I do not vacation with my Wife?!

[Alleycat72]

I've been married for 24 years to the same woman. We've never been married to anyone else. We don't go on vacations together. She loves the beach. Every beach. I absolutely hate everything about the beach. I'm miserable the entire time I'm in the heat and sand. If I'm going to be hot and dirty, I better be making $1000 a day. 

On the flip side, my Wife wouldn't in a million years go hunting for hogs in Texas. It's completely alien to her as to why someone would stay up all night with snakes and hogs.  

I think it's insane to force her to go. She, at first thought I should go to the beach regardless. I explained it to her and being who she is, gave me the benefit of a doubt.....

She loves it. She realized I'd be miserable and she wouldn't have fun because of that. Taking her mother, my mother, her sister, and what ever kids want to go makes for a fantastic...drama free vacation.

I take take vacations to places she would never want to go and I have a blast. Her friend and co-workers at first say it's horrible....wrong.... 

My friends want to know how I pulled it off.

In the end her friends love the idea, but their husband's would never let them out of their sight. 

We do try to find things we can do with the whole family. We have a trip to fall creek falls coming up. We well go to the mountains every few years, but She will do 2 to 3 trips a year for a week at a time(She's in Turks and Caicos at the moment) I do 5 to 6 for a couple of days at a time. 

I have never talked to anyone that does this. Are we an enigma? Would you live your life like this? None of the people I work with would do this and think I'm crazy (divorce, alcoholism, and self destruction is crazy high in my field dueto stress). We've literally been on 5 vacations together including our honeymoon. I'm taking care of the younger kids so she can take my oldest Daughter on a trip. I'll be taking the younger kids kayaking while she's gone. 

Is there something odd you do in your marriage that people don't understand that works for you? 

 

[deerslayer]

1 hour ago, Alleycat72 said:

I've been married for 24 years to the same woman. We've never been married to anyone else. We don't go on vacations together. She loves the beach. Every beach. I absolutely hate everything about the beach. I'm miserable the entire time I'm in the heat and sand. If I'm going to be hot and dirty, I better be making $1000 a day. 

On the flip side, my Wife wouldn't in a million years go hunting for hogs in Texas. It's completely alien to her as to why someone would stay up all night with snakes and hogs.  

I think it's insane to force her to go. She, at first thought I should go to the beach regardless. I explained it to her and being who she is, gave me the benefit of a doubt.....

She loves it. She realized I'd be miserable and she wouldn't have fun because of that. Taking her mother, my mother, her sister, and what ever kids want to go makes for a fantastic...drama free vacation.

I take take vacations to places she would never want to go and I have a blast. Her friend and co-workers at first say it's horrible....wrong.... 

My friends want to know how I pulled it off.

In the end her friends love the idea, but their husband's would never let them out of their sight. 

We do try to find things we can do with the whole family. We have a trip to fall creek falls coming up. We well go to the mountains every few years, but She will do 2 to 3 trips a year for a week at a time(She's in Turks and Caicos at the moment) I do 5 to 6 for a couple of days at a time. 

I have never talked to anyone that does this. Are we an enigma? Would you live your life like this? None of the people I work with would do this and think I'm crazy (divorce, alcoholism, and self destruction is crazy high in my field dueto stress). We've literally been on 5 vacations together including our honeymoon. I'm taking care of the younger kids so she can take my oldest Daughter on a trip. I'll be taking the younger kids kayaking while she's gone. 

Is there something odd you do in your marriage that people don't understand that works for you? 

 

We are similar.  She occasionally goes on girl trips to places where I would be bored or miserable; I go to out of town shooting matches with a couple buddies or on a hiking trip (neither interest her).  We also do some trips together, but not that often.  I know people who would never be ok with their spouse going out of town without them and I think that’s nuts.  

1 hour ago, Alleycat72 said:

She's in Turks and Caicos at the moment)

Hopefully, she checked her purse for loose ammo.  

[BigK]

Wow, I thought my wife and I were the oddballs on vacations. She takes a couple of weeks off every September to go somewhere with her mom that I don't like. I take a few days here and there to get a long camping weekend with our grandson. Every few years we take a trip somewhere together with our grandson, but it's usually the Smokies or a long weekend in Chattanooga for the aquarium.

She likes to travel, I prefer what TN has to offer. That's how we like it too.

[NoBanStan]

Sounds like you have a functioning marriage to me. You both know what you like or dislike and you agree upon that. As long as you make couples time in there somewhere, you should be good.

[RED333]

Marred for 35 years, we do not vacation together much, she likes the beach, I do not. I like the gun range, she does not.

Yall are not alone. We should start a support group.

[Alleycat72]

I think it's more common than we think it is. We went through all the luggage more than once. LOL.

[DL126]

Same here.
She does her thing(s), and I do mine.
Sometimes we even do things together! 

Even maintain separate finances and split expenses on most things.

It's a partnership ... not bondage.
Married 31 years.

[Snaveba]

My wife and I do enjoy vacations together. We both like the beach, both like the mountains. We used to car camp but enjoy the camper now.

That being said, we also do trips apart. She does girls trips (she is at the beach now), I used to go rock-crawling, now I do more gun related things. She likes to shoots, but since the Covenant shooting, it has lost appeal (except for practice). 
 

I think it is good for spouses to get away from each other a little. We just celebrated out 25th wedding anniversary (32 years together).  I trust her and she trusts me. If you don’t trust your spouse to be away from you on a vacation/trip, you have bigger issues. 

[Alleycat72]

6 minutes ago, Snaveba said:

25th wedding anniversary (32 years together).  

On a side note....My ex-girlfriend insisted that go on a date with her boss. We went out on a Saturday. Our second date was on a Tuesday or Wednesday. We decided to get married that day. We didn't tell the families for 2 weeks. We were married 4 months after our 1st date.  She was not pregnant at the time. LOL. Some people lost money on that last point.  LOL

[KahrMan]

My wife and I have been together for over 38 years and married 36 years in June.  I think it is pretty common now a days for couple to vacation separately.  As others have said it is good for spouses to get away from each other for a little bit.  Of course we always make time to do things together but time apart is just as important.

 

She loves her girls trips and I love my golf/hunting trips.  

[jhc77]

I’m in 29 years together and 23 married. My daughter (10) and wife love Boston. I can’t stand it. The flight, traffic, smells. My son is 14 now. Might have to take separate vacations starting pretty soon. I do enjoy the beach. I basically spent 2-3 weeks over the summer there with my dad when I was in school, but fishing. She goes sun up to dark when we go with family these days. I’m over that. I’ll hang for a couple hours then I’m ready to grill and have a beverage. 

[gregintenn]

My wife loves to travel. I do not. I do enjoy spending time with her, though, so I go with her sometimes. We try to find things we both enjoy. She also has some friends she travels with. She really enjoys that, and I get to enjoy the peace and solitude of home. A little give and take really helps. She’ll sometimes do things with me she doesn’t really care about, and sometimes I’ll do the same.

[krunchnik]

My wife would go to Florida with her now deceased friend and I was glad for it-

Because I also can't stand anything to do with sand-surf and skin burning sun-

I have been known to go North to see my family at times and we always had a few friends ask why we would go on separate trips-it sure keeps the arguing down-

Some of us older people actually sleep separate-wife sounds like a buzz saw going at night-used to not get much sleep-now we both sleep better which means we are both in better moods-

[Frog4aday]

My second boss and his wife took separate vacations. At the time he told me this I was a young adult, newly married, and thought that was crazy weird.

Fast forward thirty years and I now laugh at younger me. Separate vacations are genius. Every couple needs to find what works for them and then do that. Screw what other people think or do. It's an A B relationship and other people can C their way out of it.

Edited June 1 by Frog4aday
Typo

[res308]

Yeah, I can't get my wife to go off anywhere without me. Dadgummit! 

[Tuffus]

My wife and I take separate vacations on occasion but we still travel quite a bit together. We are working on hitting all of the national parks, 17 so far, and have been to most of the Tennessee state parks. She likes Europe and I had fun in France (we rode bikes up some of the Tour de France mountains, that was amazing) but I'm done with flying overseas, too much time in the air for me so she goes with girlfriends. We also do hiking trips in the U.S. and Canada together and week long bicycle trips all over America.

[Defender]

After pending a significant part of my life traveling the world courtesy of dear old Uncle Sam, I now prefer to just start home.  I despise air travel. I dont like long road trips because of traffic. My wife on the other hand, really enjoys goi g, so she goes mostly with female family and/or a femal friend of hers on mini-vacations on some long weekends throughout the year.  While we dont retain debt, we do use a credit card for large purchases to get free hotel rooms, then pay it off at the end of each month.  She uses those and adds a day here and there.  I despise hotels almost as much as I do air travel. Ive never flown first class, but could possibly modify my opinion if i were able to go first class.  I did enjoy my 14 years in Europe and wouldn’t mind going back for a visitor two, if i won the big lottery. 

[RosaSchultz]

My wife and I do something similar. She’s really into beach vacations, and I can’t stand them—too much sun and sand for me. Meanwhile, she has no interest in my hunting trips or outdoor stuff, so we just take separate vacations. She goes with her friends or family, and I go on my own trips. It actually works out great for us. We still do a family trip here and there, but honestly, I think we both enjoy getting a break to do what we each like. And yeah, whenever I travel, I try to find good deals on Business Class Flights to make the trip more comfortable. It’s kind of become my routine now.

Edited October 17 by RosaSchultz

[TNHeavyGunner]

I love spending time with my wife. We've even talked about going hunting this deer season together. She has no interest in it but she does it for me. On the other hand I do stuff for her that I have no interest in for her. Different strokes for different folks I reckon. None of its wrong if it works.

[gregintenn]

Last year, my wife guilted me into taking one of those bus trips. I dreaded it. I knew it would be all elderly folks. It was going someplace I’d always wanted to see, so I agreed.

We were some of the younger people on the trip, but we had a great time. Everybody on the trip were very nice and had a lot in common with us. I’d be happy to go on another one. 
 

You just never know until you give it a try.

I gave cruise ships two tries. They still suck.

[Chucktshoes]

1 minute ago, gregintenn said:

Last year, my wife guilted me into taking one of those bus trips. I dreaded it. I knew it would be all elderly folks. It was going someplace I’d always wanted to see, so I agreed.

We were some of the younger people on the trip, but we had a great time. Everybody on the trip were very nice and had a lot in common with us. I’d be happy to go on another one. 
 

You just never know until you give it a try.

I gave cruise ships two tries. They still suck.

Cruise line selection will play a huge part in the ability to enjoy a cruise. 

 

Don't ever go Carnival.

[gregintenn]

32 minutes ago, Chucktshoes said:

Cruise line selection will play a huge part in the ability to enjoy a cruise. 

 

Don't ever go Carnival.

Probably where I went wrong.. I don’t blame Carnival. Their employees were great. The ship was nice. It was the clientele I had a problem with. It is sure a cheap vacation if you can stand it. That probably explains the clientele.

[Kalys]

It sounds like you’ve found a solid balance that works for both of you! It’s refreshing to hear about a couple that understands each other’s needs and doesn’t force shared experiences. It’s all about finding that compromise and enjoying your separate passions. I think it’s great that you both prioritize having fun in ways that suit your personalities. Everyone's marriage is different, and if it works for you, that’s what matters! My partner and I do something similar—we each have our hobbies that we pursue on our own, and it definitely keeps things interesting. 

[Alleycat72]

Oddly enough my Wife and I are talking my oldest Daughter to Chattanooga for the weekend. LOL 

Going to do the dinner train. 

[BigK]

My grandson and I just got back from vacation w/out my wife. We took our little camper to Edgar Evins State Park for the week. It was good to get away and even better to be outside all week in God's splendor. She gave camping a try and both times I spent almost all my time trying to keep her comfy/happy and didn't get to enjoy it. Likewise, if she'd dragged me with her to Boston last month, I'd have been a miserable old grump and she would have had less fun. This separate vacation thing is working out great!