Companionship

So does your current life resemble your pre-pandemic life? Have you resumed all of your old routines, and visited all of your previously cherished places and groups? Resumed an active social life? If so, consider yourself fortunate. Because many of your peers have not been able or willing to recreate…

English writer Virginia Woolf once wrote, “Some people go to priests; others to poetry; I to my friends.” In fact, Ms. Woolf was ahead of her time in understanding the essential importance of friendships in your life. Even more than spouses and relatives, friends are the essential relationships for our…

While most of us want to age in place in the community, rather than live out our final years in a facility, that arrangement can sometimes require significant support and services in the home. Especially if the person at home has physical or cognitive disabilities, significant daily help may be…

It’s no surprise that older individuals often feel lonely, as close family and friends become distant or have passed away, and as illness and disability make it harder to connect and gather. We’ve covered this topic on many previous occasions but it’s still jarring to read new research that confirms…

It’s likely no surprise that loneliness continues to be a significant public health concern in the United States. As we reported last year when Surgeon General Vivek Murthy raised alarms about the public health crisis of loneliness in our country, loneliness is not only a subjective individual feeling of disappointment…

The list has been ongoing and in the public eye: Long-time couples, seemingly doing well from a distance, end up in divorce at a time in life when marriage dissolution seems unlikely (As one older divorcée commented, “Sixty was the age of leaving the house and returning for the car…