TL:DR – We used to be an adventorous couple. My wife found happiness in a simple, homely life, and I feel bored in it and wish I could share my passions with her. what can I do?
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Hi everybody.
34M, wife’s 30F. We met 9 years ago while traveling, and our early relationship revolved quite a bit around our passions – travel, rock climbing, long distance hiking, generally outdoory/active stuff. When we’d talk about the future and the life we envisioned, it always incorporated these (or similar) things.
Years have passed, we had good and bad times but made it through and I’m happy we did. We moved countries, health got worse & then better, I started a business, we moved from poverty to a comfortable life and bought a country house in a mountain valley, by a beautiful river.
With time, my wife slowly stopped participating in the stuff we used to do together – A sudden fear of height took climbing off the table, hikes became too much for her, it’s too cold out for a backcountry skiing expedition, and travel doesn’t sound appealing because “it’s so beautiful back home, and I don’t want to miss the changing seasons”. It really is beautiful back home, and she seems so happy just reading on our porch overlooking the mountains or relaxing by the river. She also “matured” out of stuff like going to concerts and nights out, and would rather host a dinner for our friends – She loves this new, homely life, and building our family in this setting seems like a dream to her. All of this is lovely, and I wish it was enough for me.
It’s not that I hate this life, but I miss the sense of adventure we used to have. Now that kids are coming into the picture, I feel like the little that we still have left will soon go off the table.
These days I try to pursue this passions with friends, separatly from her – I just came back from a 3-day hiking trip without her; It was great, but I definitly missed her presence there. I climb in a climbing gym, but that’s very different than a long expedition in the mountains. The kind of adventures we used to go on tend to take time – some things just aren’t doable as weekend activities, and beyond that, we’re used to spending most of our time together, and doing something like going traveling for a long while without her feels unthinkable to me – and would probably be even more so after we have kids.
I feel like forcing her into this things isn’t an option – she just wouldn’t enjoy it anymore, and that would make the whole things pointless. When we talk about it she feels very guilty for “making me” give these things up, which makes me avoid the topic. On the other hand, I’m sad to have her separate from that part of my life – if I can even keep it, and I’m scared to resent her if I do give it up – I can already feel it starting.
Is this just how life goes? What would we suggest that I/we do?
10 comments
In __some__ ways it’s just how life goes. But giving up all the outdoors and adventure stuff makes me wonder of she was faking liking those things the entire time.
The night clubs and concerts thing is fairly normal though.
Perhaps channel it into different things such as camping through the national parks?
Continue on these separate trips so you feel fulfilled.
It doesn’t sound like she wants you to stop. She just is not into them.
You two can work through this together.
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You never age out of concerts wtf? I mean the bands from your teen years are still touring and it’s way more affordable now!! I go to way more shows and concerts as an old lady lol. Adventures, traveling, life doesn’t end at…Omg rechecked the post 30?!?! You guys are young. It’s possible she will want to do things later. I’m no longer into surfing but I took up paddle boating, kids cut into international travel but I’ve been places nearby that were magical to explore. And why is individual travel off the table? I would rather my husband go travel alone or with a travel bud than a) drag me where I dont wanna be or b) divorce me?! You shouldn’t have to give up your dreams and resent your wife but marriage is about compromise so you will definitely have to compromise on something if you love your wife and want to stay married.
One of the happiest marriages I know are a couple where the woman loves to travel to exotic places, go skiing, music festivals all over the world. Her husband likes to stay home or go to their mountain cabin and chill out. Neither begrudges the other their preferences. It’s okay to go with friends or go alone. They have been married for 45 years and are still totally in love.
I don’t agree with everything she says by any means but Esther Perel is very interesting to listen to about things like this. She is a couples therapist and she talks about how monogamy sometimes leads us to put too much pressure on the ‘one’ to meet all of our needs all of the time throughout many years, and how what we expect of our partners becomes frankly unreasonable sometimes without us even realizing. It’s okay to have separation sometimes, you don’t need to do everything together in order for both of you to feel happy and fulfilled. Our individual interests and priorities change over time and that’s okay, it doesn’t mean you aren’t compatible or that she may have been faking enjoyment or anything like what people often jump to. Change is natural.
It could be a phase for her, or not, but you probably need to work together to find new ways to share joy as a couple while also working to find joy in your own interests alone or with other people.
(I’m not suggesting cheating to be clear, just making and celebrating friendships with people who like to do the same things you do. Maybe some of them even like dinner parties, too!)
I think it’s reasonable to tell your wife that you don’t just love doing fun activities, but that you love hanging out with her in the context of a fun activity. but also, your wife might be enjoying the alone time she gets when you’re out of the house.
I used to sell electric bikes and I met a lot of older couples where the husband is madly in love with his wife and wants to do everything with her and he’s big into bicycling and adventuring so they’re talking to me because they’re looking for a way for his wife to come along on a bike and not have to work so hard, and I will tell you, a great deal of those wives would rather their husbands would go biking alone and give her some time to read, or knit, or just relax.
this said, I think you might consider planning trips that are less intense and more relaxed, see if you can do the kind of camping where some people just hang out in a cabin with a jacuzzi all weekend while others go hiking about. there’s compromises to be found.
Would she consider travel still if it had more amenities? I know that I “aged out” of camping on the young side because my back just wasn’t taking it anymore. Maybe she’d consider glamping or staying somewhere with real bathrooms and beds that is hike adjacent? You could also look into professional tours, some groups have options where you can split by interest but still come back together for meals etc at the end of the day. I like river cruising (which probably already is too tame for you if you’re an adrenaline junkie) but one thing I love about it is when my homebody husband had reached his limit, he stayed on board one day and read while I still went out brandy tasting. It sort of let us both set our own pace.
>I just came back from a 3-day hiking trip without her; It was great, but I definitly missed her presence there
This really warmed my heart. You clearly love her very much. Just tell her this and ask her if there are some activities you do that she would be happy to join sometime or if you can strike a happy medium somewhere. 😊 When the kid is a bit older they might start joining you instead!
Both me and my husband got over-travelled in our youth compounded by having to travel for work. We used to absolutely love traveling but now I think I’d rather stick a fork in my eye than go to Paris.
My husband is completely and utterly over it and point blank refuses to go even a half an hour to stay at a luxury spa (or anything else). I get an itch to travel every five years or so and I go on my own on horse riding trips. I really don’t mind him not going, it wouldn’t be pleasant for me either if I knew he wasn’t enjoying himself. It’s just one of those things. Travel by yourself but one thing is extremely important – do not have kids and expect your life to stay the same. Especially don’t have kids and dump them on your wife to go gallivanting.