
When Elizabeth R.’s husband passed away from bone cancer in 2016, she felt grateful that her employer offered generous bereavement leave. Now 40, she worked in the development department of a large nonprofit cancer group at the time and felt ready to go back when her leave was up. However, about two weeks into her return, she realized it was too much, too soon. “Every time I would hear a cancer survivor or caregiver story, I had a reaction,” she recalled. Elizabeth, who asked that her last name not be used, decided to resign and has since remarried and started a second career as a massage therapist in Grand Rapids, Mich. But not every widow or widower who works has these options, and those who don’t may face increased physical and mental health challenges, a new study suggests. People who returned to work within three months of losing a spouse had higher perceived stress levels and greater systemic inflammation than retirees who had lost their partner. The less these folks earned at their job, the worse the mental health effects, the study showed. “It is important to recognize that widows and widowers have twice as much to deal with as other people who work and are not grieving a spouse,” said study author Jensine Paoletti. She is a postdoctoral research fellow in the Biobehavioral Mechanisms… read on > read on >