Well "broken heart" is a metaphor isn't it.
In victorian times they used to "go into a decline". But doctors then had to deal with so much TB and that is a weird illness - people can have a latent case, walled up in a corner of their lungs for years and then a shock to the system unbalances the immune system and they developed active disease.
I believe that everyday stress is over used as a reason for illness though. Spent a long time , a very long time, writing a chapter on this when I was writing the great work. Sometime stress (and mental attitude maybe) can improve the immune system. You know the one where you really can't afford to get ill?
Kayne West's wife Bianca ....WHY ?
Picture of Kate and William at farm shop