Learned Helplessness is a major risk factor for dying early. But you can take action.
Significant increased risks include blood pressure, diabetes, depression and cardiovascular disease.
New years resolutions are obsolete.
We’re at the stage where we know health and wellbeing is a life-long activity rather than a temporary diet in January.
But if we’re not creating resolutions, then what are we doing?
Whether’s it’s January or June, taking control of your health is paramount. Otherwise you might be in danger of entering into a learned helplessness state.
The concept of New Years resolutions has never really stuck with me. But since 2019 vision-boarding has helped me to control of my health.
I had built my own version of learned helplessness in 2019.
I was overweight and on antidepressants. I was clinically pre-diabetic, depressed, anxious. I had lost control.
I was there for the beating, and the world knew it. I wanted to take control, but I didn’t know how, and it was a long cycle back out of it.
None of us are immune to learned helplessness.
You might think that this doesn’t apply to you, but with some aspect of your life you may have come to an acceptance that this is the way it is, and it’s how it will continue to be.
Have you lost control?
Sometimes I just want to tell my patient, ‘it’s all in your head’, give them a figurative shake and tell them ‘you’re in control’.
But it wouldn’t work. Because my reality is different to the reality of the patient in front of me. My language is different.
My knowledge of health is different to the person in front of me.
The truth is, the person in front of me has tried.
They’ve not seen meaningful improvement to their health from the actions they took. They haven’t been able to sustain them.
It’s not been pleasant for them. In fact it has often been genuinely painful for them to make change.
Learned helplessness has contributed to this problem.
Medicalisation rather than focusing on health gives more power to the doctor, and less power to you.
Your doctor may give you meaningful advice on lifestyle (I hope) and medications help manage conditions like high cholesterol, blood pressure and diabetes.
Do you walk into the consulting room and tell them how your health is?
Or are you going to the doctor for your 12-monthly reviews and waiting for them to tell you how you’re doing?
If you’re in this group you are in danger of being part of the learned helplessness problem.
The patient that asks questions is the patient taking control.
The patient who takes actions based on the questions they’ve asked, is the patient in control.
What is learned helplessness?
Learned helplessness tells us that we can’t be helped, and there’s nothing that can be done to change this.
It’s a psychological phenomenon first described by Martin Seligman and Steven Maier in the late 1960s at the University of Pennsylvania.
In their original experiments, dogs exposed to inescapable electric shocks eventually stopped attempting to escape, even when the opportunity was later provided to them.
In 1978, this phenomenon was demonstrated in humans too.
When humans are repeatedly exposed to uncontrollable outcomes, they develop a belief that their actions are futile.
This leads to lack of engagement, emotional numbness and hopelessness.
Do you feel ‘resigned’ to your current situation?
Whether that be related to work, health or your relationship?
Sometimes it can stop us from making changes in the first place, because we believe it’s not going to help us.
‘Learned helplessness’ can often make us feel that we don’t have control anymore, and have to leave our health outcomes up to doctors to give us medications to manage it.
Rationally, you know that this isn’t the case, yet so often we give up control.
Learned helplessness is situational.
It’s not a universal state of being, but one that is related to a specific part of your life.
You might have control of over your health, but you may feel that there is nothing you can do about your career, and you’re resigned to what might come.
Perhaps AI is coming and you’re frozen, thinking '“this will never happen to my job” but you’re heads in the sand.
You might be the frog in the frying pan, not realising the danger of not moving and growing. Yet you may feel in control of your cholesterol with the actions you’re taking on your health.
Helplessness was the strongest predictor for the development of hypertension.
Rather than look at the physical and genetic related causes, this study also looked at psychological aspects.
Stern and colleagues studied 240 adults; a relatively a small number compared to population-based data but with novel findings.
It’s a simple study by design and by comparison, but the image below shows the major impact of helplessness compared to co-morbid disease and social wellbeing.
Depression was also a risk factor, but significantly weaker with a Hazard ratio of 1.08.
Why was this the case?
The researchers suggested that helplessness reflects a reduced sense of control over the environment, which can lead to chronic physiological stress and subsequent cardiovascular issues.
But it’s more than that. Learned helplessness means that you stop taking the actions that will actually help you, whether they are big or small impacts.
When it comes to physical health, typically there is not one thing that you will do to improve your health. It will be a combination of many small things over time, that compounds to lead to good health.
Yes. But genetics?
You are born with certain genetic risks which might increase your risk of type 2 diabetes, but for most people with type 2 diabetes, you have the ability to control and improve the impact that it does have on your life.
That goes for high blood pressure, cholesterol, fatty liver. This includes other conditions including osteoporosis and even cancer.
When we as health professionals don’t support and empower patients, we support your dependence on us to treat your disease.
There is another reality where we can support your health outcomes without dependence.
Learned helplessness is linked to other psychological concepts and diseases.
That includes;
Self-determination theory
The internal and external locus of control theories
Self-efficacy
Depression and anxiety
These concepts all have evidence on the impact of psychological health of patients, and with physical illness, especially chronic illness.
Here’s a summary of how learned helplessness and associated conditions have an impact on your health
Max’s experience
Max, a patient of mine, had tried various diets in the past to manage his diabetes, however he hadn’t experienced much success. Both his parents had type 2 diabetes.
Despite his efforts, he finds it difficult to maintain consistent blood glucose levels.
Max described to me, in hindsight, how he began to develop learned helplessness regarding his dietary choices for managing his diabetes.
He believed that no matter what he ate, or how strictly he followed a diet, his blood glucose levels will stay uncontrollable.
He lost motivation and stopped making efforts to improve his diet or seek professional support. This led to a cycle of unhealthy eating habits and a lack of engagement in managing his diabetes.
He stopped considering the impact on his blood glucose.
Max was given control and belief with the support of a practitioner.
It wasn’t me, but over time he started to change. He started seeing positive impacts.
What helped him achieve that?
Support & self-belief
He saw the results coming in, from actions he was taking.
His knowledge was upgraded. He developed a depth of knowledge that meant he had more options.
He upgraded his environment, started doing activities where had accountability to others.
He the started to feel better. He physically started to see changes in his body.
He had continued support throughout, but the support wasn’t paternalistic. It was from a coaching framework, which enabled him to find his own answers and choose the right decisions.
This gave him health ownership.
Over time he will gain this independence and confidence in himself and he won’t need the support that he had previously, and the ties to needing his health practitioners gradually slipped way.
He wasn’t helpless. He was in control. And he made decisions that he was confident were right for his health. And he saw results, and understood what the results meant.
Reducing the impact on your health
Bring your control to centre. Be the main character in your life.
Connecting, social support and accountability with others
Openness to learning and unlearning
Patience to finding breakthroughs
Feedback, guidance and support from healthcare professionals who help you take control
Be the expert patient and build knowledge of your condition
Take small goals. Make it easy to recognise when you achieve them
Take action. Build confidence through experience
Shift your thinking from permanence, to temporary problems.
Hi, Mirela from RNOH and I am happy to see you here!
Another great article. Thank you