Finding meaning is key to easing men’s transition to retirement

“It was like a eulogy without a funeral,” says Dr. Sheldon Janovski.¹

The Toronto physician was recalling the flood of emails he received from patients when he announced his retirement after more than four decades. Over and over, they told him about the real difference he’d made in their lives, and how much they appreciated him – and could they get just one last appointment?

“It was a real validation and very gratifying,” says Janovski, 70. “I was surprised by it, frankly.”

Still, Janovski says he won’t miss his work; he’d been contemplating retirement for a while. As a sole practitioner with a full and demanding roster of patients, he had become overwhelmed by the demands of his job. Not only that, the overhead costs made it impossible for him to work less than full-time hours. So when the option to renew his office lease came up, he decided it was time to close up shop. “I wanted to walk out of the office, not leave on a stretcher,” he says, “to leave work while my health was still good.”

As for what he’ll do to fill those working hours, Janovski has a few ideas. He plans to spend time visiting his children and grandchildren, who live in different cities. He wants to travel with his wife and to spend more time in warmer climates during the winter. He plans to continue his volunteer work. He’d like to take a more active role in managing his investments (although he’s well set up financially for retirement) and to exercise more, maybe get a personal trainer. He’s also toying with the idea of starting a home-based practice, where he’ll fit in a few patients around his travel schedule.

Janovski acknowledges that the transition could take some getting used to. “I’m the first of my friends to retire, aside from those who aren’t working because of health reasons. And my wife is still working part time so it could be difficult.”

But he’s not that worried: “I’m the type of person where, if I have to give a speech, I start looking at it the night before,” he says. “With my personality and my way of life, I truly believe I will manage.”

Not all men transitioning to retirement are as certain as Janovski. Both men and women struggle with the shift to the post-work world, says clinical psychologist Dr. Marnin Heisel, director of research and associate professor at the University of Western Ontario’s psychiatry department. These struggles can sometimes differ between genders. They’re more pervasive than we might have otherwise thought and can manifest as increased anxiety, boredom and listlessness to full-blown depression and even suicide. Older men in Canada (80+) have the second-highest rate of completed suicide in the country, after men in their mid-50s.

That might be because – for the baby boom generation, at least – some men’s identities are more closely tied to their careers than women’s, says Heisel. When they stop working, men can lose their sense of identity, not to mention the social connections their jobs provide and the self-esteem that comes from making meaningful contributions and providing for their families. As Janovski puts it, “I was brought up with the idea that work is supposed to be what you do until you take your last breath.”

Even men with outside interests and hobbies can suffer. They may be used to fitting in guitar or woodworking around their busy work schedules, but when all their time is free, they can have trouble organizing themselves. “The attitude is, ‘Why bother doing it now? I can always do it later,’” says Heisel. He and his colleagues are studying men who have difficulty transitioning to retirement and developing a program to give men the tools they need to thrive after they stop working.

To ease the transition, Heisel recommends that men do some advance thinking about the kinds of things they’d like to do to fill their time, post-work. He recommends consulting with partners and children, as well as close friends. “They know you well so they can give you a sense of whether those plans are realistic. Plus, your plans may involve them.”

Heisel also suggests that men begin enacting that plan before they stop working completely. It’s a great idea to begin tapering off work hours gradually, and filling in that time with meaningful activities.

That’s what Trent Watts has done. Now 68, Watts graduated from veterinary medicine school in 1973 and worked for 43 years before retiring fully this January. For the past several years, he gradually cut back on work hours. First, he took Friday afternoons off, then moved to working three days a week and, finally, three mornings a week. “I’d seen people work and work and work because they didn’t know what else to do with themselves, and they overstayed their welcome,” says Watts. “I made up my mind that I would leave while they still wanted me, before I started making mistakes and being a nuisance.”

Watts, who lives in Saskatoon, also wanted to leave while he had the vitality to pursue his hobbies. He credits his ease into retirement with the fact that he’s always had interests outside of being a vet. “I think that I’ve come to retirement with a lifetime of preparation for it, without knowing I was preparing.”

He’s had a lifelong passion for woodworking and, over the decades, has built up a fully equipped workshop where he spends hours on the lathe, building and repairing furniture and creating pieces for family and friends. He supplies a local restaurant with hand-turned wooden salad bowls and recently showed a piece in a Saskatchewan Craft Council exhibition. He teaches woodworking, cycles year-round, gardens, sees his two young grandchildren nearly every day, and meets with a group of woodworking enthusiasts every Thursday morning for coffee. “My days are taken up with things I love doing.”

For Heisel, that’s key: Finding meaningful activities is critical to thriving in retirement. It could be anything that gives men a sense of purpose and provides interest, whether that’s through a creative outlet like music or baking, relationships with family and friends, volunteering or mentoring, learning new skills or honing older ones. These activities, he says, lend depth and a greater sense of coherence to post-work life to help men through the transition and make their retirement years just as fulfilling as their work lives.

Next month: A look at social programs designed to improve quality of life for retired men.

¹Some names and identifying details have been changed