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The Death of a Spouse For much of the world, the death of
Richard Nixon was the end of a complex public life. But researchers who study
bereavement wondered if it didn’t also signify the end of a private grief. Had
the former president merely run his allotted fourscore and one, or had he fallen
victim to a pattern that seems to afflict long- time married couples: one spouse
quickly following the other to the grave Pat, Nixon’s wife of
53 years, died last June ’after *a long illness. No one knows for sure whether
her death contributed to his. After all, he was elderly and had a history of
serious heart disease. Researchers have long observed that the death of a spouse
particularly a wife is sometimes followed by the untimely death of the grieving
survivor. Historian Will Durant died 13 days after his wife and collaborator,
Ariel; Buckminster Fuller and his wife died just 36 hours apart. Is this more
than coincidence "Part of the story, I suspect, is that we men
are so used to ladies feeding us and taking care of us," says Knud Helsing, an
epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins School of Public health, "that when we lose
a wife we go to pieces. We don’t know how to take care of ourselves." In one of
several studies Helsing has conducted on bereavement, he found that widowed men
had higher mortality rates than married men in every age group. But, he found
that widowers who remarried enjoyed the same lower mortality rate as men who’d
never been widowed. Women’s health and resilience may also
suffer after the loss of a spouse. In a 1987 study of widows, researchers from
the University of California, Los Angeles, and UC, San Diego, found that they
had a dramatic decline in levels of important immune - system cells that fight
off disease. Earlier studies showed reduced immunity in widowers.
For both men and women, the stress of losing a spouse can have a profound
effect. "All sorts of potentially harmful medical problems can be worsened,
"says Gerald Davison, professor of psychology at the University of Southern
California. People with high blood pressure, for example, may see it rise. In
Nixon’s case, Davison speculates, "the stroke, although not caused directly by
the stress, was probably hastened by it." Depression can affect the surviving
spouse’s will to live; suicide are elevated in the bereaved, along with
accidents not involving cars. Involvement in life helps prolong
it. Mortality, says Duke University psychiatrist Daniel Blazer, is higher in
older people without a good social - support - system, who don’t feel they’re
part of a group or a family, that they "fit in" somewhere. And that’s a more
common problem for men, who tend not to have as many close friendships as women.
The sudden absence of routines can also be a health hazard, says Blazer. "A
person who loses a spouse shows deterioration in normal habits like sleeping and
eating." he says. "They don’t have that other person to orient them, like when
do you go to bed, when do you wake up, when do you eat, when do you take your
medication, when do you go out to take a walk Your pattern is no longer locked
into someone else’s pattern, so it deteriorates." While earlier
studies suggested that the first six months to a year - or even the first week
-- were times of higher mortality for the bereaved, some newer studies find no
special vulnerability in this initial period. Most men and women, of course do
not die as a result of the loss of a spouse. And there are ways to improve the
odds. A strong sense of separate identity and lack of over - dependency during
the marriage are helpful. Adult sons and daughters, siblings and friends need to
pay special attention to a newly widowed parent. They can make sure that he or
she is socializing, getting proper nutrition and medical care, expressing
emotion and, above all, feeling needed and appreciated. The passage states that while married couples can prepare for grieving by