Episode 021 - Not So Alone

This is In Brief. Let's get to it. Hello, and welcome back to the In Brief podcast. Each week we take a few minutes to dive into a topic that hopefully makes your post-military transition a little bit easier and gives you a new perspective to take into a new week. I'm Jordana. I'm the CEO of the Recon Network, and this week we're talking about loneliness. So many of us think that when we feel alone, it's the circumstance of not being in presence of other people. But the truth is that loneliness isn't always just about being physically alone. If that were the case, it would be a relatively easy situation to fix. You'd just find someone else to inhabit space with and poof, no more feeling lonely. That's simple, right? But in reality, loneliness is a mental and emotional state that centers around a feeling of disconnection or a lack of meaningful connections with others. It is one of 5 indicators that measures social connectedness and one that illustrates how happy someone is with the level and amount of social contact and interaction that they receive. That means that you can be in a room full of people and still feel lonely. Simply because you're either not connecting at a deeper level with others or you're not connecting with them at all. For veterans, this is even more significant because of the contrast between service and civilian life. Not only is physical aloneness less significant while in service, but you're also surrounded by others who oftentimes share your same values and experiences. Simply put, you get them and they get you. That's why some of your closest relationships will continue to be those that you served with and why the loss of those relationships has a sharper sting. There was a true connection there. You understood each other. But after leaving service, things get different. There aren't shared experiences as significant as those that you had alongside your brothers and sisters in arms. There aren't the same patterns of thinking and hell, there's even a different language half the time. Is it any wonder that veterans can feel so alone? Here's the kicker. In a study by Alan Teo by the Veterans Health Administration, Teo and his team found that loneliness is absolutely associated to higher levels of depression and suicidal ideation among veterans. Being cut off from others is not like being connected to your battery, Teo said. You lose an important source of energy. That loss of energy then results in less motivation to engage with others and seek help. Creating a downward spiral that feeds deeper and deeper and deeper into loneliness and depression. So while it's normal to feel lonely from time to time, when it begins to linger, it's time to break the cycle. Fortunately, we don't have to overcomplicate what that takes. It simply takes adjusting yourself to reach the level of connection that you need to feel, well, more connected. So how do you do that? Well, first, being able to identify that feeling of loneliness before it turns into a spiral is one way. So you need to build your own self-awareness to know when it's gone past a simple emotion and into something more. When you do notice that, take control immediately. Reach out to a friend, connect with other veterans in your area who share your experiences. Take a minute to figure out the type of connection you feel that you're lacking and reconnect with someone that you know. Along the way, make sure you're taking care of yourself in even the most basic ways, So you don't add weight into that spiral. And finally, remember, loneliness is not a sign of weakness or failure, and it's nothing to be ashamed of. It's simply a natural human stimulus telling us that we need to connect to more. Take the cue, reach out and connect to someone else for you and for them.