As traditionally domineering husbands reach retirement age in Japan, the wives of as many as half of them may begin to experience some degree of suffering from a condition that has recently been termed Retired Husband Syndrome (RHS).
The most common symptoms of this mysterious disease are said to include rashes, ulcers and other stress symptoms resulting from the lifestyle changes associated with their husbands' retirement.
'I had developed my own life, my own way of doing things, in the years when he was working long hours,' said one morose 63-year-old woman.
She told the Post she now cannot even stand to look at her husband across the dinner table. Instead, she now sits at an angle so she can stare out a window rather than at him.
According to psychiatrists treating RHS, the numbers may soon explode further unless husbands lower their expectations of spousal servitude.
