Las Vegas Sun

March 28, 2024

For an increasing percentage of the population, solo living is the lifestyle of choice

A close call with a speeding semi-truck had Pamela panicking: If something horrific happened, how long would it take before someone actually missed her?

"I thought, 'How would somebody know if I'd been hurt?' " says the Las Vegas single mother in her early 30s, who prefers to be identified only by her first name.

Pamela's list of friends is shorter than the number of days in a work week. "(I realized) my support system out here is so small. It really is scary."

She agrees with many singles transplanted here from larger cities that "it's harder to make friends and meet people here."

A few months back, Steve Grosman left his native Australia to attend UNLV's hotel college. The 19-year-old says he depends on the thin threads of family acquaintances to get him through the summer before school starts.

"If it wasn't for (family friends) I'd probably end up back home," he says, adding that he plans to live alone "until I get settled in here."

He prefers solitude to help adjust to the busy 24-hour town and its people.

"I think Vegas is great, there's tons to do," he says, but he hasn't met a lot of people he'd call good friends.

Joel Sokol, a retired dentist in his 50s and a long-time Las Vegan, declares: "Love it! I can do what I want with who I want. It's great."

For better or worse or everything in between, solo living is on the rise.

The Las Vegas Perspective, a research publication, reports that 32 percent of Las Vegas households are now comprised of adult singles (living with or without children, but without the aid of another adult), up from the 25 percent recorded in the 1990 U.S. Census data for Nevada.

This year 25 million people nationally -- about 10 percent of the population ages 15 and older -- will live alone according to U.S. Census Bureau projections. Fifty-six percent of them will be women, and 46 percent will be men.

For Las Vegas singles, the causes seem to be: People don't stay long, making lasting relationships difficult; the town revolves around tourist attractions, not its citizens; men perceive women as gold diggers and women perceive men as self-involved; and finally, the town has odd hours -- half the population is working while the other half sleeps.

Simon Gottschalk, a sociology professor at UNLV, says people are living alone longer and more often as careers take precedence over developing strong community bonds.

"In the last half of the century, we have moved (away) from the nuclear family," Gottschalk says. "We live in a society where it is normal to live alone and move about a lot."

Gottschalk says that in today's society, people move to where the jobs are, and Las Vegas is a hot destination in that respect, although not always a final one.

"We live in cities where social interactions are fleeting," he says. "It is hard to develop social contacts, roots when you move around. This is especially true in Las Vegas, which is so transient."

Pamela, as a lot of single people are choosing to do in the economically friendly Las Vegas, bought a house to establish roots here with her young son. But the local culture has not yielded to her social efforts.

"I haven't met (many of) the kind of 'quality' people I would want in my life out here," she says.

Sokol agrees that the type of people filling the growing community are not professionals seeking cultural stimuli. "We're attracting $5-an-hour people to this town," Sokol says. "It's changing."

Sokol refers to news reports of doctors departing the valley, which has him wondering if he should follow. "It's like New York here, with the traffic and the pollution -- the pollution is worse, but without all that (New York) has to do," Sokol says.

Normal or not, local experts on cultural behavior say choosing to live alone is a health no-no, both mentally and physically. "Living alone is risky," Dr. Ward Swallow, a Las Vegas psychologist, says, adding that it can lead to depression, anxiety and loneliness.

Although he lives alone, Swallow says a strong network of friends keeps a solitary dweller from going into a cocoon with their troubles and possibly losing perspective. Then there is the up side that most single people champion as the main reason they choose life alone: control over their time and how they spend it.

"One of the pros is independence -- you are not worried how your choices will affect any other cohabitants in any way," Swallow says. "All of your choices are independent of anyone else. ... That offers a unique sense of autonomy ... and most people choose it for that reason."

On the flip side, people tend to want an anchor in their lives and can feel cut off from the rest of the world if they don't spend time with others who truly care for them. Even if they interact with people all day at work, the emotional connection is not met.

"Along with isolation comes all those bad (psychological) things -- withdrawal, depression, decreased intimacy," Swallow says.

Adjusting to living alone is mostly difficult, he has found in his research, with the younger and older generations. "The people who are in the middle of their lives are really doing their thing, they seem to be doing OK," Swallow says.

He found a lot of people in the singles groups he has talked to discussing the drawbacks of getting involved with someone who has been alone for a long time. "They have become so accustomed to meeting their own needs that it's hard for them to meet somebody else's needs," he says. "As we get older, that rigidity sets in and it's hard to change that."

Gottschalk adds: "There's a tendency to focus only on oneself. You can be selfish, you are the center of your universe and your needs are the only ones you need worry about."

Making a commitment to another person becomes, well, a nuisance. "There's some narcissism in 'I've got my life the way I want it and now I'm going to protect it,' " Swallow says.

All the research points to a longer, healthier life if we choose to take the plunge into relationships, he says. "When we live with people it promotes flexibility of thinking, it promotes interaction, it does a lot of things for us," he says. "It offers problem-solving opportunities, releasing of anger in positive ways, feedback."

Although living alone is a societal necessity at times, he says staying flexible to change and being open to new ideas and active in life not only keeps the blood circulating, but the positive thoughts flowing.

Without feedback, he explains, people are a captive audience to the mind's chatter, and that's when depression and anxiety can seep in. "If you are going to live alone, you really need to have a well-developed social network," Swallow says.

The dip into despair can become a downward slide into deep depression if human beings don't reach out. "You have to have feedback, intimacy, the support, and how you want to structure them is up to you," he says. "The idea (that) you can escape from them and still be healthy may be questionable."

Swallow recommends that people living alone partake of two or three social activities a week to maintain meaningful relationships and mental health.

Gottschalk, who lived alone for 10 years in several cities including Houston and Santa Barbara, Calif., before he married, argues that time alone can be healthy when tempered with time spent nurturing relationships and interests.

"Las Vegas is a stressful place," Gottschalk says. "You have to take the time to develop friendships that are going to support you."

As the last decade of the century blinks to a close, Americans are more connected with their careers and technology than their overall physical and mental health.

"When we think of the '90s, it will be (known) as an era of (a) decreasing amount of commitment," Gottschalk says, adding that people who move from city to city "will not be able to develop meaningful social relationships.

"There is something sad about the increase in people living alone," Gottschalk says. "Our greatest pains and our greatest joys are connected to other people."

But Don Courie, a local tour company associate and longtime Las Vegan, disagrees with the popular medical theories that living alone can take years off his life and render him a lifeless couch potato.

"Self-appointed happiness can make you live longer, too," Courie says. "I nurture myself."

After a busy day dealing with buzzing tourists, the 50-year-old looks forward to going home where he can put his feet up in his peaceful, recently-paid-for home and "drink milk right out of the jug. Orange juice, the same way.

"I guess it's selfishness, but I've always done my own thing," he says.

Courie regularly kicks up his heels with friends at get-togethers, he says, hikes monthly with an adventure group and skis with a bunch of old friends.

"A lot of friends can take the place of just one person (in your life)," Courie says. "I don't need someone or something to make me happy -- I start out that way."

Sonya (who prefers to use only her first name) says single living has quadrupled her quality of life.

"I've lived alone for five glorious years," the gushes.

Divorced after three decades of marriage, Sonya, now in her late 50's, has filled her time alone by concentrating, well, on herself. "I have started a whole new career and at this point in my life, I feel and look great."

She spends hours arranging fruits, jams and gifts into elaborate baskets at her booming business in the Southeast part of the valley, and weaves a tightly knit blanket of friends and family into her daily life to keep her on track.

"Sure, I get lonely," Sonya says. "But if I get lonely, I pick up the phone and talk to somebody."

Sonya says that it is hard to find companionship -- an oasis in the dating desert. "It would be nice to meet someone to go out occasionally," she says.

That seems to be the biggest complaint among local singles: the lack of a constant companion, friend or otherwise, who can be reached for a late dinner at the ring of a cell phone.

But Sonya, a bubbly woman with a lilting voice, doesn't waste her time boo-hooing and enjoys the everyday freedoms that go along with her independence.

"I don't have to be home at a certain time; I don't have to cook dinner if I don't want to," she says, listing the attributes of her oneness. "I can do what I want, when I want and not answer to anybody."

Still, there are some things that she cannot do alone, and for that she mainly needs a fix-it friend.

"I need to hire a husband-for-a-day sometimes," she says, referring to the minor mending a house requires.

Pamela agrees that a handyman -- or friend -- would ease life's anxieties that single people -- especially a single mom -- can feel when there's just not enough time to accomplish everything a household needs.

"Last week, the garbage disposal went out and, although it's a priority, I can't take care of it right now," she says.

Pamela is working on expanding her small network of friends and hasn't given up hope on what she says is the valley's lackluster community efforts.

"The community is still forming but there are no support groups out there (yet) that support the single life," she says.

She is thinking of starting a ladies night, where friends get together over potluck dinner and play games and hopefully bring together other friends from around the valley who are suffering the Las Vegas singles blues.

"You get to know each other that way, you agree with someone or you say, 'I don't agree with that person,' and you really get to know people," Pamela says. "You become friends."

And maybe even find someone who knows how to fix a garbage disposal.

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