Edel Coffey: On connection and community - human essentials we need more now than ever
Picture: Bríd O'Donovan
A few weeks ago I read an article by Vivek Murthy, the American surgeon general, about what he called the American epidemic of loneliness and isolation.
Murthy has become so concerned by the issue that he felt prompted to issue an advisory and national framework to tackle the problem.
Surgeons general usually only issue advisories on things like public health, pandemics, and the like, but what Murthy knows is that the nebulous concept of loneliness has measurable outcomes for our health.
Take this quote from his article. ‘When people are socially disconnected, their risk of anxiety and depression increases. So does their risk of heart disease (29 percent), dementia (50 percent), and stroke (32 percent).’
And, perhaps most frightening of all, the increased risk of premature death associated with social disconnection is pretty much the same as smoking daily. We already knew loneliness felt bad, but now it turns out that it might even kill us.
But what can we do about it?
For many of us, we only realise we are lonely when we are there. We don’t realise it’s coming for us, until it’s already got its foot in the door.
Maybe because loneliness is so adept at finding a way in. Loneliness can be triggered by lots of things, even seemingly happy, positive life events. For me, it was moving to a new city with a new baby.
For others, it can be more obvious things, like the loss of a friend or family member. For others still, loneliness can come creeping quietly into a busy life.
A life full of people and family and professional success, a life that is so overwhelmed with work that you start to let go of friends because you don’t have time and suddenly it’s been a year since you saw them.
Loneliness is everywhere, fleeting or profound.
A few weeks ago, I was at a month’s mind mass for a friend. There was a narrow country path leading to the church, with cars parked up on the path bumper to bumper, making it even more narrow.
An elderly lady was walking in front of me, making slow progress so I hung back, not wanting to rush the woman. I am always reminded of the expression: Old people are not going more slowly because they have more time.
But after a couple of minutes, she turned around and apologised, saying ‘I can’t go any faster.’ She told me that her daughter usually accompanied her, so I offered her my arm and we walked up to the church together.
When we reached the door, she said, ‘you’re so kind for an absolute stranger’ and then she added, ‘but I suppose you’re not a stranger anymore now.’
And I thought how simple it is to connect, really.
During the mass, another elderly woman who was sitting beside me chatted on and off throughout the mass, asking whether this month’s mind had been advertised in the paper and if so which one, asking for details of fundraisers announced by the priest, asking about the weather and the sports fixtures that were planned for that day.
I wondered at how freely she ignored the mass but then realised this was probably why she came to mass - for the social connection. And social connection is one of the best ways to combat loneliness.
Ironically, in our super-connected world, more and more of us are isolated. Staying connected to people is key to battling loneliness.
We all learned this quickly during the pandemic, when we were forced to shelter in place and suddenly we realised how important those tiny little interactions with the postman or the shopkeeper or the people you passed on your morning walk were.
Human connection is life-saving. And not just for us as individuals. The American surgeon general’s paper shows that not only does connection have a profound impact on our individual mental and physical health, it has a profound impact on the health of our communities because social connection makes us invested in each other.
If we’re socially connected, we are, as the woman I met at the mass said, no longer strangers. If we’re connected, we look after each other. If we’re not, we become divided, polarised, and alienated.
One of the best examples of this recently was the community that fought to stop a group of Ukrainian families from being moved on from their new homes in Cahersiveen recently, a place where they had laid down roots and become part of the community. That’s a socially connected community, fighting to help and protect each other.
Community is an old-fashioned idea and something that we can dismiss as quaint in our modern world where people move cities and jobs and lives at the drop of a hat.
But I think we can foster community wherever we go and it can be something as simple as talking to a stranger.
Loneliness is everywhere, but through staying connected, and fostering a sense of community with our fellow human, we can do our bit to counter it.
And according to those American statistics, we might even extend our life expectancy a little into the bargain.
