I’m 31, happily married, and have a son with a baby on the way. This keeps me really busy and I love the life I have with my family. I see my wife’s phone always getting blown up with people needing to vent to her and it just makes me think how I don’t really care about anyone besides myself, the wife, and son. It would irritate me having to always stop what I’m doing to listen to someone when I generally wouldn’t care what they are going through. I have a lot of fun doing things with my wife and if she’s occupied I really enjoy the alone time to do whatever I want. People tend to irritate me and I prefer to be in my own space. Is this a bad thing?
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No, it’s perfectly normal for people over 30 to focus on themselves and their families. There’s a reason it’s so damn hard to make friends at this stage of your life. The reason is pretty much this.
Be happy. If it was the other way around, you’d be miserable along with 1000+ others in this sub.
I’m exactly the same.
My wife is extremely outgoing, always on the phone with friends and family, I’m much more happy by myself and individual activities.
It’s only a problem if it’s source is an underlying condition such as depression, however there is nothing wrong with it if you are living a happy fulfilled life.
I am the same and the downside I see is that my relationship network density has thinned, along with most Americans. I shudder to think what would happen to me and my mental health if my my wife was out of the picture.
I was like that until I got divorced. Then I was truly alone and it sucked. Up until that point my wife was my social life. The person I spent all my free time with. The only person I had meaningful conversations with. I didn’t care to make friends at work make an effort to socialize. I let my old friendships fall to the wayside. But then when the divorce happened I was a mess because my social life was gone.
Luckily some of my old friends hung out with me which meant alot and helped me a ton to move on. I also made an effort for the first time in my adult life to socialize and make friends. It was surprisingly exciting to make new connections and click with others who have similar interests. Before then my idea of socializing was answering “so what do you do?” or just play catchup with old friends talking about work/kids/gossip about other old friends.
I’m in a great relationship now with a baby on the way but I now make sure to have a balanced social life outside of my significant other.
I definitely need my own space too. The older I’ve gotten the more I’ve realized friendships require effort to maintain. You can’t just get a group of guys to hangout on a whim anymore. Priorities definitely shift to family, career, home, etc.
But I think putting in that effort with at least a select few is important. Kids won’t be young forever. Eventually you will slow down and have too much time on your hands. I don’t think there’s any shortage of people who are 50, 60+ who would kill for a couple of good friends to share their time with.
Going against the grain here to say that relying solely on your wife as your only form of socialization can come back to bite you since it can lead to pressure for her to be around for you and if you separate you’ll be fully alone. I also understand that people are different and have different needs, but it does feel a bit sad to not care about anyone else outside of your nuclear family.
It’s only a bad thing if it causes you discomfort or creates problems for yourself or others. If you’re perfectly happy long-term with things the way they are, there’s no problem. I suppose the worry is that it is creating problems for you that you won’t see until it’s too late, like the scenario another commenter mentioned where something happens to disrupt your family and you find yourself without any kind of support network. Or that you’re leaning too much on your wife for all of your social needs and it’s creating problems for her.
For yourself, no, not a bad thing at all assuming you can handle being truly alone if something happens to your marriage. But… I’m a woman who has almost always dated men like this. The burden of knowing I’m the only person they can really talk to is a lot but I’ve never said anything to them because I know it’ll be perceived as rejection of their feelings and the reaction will be to stay quiet when they really do need to talk instead of what I really wanted, which was for each of them to actually make good friends of their own. I know a lot of women in the same boat who feel the same way, we talk about it occasionally. How do we know our respective men will clam up? Because the times we’ve each tried over the years with various partners, that’s exactly what happened.
BTW, I’m one of those people who gets lots of texts. If I’m not feeling like chatting I just don’t answer until I’m up for it again. I don’t feel like I have to “always stop what I’m doing to listen to someone”. It’s just having healthy boundaries, nothing fancy.
Yes, because eventually you’ll want someone to talk about your wife with, and you won’t have them. Also, eventually your wife will want you to go out of the house for a few hours, and you won’t have a friend to go with. Also, you want to model good relationships for your kids, and you won’t be able to. Also, you want to find friends for your kids, and you’ll be relying on your wife for that.
It never hurts to try and make friends. Sometimes you need a break from your family. You have an identity outside of your wife and kids too.
“I see my wife’s phone always getting blown up with people needing to vent to her and it just makes me think how I don’t really care about anyone besides myself, the wife, and son. It would irritate me having to always stop what I’m doing to listen to someone when I generally wouldn’t care what they are going through.”
Don’t know your wife personally, but if people are venting to her, it shows that she’s probably a good listener whom people can trust and go to. Especially what people have gone through during the start of the pandemic, our norm has changed and some people I know personally have gone through difficult events: loss of parent due to covid, divorce, job loss, and etc.
I learned it is not our job to save people, but just having an open ear to them and being emphatic does a lot of wonders for their mental health. Instead of feeling irritated about people reaching out to her, reframe it as your wife being a solid person that people can confide in and trust to be vulnerable with. Says volumes about her.
I was expecting this to be about a loner mindset and advise that yeah, it’s maybe a sign of something to look at.
But if it’s just that you’re married, happy with your life, and don’t really find the time/need for others, I wouldn’t worry too much.
All of that being said…I do always worry about folks with no friends. It means your partner is basically your sole support for the hard things, including if the worst happens and you lose her to death/divorce/etc., and it is, IMO, not ideal to put that weight on a single person (especially a romantic partner who is already otherwise kind of “everything” to you).
The other thing about friends is that at least for me, something I noticed growing up and that always made me a little sad, was that my parents basically didn’t have friends. I feared for a long time that would be my own future, that maybe adults just didn’t really have friends because you grow up, get married, and your spouse is your “best friend”.
That hasn’t been my own experience, and I’m super thankful, because my friends have been such a huge source of love and support throughout the years, including various break-ups, divorce, other huge life changes, and I don’t know that I’d even be here today with that.
Could be normal but saying you don’t care about what other people go through sounds like you lack empathy. You are getting your needs met by your wife right now but if that were to ever go away then what would you do?
Im the same way. I just don’t care to maintain friendships. They take time, work, sacrifice. I used to feel bad about it, but I realized that I only felt bad because of the standard society has made, what we have been shown in media (movies, shows). Introverts are bad, extroverts are good. I say F that, because I love my small social group (my kids, my siblings and parents and my husband) and having time to relax.
The kind of post that breaks your heart a little bit to read
SNL actually had a skit about this dynamic where the man uses his wife for his only emotional outlet and all social needs and how it wears the wife down.
Friends are a great way to talk things out and get a social outlet outside of your partner and to give them some ‘true’ alone time (not just time where you’re in your computer room playing games but actually out of the house).
I have a trivia night with friends, go to AA meetings 4 days a week, meet up with coffee Saturday morning with some guys and other random things that come up. I find my relationship is a lot stronger and more passionate when we actually have time to miss each other.
I empathize with your irritation with other people and I used to be the same way. Who would have guessed that I was depressed and pushing down all my emotional needs and powering through days?
I did a lot of therapy work, meditation work and learned how much happiness comes from within and it really changed my life.
Your kid will get older and leave someday and then it will be you and your wife and with divorce rates over 50% and with women initiating 80%+ of all divorces, you have a higher than 50% chance of your marriage ending in divorce and you being totally alone with no social outlet.
Sounds like you’re enjoying it. How could that be wrong? Y’all vibe, and that’s a beautiful thing. Everyone has their own finite energies for others. Maybe you have less room for that than she does, and hopefully that works for you both. Sounds nice af
> Is this a bad thing?
Yes & No.
> I don’t really care about people
> it just makes me think how I don’t really care about anyone besides myself
> It would irritate me having to always stop what I’m doing to listen to someone when I generally wouldn’t care what they are going through
I would say that all of the above is essentially “bad” depending on how far it goes. The issue being that it sounds like you have very little empathy for others, aren’t interested in fostering any, and generally would like to be an ‘island’ so to speak. Obviously “good/bad” are highly subjective, so I’m using the term as extreme shorthand, and that judgment is dependent on just a quick summary that may or may not give a whole picture.
Keep in mind, with the exception of the wife/son, you’re essentially describing the classic character Ebenezer Scrooge in a nutshell based on what you’ve written here. But again, maybe you *do* care about the wellbeing of others, are charitable, have empathy, and so forth, but you see the two as separate concepts for the sake of this discussion (ie., having the ability to actively listen and empathize with others directly vs. recognize the problems facing others and empathize with them from a distance).
> have no desire for friends
Nothing inherently wrong with this imo. Another way of looking at this is that the necessary elements to meet and fulfill your social needs are much, much, *much* lower than that of your wife for example. As others have mentioned, it can be concerning sometimes if you (knowingly or not) rely on just your family to meet your social needs, but either way, having significantly lower social needs/desires than others is not automatically a “bad thing” in my view.
Im the same way but its my boyfriend who is super social and I am not, life is peaceful when Im alone 🙂 Does your wife have a problem with this? If not, then I think you are fine. Everyone has different levels of social needs and mine just happens to be really low. And its never too late to join groups if you ever feel like you want to spend time with other people.
Not only is it not bad but I envy that tbh. I always go way too far outta my way to care about others when I should be worrying about myself.
How does your wife feel about this? Have you had arguments with her about the subject, or does it stem from something else?
More than about the fact your wife stays in contact with others, you seem to be irritated by the amount of time she spends on her phone, and that she seems to drop everything as soon as she gets an incoming message. Is that the case, or is that not an issue here?
Has she asked or pressured you to make some friends?
What makes you question whether your way of doing is ‘bad’?
I thought this was just the majority of people, that most nuclear families are insular except for the occasional neighbor depending on where they live, and parents of their children’s friends.
Isn’t this why some people complain of friendships falling apart once they form families?
Whether it’s a good or bad thing for society at large I guess is for an entirely separate discussion.
I mean, if your mental health is good and it works for you, then no it’s fine. That’s really all it comes down to. Are you able to spend time by yourself just being quiet? Then yeah, you are probably fine. Are you using your kid(s) and wife to lean on for all your personal issues? Probably not fine.
I will say that humans tend to be social creatures, and it’s usually a good idea to have someone who is not your wife that knows you well enough to be able to challenge you to be a better person, and vice versa.
Look up codependency. Not healthy in the long run, currently struggling with the same.
Why are you asking if we irritate you so much? 🙂
Yes, it is bad. You will be a burden to your wife and when the kids are older and hanging out with their friends, you will truly be alone and it’s a lot harder to make new friends than it is to maintain or nurture existing friendships. I am getting a poker game together with 3 friends and 3 guys I kind of know so I can be more social. The pandemic damaged a lot of friendships and now is the time to get it back.
Nope. My wife and kids are the only people I hang out with. I have a few guys at work who are pretty cool and I can shoot the breeze with them during the day, but I don’t do anything socially outside of work. Suits me just fine.
> and have a son with a baby on the way.
If you’re only 31 that means your son must only be 15 or 16, I hope you help him raise his baby. Congrats on being a grandpa.
No. If it doesn’t cause dysfunction or disorder in your life, no reason for concern. That would be acting too American lol