We're launching a series called "All the Lonely People," diving deep into how loneliness shows up in our lives and how our culture shapes it. This week, why are moms so acutely lonely? Brittany hears from her listeners, and from the experts: Jessica Grose, New York Times opinion writer and author of the book Screaming on the Inside: the Unsustainability of American Motherhood, and parental burnout researcher at the Ohio State University, Kate Gawlik. They discuss what mom loneliness has to do with airplanes, lobotomies, and Tik Tok - and what we can do to help alleviate mom loneliness.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy
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Hello, hello. I'm Brittany Luce, and you're listening to It's Been a Minute from NPR, a show about what's going on in culture and why it doesn't happen by accident. Do you relate? Well, you may be lonely, but you're not alone. One third of Americans report feeling lonely at least once a week. And 16% of Americans report feeling lonely all or most of the time.
A lot of attention is being paid to loneliness right now. After the former American Surgeon General declared a loneliness epidemic, news organizations from the New York Times to the Atlantic to NPR jumped to cover it. And it's hard to say definitively if loneliness has gotten worse, but what we do know is that a significant amount of people are feeling it.
And we also know that chronic loneliness is really bad for us. Studies show loneliness is associated with a higher risk for heart disease, dementia, stroke, even premature death. But who is at greater risk for loneliness? And for those of us stuck in the loneliness loop, how do we get ourselves out?
I'm Brittany Luce, and for the next few weeks on It's Been a Minute, we're launching a series called All the Lonely People. We're diving deep into how loneliness shows up in our lives and how our culture shapes it. This week, we're talking to moms.
A 2024 survey from Ohio State University showed that 71% of moms said that the demands of parenthood made them feel lonely sometimes or a lot of the time, compared to 59% of dads. But why are moms so acutely lonely? We asked our listeners, and here's what a few of them had to say.
I became a mom at 24. I was young. I remember describing that time as like a cheese grater on my soul. Like it was the loneliness. It's hard to really describe.
I'm a mother of two, a six-year-old girl and an eight-year-old boy with special needs. I've been lonely for a number of years and I don't see that changing for me.
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