To ask if you think men recover from bereavement more quickly than women?

[Motherinlawsdung]

I know so many who have remarried or found new partners soon after losing their wives - within a few months. I am happy for them but I don't see this so often with women whose husbands have died. Is this the usual pattern?

I think everyone is different and deals with their grief their own way.

I don't think gender comes into it.

It isn't recovery necessarily, but a desire to replace the relationship

We don't encourage men to be as connected to their feelings as we do women so they appear to move on quicker - but they don't really

I don't know anybody who have found new partners within a few months of losing a wife, or a husband for that matter.

However, death makes people act in strange ways sometimes.

It's not gender specific. It depends on the individual and on the bereavement.

I must be unusual because I don't know of anyone who has lost a partner through death when they were young.

My mum passed away Aug 98. My dad was a rubbish single man. I was so relieved when my brother told me that he had started dating. Legend has it that he had 7 dates in 7 evenings with 7 partners, and in that week he met my step mum, who is really nice, a year younger than him and they got married in July 2002, about 18 months after they met.

Step mum's personality is similar to mum's but physically they are very different.

I think if dad had died before mum, she probably would have been single a lot longer, but they were both 45 when mum died. Too young for dad to stay on his own for too long.

I spoke to dad last year about how sad I feel at certain times of year (March, mum's birthday and August, anniversary of death) and dad said he just remembers how good they had it for almost 27 years. But he's incredibly pragmatic, and I would imagine that after his tears at the funeral, and then clearing her wardrobe in the following few weeks, he would have felt his grieving was done. I also think he had a bit of an advantage over me because he knew she was terminally ill from about 8 weeks before she died. I thought the treatment she was having was getting her better.

Lauriefairycake that's very perceptive, that they may appear to move on but don't really.
caruthers I'm probably a good deal older than you, I'm glad you've not experienced this among your peers yet.

meow I am sorry for your loss.

Motherinlawsdung I'm 52 so i'm no spring chicken.

Maybe i've just been fortunate not to witness it.

I think men used to find new wives quickly some not all as they liked being looked after in a relationship i dont think i have heard of it really grief is grief imo and how everybody regardless of gender deal with it in their own way

I think it also depends on the circumstances of the loss - for example, with an illness leading to an expected, if early, death, there might be a chance for the departing wife to say "please don't stay alone."

Thinking of the couples I know (not all of them close acquaintances) I can think of five instances where the bereaved husband had a new partner within five months. One didn't get a new partner, so far. I can think of four women in the same time period who lost their husbands - none have new partners.

Lots of research shows that in general married men are much happer than single men, and single women are happier than married women. It is a generalisation, but I have seen a number of widows flourish after the initial grief.

That would certainly explain what I've observed green.

My granny used to say that widowed women tend not to remarry as they had learned their lesson.

Mind you she did also say that she couldn't understand why young women would get married at all, as they could have homes, careers and children without the bother of a husband.

It's not gender specific. It depends on the individual and on the bereavement

I would agree with this, I know two women who were widowed young, one has had several relationships starting the first fairly soon after her loss, the other has not had one yet after several years. I wonder though if it is more likely to want to create a new family unit when there are children, the first one I mentioned has DCs, the second doesn't.

Just used google which says that widowed men are seven times more likely to remarry than widowed women.

My bil started seeing someone just a couple of months after my sister died. This relationship did not last but he soon met someone else and then married her.

I think he didn't want to be alone and couldn't cope wit not being in a relationship.

My dad had moved in with another woman after my mum had been dead less than three months. They had been married thirty one years.

I know I should be pleased he found someone but to be honest it felt horrendously disrespectful to the memory of my mother.

Widowers are just more likely to marry again because as they get older there are far more women than men. It is individual and nothing to do with gender, apart from there being more available women than men.

From wikipedia -

"The most frequent reasons older adults give for remaining without a partner after losing a spouse are gender-specific. While the common myth is "women grieve, men replace," research does not support this pattern. Rather, widows are more likely to report that they are reluctant to give up newfound freedom and independence.[18] Many widows perceive a sense of liberation no longer having to take care of another person, and value this more than additional companionship.[19] Widowers, on the other hand, tend to report that they have not repartnered because they are concerned about being undesirable partners due to older age and ill health.[18]

Some studies have found that women who are not interested in a new relationship have explicitly decided to remain unpartnered. In contrast, men were more likely to report that they would not rule out the possibility but had not encountered a suitable relationship yet.[18] Interviews indicate that widowers are more prepared than widows to take a chance on a new relationship.[19]"

I knew a man who lost his wife in November and remarried the following September.

Seemed a bit quick to me, but I wasn't in that situation.

I'm not sure men move on quicker.
I was widowed at 43, DH had cancer which was terminal.
I joined WAY (widowed and young)
Lots of people met new partners at around 16-18 months, that's both women and men. Some people have stayed single.
It is often said that after a good marriage people are much more likely to remarry, as opposed to people who divorce and don't want to remarry.
I don't know of anyone who started dating less than a year of being widowed.
Some widows are reluctant to remarry as they will lose the pension as well as widowed parents allowance.

Yes, agree with those saying moving on quickly (possibly something more men do) does not necassarily mean 'recovery.'