriad ways loneliness harms health.

People who are lonely are less likely to sleep well. They are also more likely to be anxious and stressed, have high blood pressure and high cholesterol. And they are more likely to experience declines in thinking and memory.

"No matter if you're a man or woman or what country you're from, it's important to be surrounded by people who emotionally support you," says Suzanne Steinbaum, MD, a preventive cardiologist at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York.

"We are social beings. We really do need to have a team of people. We thrive with having friends and family and being loved," says Steinbaum, who was not involved in the studies.

Loneliness can be a tough problem to tackle, Steinbaum says, but it can be done. She's seen heart attack patients, for example, thrive in cardiac rehabilitation, not just because of the exercise, but also because they're surrounded by people who can relate to what they're going through.

Some psychologists specialize in helping people with chronic illnesses, Steinbaum notes. "Everybody needs a support system," she says.

Even for people who don't have friends and family around them, "studies have shown that having a pet can be useful," Bhatt says.

Perissinotto agrees, and says it's important for people to share feelings of isolation and loneliness with their primary care doctor.

"There are a lot of resources out there," she says. "It's a matter of connecting people to the right program."

http://www.webmd.com/healthy-aging/news/20120618/loneliness-linked-to-death-disability?page=2

 

[Tiina63]

I have also read a lot of these sort of articles. I don't want to sound morbid, but if I am alone for the rest of my life, then I wouldn't want to be around anyway, so I am not worrying about this information.

 

[Solitary man]

Well **** this. I thought it was bad enough being a chronic loner whose life-long lonerism caused chronic loneliness which gave rise to anxiety and depression, but now that I know that it can cause heart attacks and strokes etc., this really is depressing news.

I logged onto this site tonight to start a thread, the title of which was going to be "My loneliness is killing me" (no reference to the Brittany slapper song of the same name), but now that I know that it really is killing me, I must either do the up to now impossible, and actually force myself out there and meet people, or I'm dead.

I can feel what loneliness does to you mentally, emotionally, and physically; I've been suffering for the past number of days, as my loneliness and isolation has once again become chronic. After reading those studies, I'm really stuck for something more to say.

 

[TrueSoulMate]

Virtual or in real life, it always helps to have someone to look forward to every new day

 

[AFrozenSoul]

You know part of me wants to believe that these are just scare tactics to get reclusive people to get over their fears. I mean, who wants to die because they have no one?

 

[Swamp Yankee]

A few years ago I had a skin cancer on my back that was found by pure chance. If I had a wife or even a girlfriend I am sure it would have been found much sooner.

In my case I lucked-out. I can imagine that others may not be so lucky.

My two cents -SY

 

[Lost Soul]

I had bad memory problem for years. Could it also cuase your sight to decrease, becuase that started happening, the same time my memory and speach went bad.

 

[Bones]

If loneliness is bad for your health, why do i have good health and not hurry up and die?

 

[Felix]

Apparently loneliness affects the same area in the brian that physical pain activates...

Brain scan shows rejection pain

Being snubbed socially provokes exactly the same brain response as being physically hurt, say US researchers.
Volunteers were asked to play a computer game designed to fool them into feeling excluded, while brain scans were taken at the same time.

After the computerised snub, the scan detected activity in an area of the brain linked to physical pain.

Experts say the study, from the journal Science, is a hint to the importance the brain places on social ties.

The researchers involved in the study, from the University of California at Los Angeles, used an MRI scanner to probe the brains of their test subject as their feelings were manipulated.

These scanners can detect subtle changes in blood flow to various parts of the brain - which indicate when the region is active.

To provoke the right response, they devised an ingenious computer simulation designed to be reminiscent of a playground game.

The participants were shown a screen which gave the appearance of a "ball-throwing" game involving both the volunteer and two other figures, represented by animated characters.


Psychological pain in humans, especially grief and intense loneliness, may share some of the same neural pathways that elaborate physical pain
Dr Jaak Panksepp, Bowling Green State University, Ohio
The test subjects were told that real people were controlling the other two "people", and the game took the form of throwing the ball in turn between all three of them.

Of course, this was an elaborate hoax - there were no other human players, and the other characters in the game were controlled entirely by the computer.

At first, the game proceeded as it should, with the ball coming at regular intervals to the player controlled by the human volunteer.

Mean machine

However, after a while, the two computer controlled characters started throwing the ball only to each other, apparently excluding the test subject from the game.

It was at this point that the brain reactions were measured by the scanner.

The researchers noticed one key area of the brain "lighting up" on the scan when this happened.

This area, the anterior cingulate cortex, is already known to be associated with the brain's response to the unpleasant feelings linked to physical pain.

This was not just a frustrated reaction to not being able to play - researchers had already tested this by having a short period at the start of the game in which the controls appeared not to work properly.

The researchers wrote: "Evidence suggests that some of the same neural machinery recruited in the experience of pain may also be associated with social separation or rejection."

Powerful feelings

Dr Jaak Panksepp, from the Centre for Neuroscience, Mind and Behavior at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, said that feelings of social exclusion were powerful instincts in animals and humans.

He said: "The feelings induced by experimental games in the laboratory, are a pale shadow of the real-life feelings that humans and other animals experience in response to the sudden loss of social support.

"Psychological pain in humans, especially grief and intense loneliness, may share some of the same neural pathways that elaborate physical pain.

"Given the dependence of mammalian young on their caregivers, it is hard not to comprehend the strong survival value conferred by common neural pathways that elaborate both social attachment and the affective qualities of physical pain."

 

[Fragile]

I guess you could find something to counter it with so to speak. For me it has been to escape into my own world through my artwork. Makes me happy at least, when I'm painting, sculpting, drawing etc.

 

[wolf359]

I have also read a lot of these sort of articles. I don't want to sound morbid, but if I am alone for the rest of my life, then I wouldn't want to be around anyway, so I am not worrying about this information.

Amen Tiina63, amen....

 

[Felix]

I guess you could find something to counter it with so to speak. For me it has been to escape into my own world through my artwork. Makes me happy at least, when I'm painting, sculpting, drawing etc.

Same for me.

 

[roguewave]

how many of these people worked out and ate healthy? Also what do you define as social interaction? I go out to the gym, and to the grocery store and to anime conventions. Is that social interaction? :/ to be honest this is a stretch. Yeah I can see how social anxiety can raise Cortisol... but stress can do that in general. I mean why not say that having a job is bad for peoples health? Oh I know, why not say that meeting new people is bad for people. The stress from wondering if they carry a disease is killing us.

-_-... needless to say I do not buy this crap. It is WAY to generic for me to really believe it. I mean if social interaction raises your Cortisol, then avoid it. Problem solved. As for cancer and stuff. You know that is linked to poor health in general. There are plenty of social people who get cancer.

I completely agree. These studies are done from a very one dimensional view point. "All human beings fit into frame A because that's how it is, because we have PhDs and we say so."
The study essentially declares that we all share the same cognitive and emotional styles and therefore, the same things are important and vital to everyone. ********.

 

[gothandre]

Well, if the article is true... I wont live that long....