When Loneliness Crosses Professional Boundaries

Format: Post-call (and several months after) Runtime: ~8 minutes Source: Psychology , loneliness and social hunger (Cacioppo & Patrick, 2008); parasocial relationship extension; the boundaries of service relationships This one unfolds slowly. I want to tell you about a customer and what happened over about six months, because that's how long it takes for this kind to show itself fully. First call was a tune-up. Early in the spring. He was retired, early seventies, wife travels a lot for her work , she was gone when I got there. He was perfectly pleasant. We talked while I worked. He had opinions about things and wanted to share them. I have opinions about things and was willing to engage. The call was easy and went long because we talked. He called again in the fall for the heating tune-up. Same thing. Good conversation. By the time I left I'd heard a fair amount about his life , his career, his kids, what retirement had been like, some opinions about the neighborhood and the town. He was engaged in a genuine way, not performing. And I was engaged back, because I genuinely like people and the conversation was real. Then he started texting. Not about the system. About things he'd read. A news story he thought I'd have thoughts on. A question about whether I'd ever done work on a specific kind of system he'd heard about. Then he forwarded me something funny. Then he texted on a Monday afternoon just to say hello. I answered all of it, because none of it was unreasonable individually. But at some point I noticed I was answering his texts more often than my actual friends. And then he asked if I wanted to come to his granddaughter's birthday party on Saturday. John Cacioppo spent decades at the University of Chicago studying loneliness. What he found , documented in his book with William Patrick, published in 2008 , is that loneliness is not just an emotional state. It's a biological signal, as real as hunger or thirst, that the social connection your nervous system needs is insufficient. And like hunger, it doesn't always direct you toward the right food. A lonely person's social hunger can fasten onto available connections in ways that don't quite fit , relationships that are warm and real but not designed to carry what's being asked of them. He wasn't unpleasant. He wasn't inappropriate. He was lonely, in the particular way a retired person is lonely when the social scaffolding of a career is gone and the spouse is away and the regular structure of human contact has thinned out. And I was a person who had shown up twice in his house and talked to him like an actual human being instead of a technician who wanted to get back to the truck. From his side, I think, that was rare enough to be notable. I didn't go to the birthday party. I didn't say yes and I didn't say no , I said something like "I'll see if I can make it" which was wrong of me and I knew it was wrong when I said it. I was avoiding the thing. Give Us A Shout Thanks for tuning in to Hartzell's Heat & Air, your trusted HVAC experts in Oklahoma and beyond. From Kingfisher to coast-to-coast consulting, we design, install, and maintain smart, efficient systems that deliver year-round comfort. We're employee-owned, family-run, and powered by 45+ years of experience. Whether it's AI-powered thermostats, geothermal systems, or classic tune-ups, we deliver upfront pricing, expert care, and warranties that back it all up. 🛠️ Book Online:https://book.housecallpro.com/book/Hartzells-Heat--Air/4a569038b3dc460daf2d5f6497b18351?v2=true🌐 www.hartzellsheatair.com📞 (405) 375-4822 🚛 Trane Comfort Specialist • Mitsubishi Diamond Dealer • ClimateMaster Elite🛡️ VIP Comfort Club • Remote Monitoring • Extended Warranties 📲 Follow us for tips, updates, and real-world installs:YouTube: @hartzellsheatair6003X: https://x.com/HartzellsHVACFacebook: facebook.com/hartzellsheatairLinkedIn: Dave Hartzell Built on trust. Backed by warranty. Designed for comfort.