Elderly people suffering from dementia who are bored become restless and search for activities in an unstructured manner. These problems are sometimes described as ‘behavioral disorders,’ for which medication is then considered. Boredom is also sometimes confused with depression, or it can trigger, maintain, or exacerbate an addiction problem. Boredom can also indicate an existential sense of meaninglessness.

In other words, boredom is a particularly relevant theme in elderly care. Paying sufficient attention to it, both in the preventive aspect and in the treatment and interaction with the elderly, is therefore more than worthwhile.

Notwithstanding the relevance and importance of this subject, we must conclude that, generally speaking, relatively little attention is paid to the problem of boredom in elderly care. It is also striking that when conducting a literature review, one must primarily consult literary studies, philosophy, and history, and less so psychology or medical sciences. An initial exploration of this theme is therefore called for.

Boredom

You almost never hear adults complain about boredom; on the contrary, adults will vehemently deny that they might ever suffer from boredom. It seems as if we, adults, are convinced that we must constantly come up with new and sufficiently exciting ‘challenges’ for ourselves. Anyone who is bored feels ashamed. After all, one is unable to elevate oneself to significance through ‘meaningful activities’. One is embarrassed by this. In boredom, one feels naked in one’s own eyes and in those of others. And that is why one tries to conceal it—both from oneself and from others. Boredom as a state of mind is a self-experience of poverty that one prefers to keep hidden.

But what exactly does boredom mean?

In the ‘Van Dale’ dictionary, boredom is defined as ‘an unpleasant feeling of emptiness such that time seems long’.

When we look at the etymology of ‘boredom’, a first interesting observation immediately presents itself. After all, different aspects or different forms of boredom are emphasized in different languages.

In the German “Langeweile” (literally ‘the long duration of time’), the experience of time is primarily emphasized, whereas in the French “ennui” and in the English “boredom, weariness or tedium”, a state of mind takes center stage, ranging from a state of dissatisfaction to an aversion or disgust with existence, as in the French “la nauseé”. Awee Prins, a Dutch philosopher, argues in his particularly interesting dissertation that ‘an elliptical semantic structure with two semantic focal points can be attributed to the word boredom’ (Prins, 2007): the experience of time and the state of mind. Over time, the experience of time has come to predominate in the German-speaking world, whereas in the French-speaking world (ennui), the state of mind is primarily emphasized…

The Dutch word ‘verveling’ comes from the High German word ‘verviln’ (van Wijk, 1912), which means: to become or seem too much. This ‘too much’ would refer both to the perception of time (too much time) and to a state of mind (a state of mind that is too heavy). Also interesting is the etymological relationship between the words ‘verveling’ and ‘verlangen’. The word ‘verlangen’ also contains a time component – ​​even the word ‘lang’ – longing can last a long time…

Thus, both the emotional and the time components are interwoven in our Dutch word ‘verveling’. To distinguish between these two components, a split is often made in Dutch literature between everyday boredom and existential boredom.

We could describe everyday boredom as a social emotion of mild aversion, evoked by a temporary, unavoidable, and predictable circumstance. Just think of waiting for a train or a delayed plane, a boring lecture, queues at the checkout, a long family dinner (Toohey, 2012). Everyday boredom is therefore highly circumstantially determined.

“Instead of allowing oneself to be seduced by that constant lure of the autonomy supporters, one would do better to ask oneself what one is so afraid of.”

Boredom, however, can be so all-consuming and intervene in all domains of life that it is no longer a matter of ‘everyday’ boredom, but rather of hyper-boredom, or existential boredom. This boredom permeates the entire person, is not fleeting, and is not determined by circumstances. It concerns a boredom that affects the person very deeply and can bring about a sense of emptiness and meaninglessness. Boredom depersonalizes.

One ends up in this existential boredom involuntarily, for one actually does not want to end up there oneself. One therefore ends up there despite oneself, although one person may be somewhat more vulnerable or susceptible to this than another. One experiences oneself as ‘trapped’ in a ‘strange, impersonal power’ that can sometimes be so great that one ends up in a state of boredom from which one can no longer escape.

In 1935, Levinas wrote in “De l’evasion” that boredom is related to the ‘il y a’, the darkness that swallows up all difference (‘everything is the same: there is neither I nor you, today nor tomorrow…’). He adds that boredom is therefore accompanied by the ‘feeling’ of ‘horror’. One wants to escape it, but the bitter feeling creeps over the ‘bored’ person that this will not succeed. In that respect, boredom manifests itself in consciousness as a ‘malaise’ that holds man in its grip as a ‘victim’. But – according to Levinas – that feeling of ‘mal à l’aise’ that accompanies boredom is the lever from within to ‘seek’ to ‘get out of it’. Whoever experiences this existential boredom does not want to remain in it; he or she finds no pleasure in it. And that is the ‘healthy’ lever in the ‘evil of boredom’, even if one does not immediately see how to get out of it (Lévinas, 1998).

Boredom can therefore be considered an adaptive mechanism; boredom is, as it were, a protective mechanism against contagious social situations, the healthy lever to escape circumstances that are ‘more restrictive, predictable, and dull than is good for our (mental) health’ (Toohey, 2012). Boredom protects us against ‘illness’, against ‘toxic’ social relationships, especially because it has a dynamic element: it drives people to overcome boredom. That active element linked to boredom is a major difference from depression: depression paralyzes the person, as it were.

Escaping Boredom

‘Escaping’ boredom can take various directions: people can find creative solutions to deal with boredom; many beautiful novels have been written by authors who were terribly bored. Svendsen argues against avoiding boredom, but rather for seeking it out, because a source of creativity may be hidden behind the immense emptiness (Svendsen, 2003).

But escaping boredom can also go in the wrong direction. After all, there are other remedies for boredom, which we could summarize as drugs, travel, and sex (Toohey, 2012). Eros, or the pursuit of the erotic, the new, or the exotic, does not work: as soon as new experiences are sought out, there is a high probability that they, too, will become boring. The use of substances such as alcohol or drugs does work, but is, of course, very self-destructive. Existential boredom: an overview of the literature Existential boredom is found primarily in literature. References to boredom can already be found in texts from antiquity, and throughout history we find much about it, albeit under different terms.

In the 17th century, the English writer Robert Burton fought against the disease in ‘The Anatomy of Melancoly’, which ‘dries up the mind, blocks imagination, and causes sadness, dullness, and melancholy’.

At the end of the 18th and certainly in the 19th century, there was a ‘boom’ in literature featuring somber, depressed protagonists, which is likely linked to the flourishing of psychological novels in this century. Boredom is sometimes referred to as “La maladie du siècle” during that period (Verstrynghe, 2002). An early example is ‘Die Leiden des jungen Werther’ from 1774 by Goethe (Goethe, 2002). Some examples from the 19th century are: Madame Bovary by Flaubert (1856): the main character is married to a ‘boring’ country doctor and seeks her distraction in affairs with various men, which, however, also becomes boring. Another example is Eline Vere by the Dutch writer Couperus (1889). Here, the escape route from boredom is a ‘means’ (laudanum).

Nowhere has so much been written about boredom as by the great Russian authors, where boredom is sometimes regarded as the disease of the rich. The Russian authors also introduced the concept of the ‘superfluous man’, an idealistic but inactive hero who is sensitive to moral and social problems, but who takes no action, due to his own weakness and laxity but also due to the social and political restrictions on freedom of action (Turgenev, 1850).

In the 20th century, Fernando Pessoa wrote a semi-autobiographical book about his own existential boredom, ‘The Book of Restlessness’ (Pessoa, 1990): Pessoa found both a creative solution for his own existential boredom – writing – and a destructive solution: smoking and drinking alcohol, to which he succumbed….

Another example is “La nausée” by Jean Paul Sartre. In “La Nausée,” the protagonist wanders around in isolation through an endlessly banal existence.

Three o’clock. Three o’clock, that is always too late or too early for everything one wants to do. It’s not working! It’s not working at all; the aversion, the disgust has come over me. When one lives, nothing happens. The scenery changes, the days, people come and go, that is all. There is never a beginning. The days string themselves together, without conclusion or meaning, it is an endless and tedious accumulation. Tuesday. Nothing. I existed. (Sartre, 1965)

A great deal has therefore been written about that feeling of boredom, meaninglessness, and despair, and quite a few words or terms are used to express those emotions: a superfluous person, melancholy, depression, l’ennui, despair, weariness of life, weltschmerz, taedium vitae, the ‘demon of midday’, la nausée or disgust, ‘Tiefe Langweile’, etc. We are dealing here, as it were, with words with ‘floating meanings’: the meaning these expressions carry can differ depending on the era and the specific context in which they are used.

Boredom is therefore timeless, but in our postmodern society, the problem of boredom presents itself in a new and sharp manner. This is linked to a world that is fragmenting more and more, the loss of grand narratives and traditions, and the disappearance of connectedness… People who are increasingly lost, at risk of becoming isolated and lonely.

Awee Prins argues that it is not fear, but boredom that is the underlying mood of our time (Prins, 2007). In an interview with the ‘Groene Nederlander’, he states: “We have become homo zappens. That also applies to that supposed fear. We jump from one terrorist attack to another. Think of all that ‘breaking news’ that is sent to us on our smartphones. Giving the impression all day long that something is happening all over the world. We are addicted to hectic experiences, bungee jumping, or taking drugs like cocaine, speed, or ecstasy. Underneath all of that lies boredom.”

Boredom and (our prejudices regarding) the elderly

The question that then arises is what it means when this ‘channel surfing’ must come to an end due to age or the limitations that age may bring with it. Most seniors who are still in good health seem to carry on calmly and merrily, and a frequently heard statement is therefore: ‘pensioners have no time…’. Here, too, the societal expectation seems to be that one must be busy, busy, busy even after retirement… Going on vacation, playing sports, dancing, attending lectures, regularly babysitting the grandchildren, going to restaurants… many seniors are even busier than before. There is, of course, nothing wrong with that in itself, but the question must surely be asked whether this evolution does not once again place pressure on today’s seniors?

What does it mean, for example, that the term ‘Successful aging’ is also frequently used in the literature on the elderly (Bowling, 2005)? Does that not imply that aging, too, must proceed ‘successfully’? Moreover, the elderly are certainly not allowed to feel old. “You are only as old as you feel” is a frequently heard saying. Suppose an older person were to say: ‘I feel my age’, then this is associated by young people with the idea that the older person is exhibiting a lack of vitality; which is rather strange (Karpf, 2014).

Does that not say more about our fear of being truly old? We must acknowledge that we live in a gerontophobic culture, a culture that prefers not to be confronted with the consequences of old age. Over the past decades, the perception of the elderly has shifted strongly in a positive direction, but strong prejudices against old people still prevail, which is referred to as “ageism” in English-language literature. Unlike other prejudices such as sexism or racism, ageism involves a prejudice against oneself, more specifically one’s own future self or ‘future self’ (Karpf, 2014). Today’s young people are the elderly of the future. What young people think about the elderly, they think about themselves, albeit in the future.

The fear young people have of old age is a fear of themselves. The predominant way to deal with that fear is to try not to be old or not to look old, something the anti-aging industry makes a fortune from.

So, even healthy, active seniors try not to be ‘old’ and to continue ‘zapping’. But then what they tried to avoid can happen: they suffer a stroke, they are no longer mobile and are confined to their homes, or their memory fails, or their hearing or sight, they can no longer drive, or they are forced to move to a residential care center. And then those people disappear from the public sphere. Because those are the others, those are the real elderly people with whom we do not want to identify, those are “them” and not “us”…

Is that why “we” are not really interested in what goes on in the residential care center? Is that why we all tolerate the fact that far too little is invested in elderly care, just as is the case for mental health care? Our residential care centers are understaffed. The nurses and caregivers in these centers are not bored; on the contrary, they are rushing around all day and have to learn to live with the constant frustration that they cannot give the elderly people they care for the time and attention they would like to. And the residents? Some adapt remarkably well, adjust easily, and are not dissatisfied. Others languish and get bored, just like many elderly people living at home, who are confined to their homes and become isolated. They suffer from life. Without necessarily being or becoming depressed.

One would expect societal pressure to emerge that things simply cannot continue like this, but nothing could be further from the truth. On the contrary, a completely different discourse is emerging. With the increasingly loud voices of the absolute autonomy proponents, the red carpet is being rolled out more and more towards an exit. “You don’t have to become like ‘them,’ you don’t have to become demented; if you are ‘done with life,’ feel free to step out, we will help you” is becoming the dominant message more and more. The old term from Russian literature, ‘superfluous man,’ suddenly takes on a very different meaning here. These elderly people are superfluous in a different way. They feel superfluous and are perceived as superfluous…

Instead of allowing oneself to be seduced by that constant allure of the autonomy proponents, one would do better to ask oneself what one is so afraid of. What underlying image of the elderly is hidden there? What other answers can be given, besides ending one’s life? Wouldn’t it be sensible to explicitly dare to ask the question: how do we deal with the perception of time of older people? And with the fact that, in the long term, they question our own well-filled sense of time?

Boredom and Depression

Besides the possibility of euthanasia as a response to the existential suffering of the elderly, many other answers are conceivable. An answer that is often given, but is not a good one, is the medicalization of suffering—in this case, viewing existential boredom as a disease, specifically depressive illness. Over the past decades, there has been enormous positive progress in the field of research, prevention, detection, and treatment of the problem of depression in the elderly. However, what has become clearly noticeable in recent years is that the pendulum is swinging to the other side. Notwithstanding that many elderly people are still not treated or are undertreated for depression, there is also clearly a great deal of ‘overtreatment,’ which is confirmed by the figures on medication use (Vision text metaforum, 2010). Many elderly people are prescribed antidepressants far too quickly. While it is often about other things: grief, adjustment problems, boredom—both everyday and existential—in other words, problems of meaning, and a lack of meaningful activities and meaningful contacts. We won’t solve that with antidepressants…

The listlessness of boredom should not immediately be considered a (depressive) illness.

The listlessness of boredom should therefore not immediately be regarded as a (depressive) illness. That distinction is not always easy, but there are nevertheless some clear points of difference, for example in how a bored person and a depressed person experience time. Thus, a distinction can be made between ‘I-time’ and clock time. ‘I-time’ relates to the person and their activity. Clock time relates to the time of others, the world, and things, and is, in other words, objective time. In cases of boredom, ‘I-time’ runs ahead of clock time. What is happening around a person no longer holds sufficient appeal to hold their attention. That is something completely different from depression. We can summarize the core symptoms of depression in a few terms: anhedonia, arrhythmia, anhormia, anesthesia: no longer being drawn to life, the stagnation, falling out of rhythm, not keeping up with time, not vibrating along, not feeling driven towards, not feeling the painful. In depression, the self falls silent, the self fails to catch up with time, ego-time lags behind clock time. Depressed patients also phrase it this way: minutes last hours, hours days, days weeks… one accomplishes nothing anymore. Meanwhile, the person who is bored tries to combat the emptiness. He exhibits restlessness, seeks distraction, tries to escape. Here we return to that active component of boredom: the unease or restlessness that makes you search for a way out.

In addition to the confusion between existential boredom and depression, there is often also confusion between existential boredom and other pathologies. For instance, much has been written about the connection between boredom and eating disorders, and between boredom and excessive smoking or excessive alcohol consumption. The common thread here is: there is a void that needs to be filled.

Naturally, the problem of addiction cannot be reduced to a problem of boredom. Many factors play a role in the development of an addiction problem. However, alongside biological and psychological factors, we must not lose sight of boredom—at all ages—both everyday and existential boredom. Consuming a substance (alcohol, drugs, medication) or engaging in an activity (Facebook, gaming, gambling, shopping…) can be an escape from boredom. Through the rush and the intoxication, the daily grind or life as it is is forgotten for a moment. Addiction then becomes a disguised search for meaning. In other words, in concrete care, we must make a clear distinction between boredom and/or existential problems and genuine illnesses. Additionally, when treating elderly people with psychiatric disorders, such as depression or addiction, we must pay attention to boredom, to the void that needs to be filled, and to the existential suffering of our patients or residents.

Conclusion

In summary: paying more attention to the issue of boredom in elderly care proves to be particularly relevant and often puts us on the track of a deeper problem. This means that within good and humane elderly care, we must look for circumstances that can give rise to boredom, investigate what we can improve in this regard, and invest in those areas. Moreover, it is important to be more present and show more interest in the real elderly, those who have disappeared from view—inter-esse, as the Latin expresses it, being among them… attentively present.

And undoubtedly, we can learn a great deal from the real elderly. How do they give meaning to their lives now that they are forced to endure a monotonous life? And what can we take away from that for our own lives? What could help us cope with our own fear of growing old? If we were truly attentively present with many elderly people, we might notice the great resilience of many of them, the strength they display, and how rich their inner lives are. This “gestalt switch” seems necessary to help young people overcome their fear of old age, to upgrade our elderly care as well as the people working in elderly care.

For all of this is urgently needed…

Source of this article: https://evara.be/artikel/over-ouderen-en-verveling-ik-verveel-me-zo-ik-verveel-me-meer-en-meer

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