Beware: Annual Subscription To Loneliness

When a diplomatic spouse follows their partner on a first posting, they often receive logistical information and, in the same envelope, an annual subscription to loneliness.

They say loneliness is the defining condition of this century, a real public health crisis hiding in plain sight. On a diplomatic posting, with its constant relocations and forced fresh starts, it becomes part of the daily routine. The challenge is that you are rarely alone. Your social calendar may fill fast and you may be surrounded by hundreds of people.

So why loneliness? Because the posting removes one thing all of us need: connection.

Four types of connections we need

As adults we need four types of connection to feel held, seen, and alive:

The anchor relationship: usually a partner or a very close friend, someone who knows your messy self and believes in you anyway.

The social fabric: the colleagues, neighbours, and regulars whose presence gives daily life its rhythm.

The identity-shaping connections: the peers and communities that reflect back who you are beyond your role.

And the sense of belonging to something larger than your immediate circle. Some kind of a mission.

Diplomatic spouses may be missing on several fronts

A posting dismantles all four after every move, all at the same time.

The anchor relationship of diplomatic spouses often comes under immediate pressure.

The diplomat's hours and emotional investment in the role leave little room for the kind of presence an anchor requires. For spouses without children, this one relationship carries almost the entire emotional weight of the posting. When it feels thin or distant, it feels like a house without a base.

The social fabric, the everyday non-familial contacts that give life its texture, must be rebuilt from zero with each move.

For spouses with children, the school gate provides some scaffolding. For childless couples and those whose children have already left home, there is no natural entry point. The spouse coffee morning exists, but a room full of people performing adjustment is not the same as a room full of people who actually know you, and are happy to see you for you.

The identity-shaping connections are the ones the posting takes most completely.

The colleagues who knew what you were capable of, the professional community that once reflected back something beyond your role, and the peers who called you by your own name rather than your partner's job title. For male spouses this loss may be sharper still. While they are often included in the spouse networks, quite a few feel out of place with the rest of the crowd.

And the sense of belonging to something larger can be genuinely sustaining, but it requires that the "something larger" is actually yours.

For many diplomatic spouses, what fills that space by default is the partner's career, their posting and next move. This can feel enough and meaningful, and sometimes it is. But a borrowed purpose is not the same as one you chose, and over time the difference tends to show.

So yes, diplomatic life is a journey of a million gains and a million losses. The loneliness is one of the losses that rarely gets discussed, because the life looks so full from the outside.

Most of these connections can be rebuilt, in different forms and cities. But first comes the surprise of how lonely it feels, and then, further down the road, the surprise that it still does. I believe knowing what is missing makes it less mysterious, and a little less defeating.

Which of these connections are you trying to rebuild right now? I would like to know.

Photo by Matthew Henry on Unsplash