Get Real: Talking mental health & disability
Get Real presents frank and fearless conversations about mental health and disability, including people with lived experience, frontline workers in the sector, as well as policymakers and advocates. Get Real is produced and hosted by Emily Webb and co-hosted by Karenza Louis-Smith on behalf of ermha365 Complex Mental Health and Disability Services provider (https://www.ermha.org/).
Get Real: Talking mental health & disability
Why loneliness is a health issue with Dr Michelle Lim
Our guest for this episode is Dr Michelle Lim, Scientific Chair and CEO of Ending Loneliness Together - a national network of organisations that work together to address the loneliness in people living in Australia. This is done through evidence-based research, advocacy and public information and awareness.
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Find out more aboutEnding Loneliness Together and Loneliness Awareness Week.
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Speaker 2:Welcome to Get Real talking. Mental health and disability brought to you by the team at Burma 365.
Speaker 3:Join our hosts, emily Webb and Carenza Louis-Smith, as we have frank and fearless conversations with special guests about all things mental health and complexity. With special guests about all things mental health and complexity. We recognise people with lived experience of mental ill health and disability, as well as their families and carers. We recognise their strength, courage and unique perspective as a vital contribution to this podcast so we can learn, grow and achieve better outcomes together.
Speaker 4:So I think the idea that we need to kind of get our head around is that, first of all, feeling lonely is quite a normal human signal for us to do something about our relationships. It's not actually any different to feeling hungry and the need to actually eat and nourish ourselves.
Speaker 5:Welcome to Get Real talking. Mental health and disability. I'm Emily Webb. Our guest is Associate Professor Michelle Lim, CEO and Scientific Chair of Ending Loneliness Together, a national network of organisations that work together to address the loneliness in people living in Australia. This is done through evidence-based research, advocacy, and public information and awareness. Michelle is a registered clinical psychologist and a recognised expert in loneliness. I've been following the work of ending loneliness together pretty much since I started working at Irma365, and I'm really thrilled to be speaking with Michelle. Welcome, Michelle. Thanks for joining me.
Speaker 4:Thanks for having me, Emily.
Speaker 5:Now, michelle, before we delve into the issue of loneliness and social connection. How did you become, as I mentioned in the intro, an expert in loneliness and its impacts on people?
Speaker 4:Emily actually started with my career as a clinical psychologist when I was working in the mental health service and public health over here in Melbourne.
Speaker 4:I found that despite seeing people many times in the day, sometimes up to three times a day to try to assist them in their medical care and their mental health care, the people that I saw continued to complain about loneliness and feeling lonely, and it really struck me that our care industry really can't cater to the social needs of the people we're really trying to help.
Speaker 4:And this kind of led me to study a little bit more around social relationships and people with kind of chronic mental illness. And what we did find was that people who had what we call reciprocated relationships, so a give and take relationship with other people, were actually more likely to feel less distressed with their symptoms that they're experiencing and the quality of life was significantly higher than people who had these one-way interactions. And many of us know that when we are actually seeking services of, you know, a health service, they're generally kind of a one-way street. You know we don't have this reciprocated relationship with our doctor or our psychologist or the nurse that comes to visit us. We almost don't know anything about them, and so I really was interested in kind of studying a PhD and looking at this issue and to really understand what can we do to actually better our care or social care in Australia?
Speaker 5:Yeah, and the work of ending loneliness together and the information that is available, that you know is shared, is so interesting and I had really not a lot of idea about the deep impacts on people of loneliness. So what is loneliness as you define it in the research you've done?
Speaker 4:So loneliness is defined as a subjective feeling of distress that comes up when you feel your social relationships do not meet your current social needs. So you might be with people living in a family, having lots of interactions with your colleagues working, living in the neighbourhood, where you speak to your neighbours but you don't feel you have that meaningful social connection. So it's very different to being alone. So being alone is a little bit easier for us to see as a third person. So being alone is a physical state. Being socially isolated is something I can see. So the number of people I talk to, the number of people I live with, the number of interactions I have, people tend to mix them up and it's really. They're really kind of they're related but they're kind of distinct constructs.
Speaker 5:Ending Loneliness Together released a report last year called the State of the Nation Social Connection in Australia 2023. And there's loads in this report and I'll put links in the show notes. It's a really interesting read. There's a lot going on. There's the health and mental health impacts, perceptions of loneliness and stigma. So let's talk about stigma. It's a barrier for people to seek support or make connections, isn't it, which exacerbates the feelings?
Speaker 4:Yeah. So I think the idea that we need to kind of get our head around is that, first of all, feeling lonely is quite a normal human signal for us to do something about our relationships. It's not actually any different to feeling hungry and the need to actually eat and nourish ourselves, or feeling thirsty and for us to quench our thirst. Feeling lonely is for us to stop and think about OK, what do we need socially that will allow us to thrive and flourish? But for some reason not just Australia but many parts of the world feeling lonely has become this stigmatized issue. It's something that's unacceptable, it's something that has to do with something wrong with that person, and our state of the nation report found that loneliness was highly prevalent.
Speaker 4:So you know, at least one in three of us experience loneliness at any given point. One in six experience what we call very high levels of problematic levels of loneliness. Almost half of us are too embarrassed to talk about it. We conceal it, so we were trying not to talk about it. We conceal it, so we will try not to talk about it. So it's almost this thing, this silent thing, that none of us really want to admit it. We don't actually reach out, so it's a normal feeling to have, but we don't actually try to satisfy that urge, that human instincts. And, of course, emily, when we actually try to ignore very basic human signals, we actually get unwell. It's almost what I call social hunger. When we don't actually feed ourselves or we don't actually drink to quench our thirst, physiologically we actually become disadvantaged and hurt in some way.
Speaker 5:It's fascinating, isn't it? There's so much in this, and I was really surprised that in the report that was released last year, that it's the 18 to 24 year old Australians who feel the most lonely. My misconception was and I'm guessing that a lot of people might share this is that it's probably older Australians who feel loneliness most. So what's the story behind those stats?
Speaker 4:To kind of frame the whole issue.
Speaker 4:I do believe that older adults are very much affected by loneliness as well as social isolation, but this report did not pick it up because we surveyed older Australians that were a lot more connected, so what we'll call a sample that might have picked up, because it is an online sample. We might have picked up older Australians that are a lot less vulnerable, but when we kind of look at other parts of the world and other data, we may see the non-online version type data to be a lot more significant in older Australians. So definitely something that we still need to think about. But young people, of course, are very competent in online surveys and when we actually do these large surveys, we're likely to pick up, you know, loneliness in some of these samples 18 to 24, and the other surprising statistic is 45 to 54. So I would say both groups age groups that are well embedded into our society, who are working, who are integrated, highly valued are actually reporting highest levels of loneliness, which probably says something again about the differences between subjective versus objective states of isolation.
Speaker 5:Yeah, and something else that I found interesting in the research is there's real health impacts about loneliness. It can cause ill health, chronic illness, there's mental ill health, but also there's an impact on the workplace, on productivity. Can you tell me a bit more about that?
Speaker 4:That's a really good question as well, and it's something that is starting to emerge in this field that we realise. Oh, being lonely is not just bad for our health, it's actually bad for our workplaces and for business. We do know, especially in the UK, loneliness costs employers and employees billions of dollars in pounds, for example, and this is things like, you know, poor health, so you're more likely to suffer increased health problems if you're lonely, perhaps caring for people as well, and also things like being less productive, less creative. New economics report costs revealed that loneliness was actually a huge burden to the workplaces, costing both private and public employers around 2.7 billion pounds, I believe, a year. So it's quite a lot of money.
Speaker 4:And we don't do anything about our workplaces. In fact, if anything, we assume that just because we're at work, we're competent and we can actually thrive socially. But that's not really the case, and our particular report is showing that people who are lonely are just more likely to be absent from work. They're more likely to be also showing presenteeism, which is actually just as worrying as absenteeism. But presenteeism is actually going to work, even though you feel really unwell. Sometimes, perhaps, it might be worse than absenteeism. People report feeling more impaired in their workplaces, both at the workplace but also outside the workplace. We need to really understand a little bit more about the impact on workplaces, and workplaces need to think about what we can do to actually not just have people come together but have people have the meaningful social connection so that they can thrive and flourish as an organisation.
Speaker 5:And as well as the evidence-based work you do, and that's what I really love. There's real, you know research backed. It's not you know research backed, it's not you know. The feelings are important, but there's actual evidence. But lived and living experience is a big part of your work as well. How does that work? Because we know, particularly in Victoria, the lived and living experience workforce is massive coming off from the Royal Commission. I know at Irma 365, we're going great guns with you know living experience and we've got some peer cadets. So how does that? What does that look like for ending loneliness together?
Speaker 4:So, emily, I think this is actually part of how we started. I was actually approached by a community member that had lived a living experience of loneliness, and the way she described it to me was that she was not someone that was financially disadvantaged. She was well embedded within the workplaces, in fact had a kind of exec job in a charity, had a family, and within a span of three months she had lost everything. And she basically said well, someone like me, who's well equipped, can actually feel lonely. What can we do to actually prevent that from happening to other people?
Speaker 4:So, michelle, we need to start something here, and I think this is really the foundation of why we're here is really that a lot of the work that we've been been doing is not just by the evidence but the live and living experience, because we do know it's such a subjective experience. So loneliness has many faces. We're looking at, you know, these diverse voices to actually get people to understand that it's subjective, it's prevalent, and we cannot assume that one is not lonely just by looking at them cannot assume that one is not lonely just by looking at them.
Speaker 5:That is so true. That's so true. And, if I'm allowed to slip this question in, you're a new mum and mums can feel lonely, parents can feel lonely. You know, I've had, I've got teenagers and you know it's a grind parenting. But your life changes so much. And is that part of some of the research that's done?
Speaker 4:Yeah, look, I think one thing that's really important to know is that when you even have positive changes in your life, like having a baby or maybe even moving countries for a new job which I have done both now positive events can pose social challenges.
Speaker 4:So positive events can pose social challenges and there's a massive change in the way you have to maintain your friendships, your networks, the way you interact with people. When you're going through these transitions, you can feel incredibly lonely and it's really important to keep that conversation going to also maybe find friends that can support you. For example, I have I'm very lucky to have friends who've really gone through this journey. When I kind of have an issue like, oh, my baby's not sleeping and all that stuff, you know they will be able to provide that ear and say, oh, this is what I did, so that this shared experience really helps me not to feel so isolated and I say feel isolated because I'm not isolated, but that shared experience with other parents can really alleviate that. Or for me, when I moved to the US, I found a lot of my colleagues were transplants from other parts of the world to to America and again, this shared experience helps alleviate that sense of loneliness yeah, yeah, it's a big thing moving country.
Speaker 5:yeah, I've done it, well done it, and my husband's from the uk, so it's like you know, michelle, what do you think are some of the most pressing, effective or much needed solutions and actions to help people feel more connected and less lonely and it's been exacerbated, obviously, by the pandemic and coming out of that, so what we do know actually is that loneliness is a highly prevalent issue, but it's also a complex issue that's not that easy to resolve, and I say that because it's what I call a wicked problem.
Speaker 4:It takes many different layers for us to resolve this in our society, but we all have a role to play. So if you're listening, for example, and you felt lonely, or you know someone who's lonely, I think that the biggest thing is to reach out in a way that is helpful to the person. We actually have spoken to a lot of people who live a living experience around this, and how do we start that conversation and how do we know if someone's lonely? We ran Loneliness Awareness Week this year and if you want to see some tips around that, it's lonelinessawarenessweekcomau about how we can have that conversation and being open, not assuming that just because something works for you is going to work for them. So asking the person who's lonely what would work for you or what has worked for you in the past, and never assume that things that you have done for yourself will definitely work for them. And it's really important for us to be open, unassuming. Get them the person who's feeling lonely to tell you what works for them.
Speaker 4:And if you are the person who is feeling lonely, I think one thing that is really helpful is to seek that connection and not actually ask for a soft request. And when I mean soft request, people are lonely, they don't want to be a burden to other people. They feel embarrassed, they're really ashamed. But actually it's quite okay to say, hey, I really want to connect, and it really would mean a lot to me if we spent the time to connect because I feel like I need that connection. So you can say it that way, or you could actually in my, in my ideal world, to say hey, I feel lonely, can we connect?
Speaker 4:Because that the word loneliness has to be part and parcel of our everyday lingo, as opposed to something that's a bit weird. So perhaps your listeners might be thinking now oh, can I say that? But our goal is to say when I say I'm lonely, it's not very any different If I say I'm hungry. You need to have that same sentiment. So if I say I'm lonely, the response will be oh, would you like to connect? As opposed to and similar to, would you like some food. I think we need to kind of start having that conversation and destigmatize that word.
Speaker 5:Yeah, that's great, that's so. Yeah, destigmatize the word and just normalize it Like I'm tired, Go have a nap or have a rest. Michelle, it's been great chatting to you. As we come to the end of this conversation, do you have any final thoughts that you want to share with us?
Speaker 4:One thing that's really important to take away is that loneliness is a very normal feeling. We will all feel lonely at some point. Emily. You and me and everyone else living in this earth will feel lonely, but we should not stay lonely, and that is the the issue. But it's got to start somewhere. So understanding, learning, sharing those experiences is really highly valued, and we do know that ignoring it will not change anything. It will be not just harmful for for you, but also for others around you, um, so I think it's really important to start that conversation somewhere. So do go to the website endinglonesscomau, or Loneliness Awareness Week, and actually support the cause, because the more of us that talk about it, the better it is, so that this is actually again becoming part and parcel of our language and the way we speak to each other.
Speaker 5:Thank you so much, michelle, for your time, and I'm really looking forward to seeing more of the work you do and sharing this episode with listeners. So thank you very much.
Speaker 4:Thank you, Emily.
Speaker 2:You've been listening to Get Real talking mental health and disability, brought to you by the team at Irma 365. Get Real is produced and presented by Emily Webb, with Carenza Louis-Smith and special guests. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time.
Speaker 3:Irma 365 provides special support for people with complex mental ill health and disability. Established by consumers in 1982, today Irma 365 is proud to deliver services across Victoria and in the Northern Territory. Find out more at wwwirmaorg. That's, thank you.
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