Your Go-To Guide for Coping with Retirement Stress
Retirement is a fresh start for many, but for some it can also mean difficult emotions and adjustment challenges. For instance, you may have concerns surrounding your health or finances. But fortunately, adjusting to retirement doesn’t always have to be difficult.
In today’s blog post, we will be going over retirement stress and how you can efficiently cope with it as you adjust to your retirement in Thailand.
What is Retirement Stress?
Retirement stress, true to its name, is a form of stress retirees feel when adjusting to retirement. Such stress could stem from concerns regarding their declining health or maintaining their health, or financial concerns such as potentially overwhelming healthcare expenses.
For instance, pre-existing conditions have a strong likelihood of manifesting during old age, and it can further spike up your health insurance premiums.
While some may consider living in retirement a sigh of relief, gone are the days of constant commute to work and late meetings or deadlines, others may find the transition problematic and that’s perfectly normal.
Tips for Coping with Retirement Stress
From continuing to make friends to maintaining both physical and mental health, there are multiple ways to help you cope with retirement stress. Below are some tips for coping with retirement stress.
Staying Connected with Older Friends and Making New Ones
There is a risk of isolation during your retirement. Gone are the days of meeting familiar faces at work everyday during your usual work routine, and it may not be as easy to keep up with some of your older friends as you go your separate ways once you retire.
However, that’s not to say staying connected with friends and making new ones in your retirement is impossible. For instance, if you still have contact with some of your older friends, you can text them and maybe meet up for lunch together every once in a while.
You can then stay in touch with your old friends regularly by inviting everyone into a dedicated LINE group and sending them messages every once in a while. This will help you keep track of older friends you’re familiar with and keep in touch whenever you need them.
In addition to remaining in touch with your older friends, you can also make new friends through your neighbors. For instance, if you’re still physically active by going out for a morning or afternoon jog, you have the opportunity to meet other retirees with shared interests.
Additionally, staying physically active by exercising regularly will also help relieve stress thanks to the secretion of endorphins. Exercise also helps improve sleep, which is good news for old people who suffer from insomnia or disrupted sleep patterns, which brings us to our next point.
Maintain Physical and Mental Health
Speaking of health, another way to cope with retirement stress is to maintain both your physical and mental health. First off, exercising such as jogging, yoga, or aerobics will help secrete stress-relieving hormones known as endorphins, which leaves you happy and satisfied.
Jogging will help improve your blood flow, allowing greater oxygen delivery to the brain, muscles, and organs. This will help relieve fatigue and breathlessness that may affect you during everyday activities.
On the other hand, aerobics will help you burn calories through high-intensity repetitive movements, while yoga helps with mindfulness, posture correction, and correct breathing techniques.
Beyond physical health, maintaining mental health plays a significant role in coping with retirement stress. Prioritizing mental health will allow retirees to efficiently adapt to their life after the workforce with a positive outlook.
Aside from exercising regularly, you can stay connected with old friends while simultaneously making new ones, pursue hobbies, or seek professional support when needed.
Bonus: Secure Health Insurance Right from Your Youth
For good measure, it’s better to be safe than sorry by securing health insurance right from your younger days. This is because, as mentioned before, pre-existing conditions such as diseases and ailments have a tendency to manifest during old age and can spike up your health insurance premiums.
Thus, it’s important to secure health insurance before you plan your retirement as insurers consider younger individuals to have lower risks of illnesses and injuries, which makes premiums considerably more affordable.
By securing health insurance before you begin planning your retirement, you can better plan your finances for key expenses such as housing, vehicles, and most importantly, retirement savings.
Not securing health insurance ahead of time is one of the biggest mistakes people make when buying health insurance, which results in overwhelming premiums by the time you retire. For further reading on other common mistakes people make when securing health insurance, click the link below.
Top 5 Mistakes People Make When Buying Health Insurance
Conclusion
While some may succumb to the effects of retirement stress during their transition from the workforce to a more secluded life, that doesn’t mean finding comfort and coping with such stress is impossible altogether.
By staying in touch with older friends and making new ones with shared interests as well as making sure to maintain both your physical and mental health during this time, you can efficiently adjust to a new, hassle-free retirement life.
As a leading international health insurance broker, Pacific Prime Thailand has experience matching both expats and local Thai citizens to the health insurance plan that matches both their budget and unique healthcare needs.
Whether you’re a local Thai citizen yourself or an expat looking to retire in Thailand, we are more than happy to help you out. And if you have any further questions, please get in touch with us.
He graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communication Arts, Media & Communication major (concentration: Creative Content) from Mahidol University International College (MUIC). During the compulsory major elective period in the summer of 2021 and voluntarily during the summer of 2022, he also interned as a video and photo editor at Mbrella Films.
He has experience working as an English Content Writer at a real estate buying/renting/selling platform in Thonglor. There, he crafted company blog posts on a multitude of topics. Topics include market trends, legal issues and disputes in property businesses, financial guides, expat guides, home insurance, home decoration and maintenance, and weekly real estate news quick-recaps. Occasionally, as part of the blog-writing process, he would also translate existing Thai blogs to English.
In his free time, Guy enjoys doing scriptwriting and storytelling for comic strips, watching movies, and listening to music (particularly film scores).
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