Life-Saving Wives Help Men Age
“I’ve come across a lot more women who can and do live alone in their 50s, 60s and 70s,” says Aryeh Maidenbaum, a Jungian analyst. “Men, almost invariably, need a partner.”
The biggest factor in protecting older men against depression and prolonging their lives may be the save-your-life wife.
Consider: Men from the ages of 45 to 64 who live with wives are twice as likely to live 10 years longer than their unmarried counterparts.
That was the stark conclusion of a large-scale study of survival factors in more than 7,000 American adults by the University of California, San Francisco. Being married remains for men the strongest link with male survival, even after one accounts for differences in income and education, and such risk factors as smoking, drinking, obesity and inactivity. The greatest surprise to these researchers was to discover that it’s not just ANY woman who is a lifesaver; the same benefit is not enjoyed by men who have live-in lady friends or who reside with their grown children, parents or other relatives. As other studies have confirmed, there is something special about wives that protects men from depression.
First wives often get a bum rap. Many men I’ve interviewed describe their first wives the same way: “She’s a nice lady, but …” What’s surprising is how little they ever knew about this “nice lady.”
One of the unmarked revolutions of the last 20 years is the resistance of women in middle life to remarriage. The ranks of divorcees between 40 and 54 have grown the most rapidly of any age-group since 1970, but these divorcees are radically different.
Demographers say that increasingly these women are CHOOSING to remain single, rather than sacrifice their independence. As long as they are able to support themselves in a reasonable style, once having tasted financial and sexual freedom, and now that they are beyond childbearing years, they view most offers of remarriage as a bad deal. They don’t want to “knuckle under” ever again.
A recent study of several hundred “typical” white middle-class American women front-runners of the Baby Boom Generation, and their slightly older counterparts, confirmed that divorce spurs a woman’s psychological growth: “Suddenly single - whether by choice or default - most felt unburdened for the first time in their lives. And they weren’t risking remarriage if it meant being restricted. They were out to discover who they were.”
But what turns out to be a divorce springboard for many women represents a slippery slope for many men. Most middle-aged men are reluctant returnees to single life. In my interviews with divorced men of 40 to mid-50s, the common theme is a sense of failure and downgraded self-worth. More often than not, these men will confess that their wives instigated the divorce.
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The following fields overflowed: CREDIT = Gail Sheehy Universal Press Syndicate