Married couples taking separate vacations

[Red_James]

When I was young my grandpa went on a vacation to see his daughter, my mother. He lives in another country and lives on a small family farm with his wife. Both of them could not come on this vacation because there nobody would be left to run the farm and it cannot run itself. Relations with other family members are important and I see nothing wrong with these particular circumstances.

 

[Bonnie]

I don’t know if they would be called vacations, but husband has visited his family alone & I have visited mine. The reason we rarely do this together is that we have a lot of animals to be cared for. It not only costs quite a bit to have someone come here twice a day, I haven’t yet found anyone who is really trustworthy.

That said, we spent 2 weeks visiting his family (& doing a few other things) last summer, & hope to spend a week visiting mine this coming fall.

 

[hwriggles4]

When I was a Boy Scout, I remember our Scoutmaster and our Assistant Scoutmaster making the time to come to the week long Summer Camp. Each Scoutmaster would come in three day shifts. That way, they only had to take three days off work - sometimes without pay. Thank these men for sacrificing vacation days to be there with us at Summer Camp. Most of the time a Scoutmaster had to use vacation time. I also had an Explorer Advisor who took two weeks off work to be our over 21 adult leader at Philmont.

I remember being on the volunteer fire department and using one week vacation time to go to the week long fire training school at the TEEX facility in College Station. Many of the married men there also used vacation time for that too. Some saw it as a second job, some as a hobby, some as a business trip, and some as volunteer time.

Anyway, thank those adults who have used vacation time to help others. Many parents do this to chaperone youth gatherings and youth sporting events.

 

[AdamP88]

Well as the title pretty much says, are there any married couples here who take separate vacations (not business trips but personal vacations) for whatever reason…just curious how your spouse feels about it and the reasons for doing so in the first place…TIA and God bless…

I don’t think I’d take a separate vacation from my wife. But I would be interested in doing different things on my vacation. I’d probably take a few days to do wildwater kayaking but my wife would have no interest in that so she’d do other stuff.
She’d probably come along if I went on a kayaking trip though.

 

[boldlygo]

When I was a Boy Scout, I remember our Scoutmaster and our Assistant Scoutmaster making the time to come to the week long Summer Camp. Each Scoutmaster would come in three day shifts. That way, they only had to take three days off work - sometimes without pay. Thank these men for sacrificing vacation days to be there with us at Summer Camp. Most of the time a Scoutmaster had to use vacation time. I also had an Explorer Advisor who took two weeks off work to be our over 21 adult leader at Philmont.

I remember being on the volunteer fire department and using one week vacation time to go to the week long fire training school at the TEEX facility in College Station. Many of the married men there also used vacation time for that too. Some saw it as a second job, some as a hobby, some as a business trip, and some as volunteer time.

Anyway, thank those adults who have used vacation time to help others. Many parents do this to chaperone youth gatherings and youth sporting events.

I was a Scoutmaster for many years…after I got married, Scout weekends and Summer Camp were the only times my wife and I were separated…

 

[Lorelei12]

Before we had our son, I used to go away on weekend trips with my friends a couple of times a year. It was fun for me, and my husband liked having the place to himself. Our marriage is fine, and we both enjoyed it.

Our lives are different now, but when our son and any other kids we have are older I can see doing this again. My husband doesn’t really like traveling, and I do. We’ve been on trips together, which are fun too, but if he likes some time to himself and I get to have some fun, and it works for both of us, I don’t see what is “immature” about that…

 

[CradleJourney]

Well as the title pretty much says, are there any married couples here who take separate vacations (not business trips but personal vacations) for whatever reason…just curious how your spouse feels about it and the reasons for doing so in the first place…TIA and God bless…

Sometimes my “alone” time if for others safety I grew up with copious amounts of quiet, uninterrupted time. As an adult I live with my spouse, raising / raised our six kids in a very small house. An occasional (once every couple years) weekend away is necessary to preserve my sanity.

Also, as others mentioned, just because my spouse has something he has enjoyed doing his entire life that I dislike doesn’t mean he should have to give it up. So why not let him go on a long (3-5 day) fishing trip if/when we can afford it?

I see nothing wrong with separate vacations, assuming the couple is also do shared adventures and relaxing as well.

For us, the main rule is neither of us gets to go “play” alone at a spot the other wants to go to as well. We use our separate trips to indulge things that the other spouse has no interest in.

 

[Xantippe]

Sometimes my “alone” time if for others safety I grew up with copious amounts of quiet, uninterrupted time. As an adult I live with my spouse, raising / raised our six kids in a very small house. An occasional (once every couple years) weekend away is necessary to preserve my sanity.

Also, as others mentioned, just because my spouse has something he has enjoyed doing his entire life that I dislike doesn’t mean he should have to give it up. So why not let him go on a long (3-5 day) fishing trip if/when we can afford it?

I see nothing wrong with separate vacations, assuming the couple is also do shared adventures and relaxing as well.

**For us, the main rule is neither of us gets to go “play” alone at a spot the other wants to go to as well. ** We use our separate trips to indulge things that the other spouse has no interest in.

Right, that would be gross and unfair.

Also, it wouldn’t be fair if one spouse got to do their trips and the other spouse didn’t get to do any.

I was just remembering that while my dad almost never was away from my mom overnight (I can remember maybe 2-4 nights my whole childhood when my dad was on a school board trip or work travel), I can remember LOTS of occasions when my parents left us kids with friends and family and went off for overnight trips. I don’t even remember why they were gone, but I can remember staying at half a dozen different homes when they were gone on those trips.

Meanwhile, my husband and I have literally never left all of our kids and gone for a trip just the two of us. I’m plotting a trip for our 20th anniversary next year, but it may not happen given how hard it is to find people who are both a) willing to take the kids and b) capable of doing so.

So I suspect that’s another contributing factor to why couples do solo trips–the lack of good options for leaving kids with.

 

[Bonnie]

Sometimes my “alone” time if for others safety

I used to have fantasies about spending a few nights at the best local motel so I could soak in the tub & watch tv. I never did it as I couldn’t justify spending that much money on myself. But now I have my own tub, so I lock myself in the bathroom with a book, the radio on, & plenty of hot water. Still no tv, but I’m OK with that.

 

[Patavium]

No. And I just asked my husband about it and he was as horrified as I was. That kind of vacation time and money is not used to spend time apart. Alone time is coffee shop and a book time and money, not several days off work and hundreds or thousands of dollars.

 

[ConfusedLucy]

It’s a problem when it’s done thoughtlessly, someone I know was very upset when her husband was talked into an expensive stag week abroad as it meant that they didn’t have the money for their own holiday that year.

Beyond that I don’t see why married couples have to do absolutely everything together, I have a close friend who is a very adventurous traveller and her husband doesn’t even have a passport, her travelling on her own or with friends works for them. My husband wants to do a safari adventure holiday whereas I am an arachnophobe who doesn’t do well in the heat, one year I hope he will go ahead with his dream holiday and maybe I will go somewhere else with my mother

 

[Bridgit_Andrews]

My wife and I had never spent more than one night apart for over twenty years, and we had only done that about three times. I never understood married people who regularly take off on their own for several days or more. It seems pretty common.

And I don’t mean to insult anyone by typing this, because different strokes for different folks, but I sort of regard the whole “vacation with the girlfriends” or “guys trip” as something you mature out of when you get married.

All that being said, I have a confession to make. A guilty confession. Several weeks ago my wife needed to leave town to take care of some stuff with her parents, and I was looking forward to not having her around the house for a few days.

There are lots of reasons couples spend several nights to months apart. My parents spent months apart because my dad was in the military and deployed often. Actually he is a Vietnam vet so there was a great deal of time they spent separated in their early years.

Hubby gets sent to schools or meetings with his job. We were also separated for about a year during our 3rd year of marriage while he was at FLETC. As much as I love him, I’m one of those women who happily wave him on and then joyfully sleep in the middle of the bed.

Vacations are a different story. We love to travel and have yet found a reason to travel to separate locations during the same time period for fun.

Peace,
B

 

[LundyLund]

We don’t vacation much as a family, simply due to work schedules. We do go visit family, but I’d hardly call that a vacation. Because we don’t vacation much, my wife and I occasionally do take separate trips. They’re usually short (2-3 days), and involve something the other is not interested in doing.

We are actually going on our first real vacation in years next month. Just the two of us, no kids. I’m stoked.

 

[BlueEyedLady]

What about the very occasional trip / vacation with a same-sex close friend?

There’s nothing wrong with it, but it doesn’t really sound like fun to me. We skip town with friends a few times a year either with another couple or two, or a small group, usually another couple and two single male friends of ours. We do small road trips, camping, concerts, stuff like that. Going with just “the girls” sounds terribly boring and much less safe. We’re all good friends and have never divided up on gender; it seems strange to start now.

 

[Phemie]

There’s nothing wrong with it, but it doesn’t really sound like fun to me. We skip town with friends a few times a year either with another couple or two, or a small group, usually another couple and two single male friends of ours. We do small road trips, camping, concerts, stuff like that. Going with just “the girls” sounds terribly boring and much less safe. We’re all good friends and have never divided up on gender; it seems strange to start now.

Why on earth would going on a trip with just the girls be less safe or be boring?

When M & I went to Europe we never thought in terms of “safety”. We were two 50-somethings going off with a backpack, a eurail pass and a list of hostels and the brains not to do anything we wouldn’t think safe to do at home.

We were going to do the cultural stuff and religious stuff that our husbands had absolutely no interest in. We shopped, visited museums and churches, went to a wonderful Mozart dinner at the oldest restaurant in Europe, got lost, repeatedly, and found our way again. We had a fun-filled three weeks and then came home to our hubbies who, in the meantime, had done their own thing while we were away (mine had been off to a regional Scout Jamboree). I’d repeat the experience in a heartbeat. It wouldn’t have been as much fun with my husband, no matter how much we love each other. He would have been bored out of his mind.

 

[BlueEyedLady]

Why on earth would going on a trip with just the girls be less safe or be boring?

Because our group isn’t set up to where I’m friends with the women and hubby is buddies with the men; we’re all a group of close friends. It just seems silly to leave my husband at home and go out of town with a few members of our friends group who aren’t the people I’m closest with to start with when we could just all go together and have a blast. I would never go on a trip with male friends without my husband, so I’m not sure what the problem is.

As far as safety goes, 3 attractive 20-something women are much safer bar-hopping in DC or going to a music festival in Chicago with large men who love them present.

 

[JanetF]

I have vacationed without my husband in the past. If he couldn’t get off work when our daughter was off for Spring break or whatever. He has taken her on trips without me as well. Sometimes our schedules just didn’t mesh.

He was self-employed for the first 22 years of our 30 years of marriage and only took 2 vacations of more than a day or two in duration, so if I wanted to go somewhere I went with my sister, or later when our child arrived with her.

It’s not a question of a weak marriage at all, just working things out the best way we can.

 

[Patavium]

Because our group isn’t set up to where I’m friends with the women and hubby is buddies with the men; we’re all a group of close friends. It just seems silly to leave my husband at home and go out of town with a few members of our friends group who aren’t the people I’m closest with to start with when we could just all go together and have a blast. I would never go on a trip with male friends without my husband, so I’m not sure what the problem is.

As far as safety goes, 3 attractive 20-something women are much safer bar-hopping in DC or going to a music festival in Chicago with large men who love them present.

 

[AdamP88]

Sometimes my “alone” time if for others safety I grew up with copious amounts of quiet, uninterrupted time. As an adult I live with my spouse, raising / raised our six kids in a very small house. An occasional (once every couple years) weekend away is necessary to preserve my sanity.

Also, as others mentioned, just because my spouse has something he has enjoyed doing his entire life that I dislike doesn’t mean he should have to give it up. So why not let him go on a long (3-5 day) fishing trip if/when we can afford it?

I see nothing wrong with separate vacations, assuming the couple is also do shared adventures and relaxing as well.

For us, the main rule is neither of us gets to go “play” alone at a spot the other wants to go to as well. We use our separate trips to indulge things that the other spouse has no interest in.

This makes perfect sense. I’d never go alone to something that my wife would love to go and visit. But there are things that I love that she has zero interest in and vice versa. if I was going on a trip alone I’d most likely be doing some of those activities. In my case Camping, kayaking, hiking etc. Mrs Adam Peter prefers activities that don’t involve getting soaked, being cold, being bitten by insects, or having to sleep in a tent.

 

[Wedge_Antilles]

My wife has gone to visit her grandfather on the west coast twice in our 9 year marriage without me, as we have small children, and it wasn’t conducive for me and the children to go.

Beyond that, it is hard enough to time vacations while we are still having babies (3 so far, fourth due in July) to even think about a true vacation alone.

As a dad and husband, I do vacations only for my wife and children. They do nothing for me that I can’t get at home - time to enjoy my children and wife. For me, they are a stress over cost, and an interruption to routine, which I love. I support them, but for me, they are a labor of love, not something I’d do otherwise.