The Feeling Of Loneliness

The feeling of loneliness is a significantly common condition, and it’s a very impacting part in our lives; it also has severe effects on mental and physical health. Therefore, it must be taken seriously and managed before it leads to serious health issues.

The feeling of loneliness

Almost all people experience loneliness occasionally, and it’s a normal condition that might occur and wears off on its own. However, there are some situations in which a person feels alone longer than normal and becomes a chronic condition, and it happens that loneliness could extremely affect the person’s life and leads to a negative impact on their psychological or physical health, or both.

The feeling of loneliness can generally be defined as the discrepancy between an individual’s desired and achieved social relationships, and also the absence pf imperative social relations in addition to the lack of affection and passion amid the existent ones.

A distinction must be made between the two terms loneliness and social isolation, because loneliness is evaluated according to the quality of the social relations while social isolation is evaluated depending on the number of these relations. In other words, a person can be lonely without being socially isolated and can also be socially isolated without being lonely.

Loneliness is more common in young children and adolescents; 80% of people under 18 years old and 40% of people older than 65 years old felt lonely at least sometimes during their lives.

Types of loneliness

• Situational loneliness: it’s associated with environmental factors like negative experiences, accidents and disasters, personal conflicts, migration, and others.
• Developmental loneliness: it’s associated with various factors like lack of correct personality development, mental or physical disabilities, bad separations, poverty, and living arrangements.
• Internal loneliness: it’s associated with personality, mental distress, low self-esteem, lack of control, guilt feeling, and poor coping strategies with situations.

Factors that increase the risk of loneliness

• The risk is higher in women.
• People who lost their partners.
• Living alone.
• Bad financial status.
• Bad health status.
• Low education level.
• Limited social interaction sources.
• Decreased physical activity.
• Psychological distress.
• Bad living conditions.
• Bad job.

Loneliness’s impact on health

Loneliness causes several adverse effects on both psychological and physical health.

Effects of loneliness on psychological health

Loneliness leads to increasing the risk of the following conditions:

• Depression.
• Anxiety disorders.
• Personality disorders like schizophrenia.
• Cognitive disorders like dementia.
• Sleeping disturbances like insomnia.
• Stress.
• Alzheimer’s disease.
• Alcohol abuse and smoking.
• Child abuse.
• Suicide.

Effects of loneliness on physical health

Loneliness causes an increased risk of the following conditions:

• Diabetes.
• Autoimmune diseases like lupus and rheumatoid arthritis.
• Cardiovascular diseases like coronary artery disease.
• High blood pressure.
• Obesity.
• Weak immune system and increased susceptibility for infections.
• Cancers.
• Impaired hearing.
• Impaired health in general.
• Ignoring health and a tendency to follow bad health habits.

How to overcome loneliness

Loneliness mustn’t be ignored to prevent it from causing serious effects, and the following can aid in overcoming it:

• Realizing the existence of the problem and seeking to manage it.
• Exercising regularly.
• Incorporation of recreational activities.
• Engaging in social, educational, and cognitive support groups.
• Developing social skills.
• Giving chances to social interactions.
• Psychological therapy if needed.