If you’re over the age of 65 and you think about what it means to be healthy, your first thoughts might be to think about your physical health. Keeping up your strength and flexibility, looking after your diet, noticing new aches and pains, or perhaps managing any health conditions. But that’s really only half the picture. The other half, which is often overlooked, is your emotional health.
Emotional health is how we think and feel, how we manage our emotions, cope with life’s ups and downs, and our sense of wellbeing. As we age, we can encounter different things that impact on our emotional wellbeing, for example retirement, changes to our physical health, grief, or becoming a carer. Physical health and emotional health aren’t separate things, there’s a very close relationship between the two and they often interact with one another.
Many older people don’t seek support for their emotional health when they’re struggling, for example if you’ve been feeling sad, worried, or not yourself. This might be because you don’t think your problems are severe enough to warrant help, they’re seen as a normal part of ageing, or because of a fear of being judged.
It’s very important to know that struggling with emotional health isn’t something you need to just to accept, they’re not simply a part of getting older, and there are free services available that can help. It’s also very common, as data shows that more than six in 10 people in the UK aged 65 or over have experienced low mood or worry.
In this article we take a look at the links between emotional and physical health, the importance of looking after our emotional health, and the support that’s on offer.