Photo: Caroline Hernandez/Unsplash.
Few things matter as much as a good friend.
I’m thinking a lot about friends today because one of my friends has been in the hospital more than a week, having had a serious fall. She lives alone and has health issues that cause her to fall. Her only family, a nephew, lives far away. So her health proxy (and good friend) designated four of us as her family. The ICU admits only family.
My friend has come out of her coma and ditched the ventilator, and we have been rejoicing over the smallest things: eyes opening, head nodding for answers to questions, the lifting of a hand.
Friends have always meant a lot to me (see post “Time with Friends Boosts Health“), and today’s article suggests one of the reasons why: they are good for my health. They certainly have been good for my friend’s health.
Sharon Barbour (@SharonBarbour on Twitter) reports at the BBC, “A new approach to helping people with depression is becoming more and more popular. ‘Social Prescribing’ sees GPs sending patients on trips to places like allotments (community gardens) rather than pharmacies. Healthcare professionals say it works, and reduces pressure on GPs and A&E [emergency rooms] too.
“Craig Denton, from Gateshead, has struggled with depression and loneliness for years. … He is one of more than eight million adults in England now taking antidepressants. But, in the North East, a new approach to helping people with depression is growing.
” ‘Social prescribing’ is part of a plan by health and council bosses to tackle what Gateshead’s director of public health described as ‘really shocking’ health outcomes in the region.
“It has seen Craig enjoy a day out at an allotment run by his GP’s surgery where he has dug and cleared, but also chatted with other people, and not been alone.
” ‘Instead of just sitting down in your house, where you can just dwell on things, you can use this as a distraction, meet new people,’ he said.
“Julie Bray, from Oxford Terrace and Rawling Road Medical Group in Gateshead, was one of the first NHS social prescribers in the country and said she was ‘really passionate’ about it. … ‘They build their confidence up, it reduces GP appointments, it reduces A&E appointments, and it just makes them connect with the community and be resilient.’
“The North East has among the highest rates of drug-related deaths, heart disease, liver disease and suicide in England.
“Rates of child poverty are double the England average in some areas with poverty underpinning much of the ill health. Social prescribing is only one part of a plan by the NHS, local councils, and community groups to make improvements by 2030.
“Alice Wiseman, Gateshead director of public health, said a report in 2020 showed that, while life expectancy across the UK had stalled, it had started getting shorter for those in the bottom 10% income bracket in the North East.
” ‘Nine of all 13 areas within this plan have a healthy life expectancy of less than 60 years,’ she said. ‘People aren’t even reaching retirement age without having a life-limiting illness. It is really shocking.’ …
“What is needed is ‘forming friendships and feeling as if they’ve valued, as if they’re worth something,’ she said.”
Tell me about the importance of your own friends. It may not be enough for serious depression, but as the saying goes about chicken soup, “It wouldn’t hurt.”
More at the BBC, here. No firewall.
Suzanne's Mom's Blog 
I hope your friend continues to recover! I spend the most time with friends whose musical lives overlap with mine while we work on a performance or project together (which often includes shared meals). However I also many long-term, non-musical friends from the past 45 years with whom I went to school, or shared a house, or met while working a non-musical day job. Our lives cross a few times per year (or per decade in some cases…), and it always feels deeply comfortable to spend time with them. Lovely to have modern medicine reminding us about the value of human interactions!
Indeed! In some ways, it’s obvious. Until you see there are people stuck in a pattern of aloneness.
Yes. I watch Molly’s dad, at age 95, strive to keep an active social life going as more and more of his friends and siblings die. He does NOT want to become stuck in a pattern of aloneness, but there are fewer and fewer folks remaining in his life to reach out to for a walk, talk, meal, song, game of cribbage, etc. Deep breath in. Deep breath out.
That’s a reason it’s been important to me to make new friendships among younger people, like the teachers I assist in ESL classes.
Yes!!!
Best wishes for your friend’s recovery!
Thank you so much!
Good wishes for your friend to continue on in a positive direction and outcome. This is a remarkable act: “So her health proxy (and good friend) designated four of us as her family. The ICU admits only family.” Absolutely brilliant.
The only problem was that when other friends saw “no visitors,” they thought she was alone all the time and one of them charged the gate. As her proxy says, it’s not good for anyone else to come yet as the patient wouldn’t want even the four of us to see her as she is. She always cared a lot about her appearance.
Thanks. I can relate to not wanting visitors. While I have never cared much about my appearance, I was inpatient in a hospital and then a skilled nursing home for 9 weeks last summer and I didn’t want any visitors. I didn’t have the “energy” to be socially “on” for anyone – even closest friends. It is draining at a time when rest and recovery is of primary importance. Email is fine. Phone calls only if the timing was arranged in advance, though. Best wishes to your friend who is recovering. She is fortunate to have such a responsive group cheering her on in the ways she can appreciate best.
It’s so true, friendship is all some people have and it is imperative to our well-being, I hope your friend continues to improve!
Thank you, Tiffany!
Friends mean a lot to me, too. Best to your friend. I hope she makes a complete recovery.
Thank you. She was coming along but had a relapse. The nurse said the trajectory is never straight in the ICU.
So very sorry.
May her recovery continue, moving like a sailboat across a lake…