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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to think you can hang out without your husband

397 replies

Independentlondoner · 03/07/2019 17:57

NC
So genuinely don’t know if I’m unreasonable in my expectations.
Recently a new neighbour moved in, and her daughter and mine attend the same preschool. Really nice woman/ family, we’ve attended parties at her house and vice versa.
First time she suggested a play date I said yes and suggested the local park- great. Me and my LO leave the house and her, her husband and her daughter are all ready to walk round to the park- it didn’t really cross my mind to bring my husband. It was a nice trip but I felt slightly like an intruder on their family day out.
Next she group messaged me and another mum to a get together at hers- great I could do with more mum friends. Very quickly the third woman mentioned her husbands dietary requirements, another bring your husbands get together.
I love my husband and we do things as a family often, but we have our own friendships- and to be honest my husband and hers are very different and wouldn’t naturally be friends. I also think it hinders our growing friendship.

Fast forward to this week and I’ve asked if her and her daughter would like to come to a day trip to the zoo, she wants to invite her husband. This means two cars, or me sitting in the back of their car like a child.

AIBU In thinking she could dare do something independent from her husband for a couple of hours or am I the strange one?

OP posts:
SushiForAmateurs · 04/07/2019 21:36
  • another friend!!
SushiForAmateurs · 04/07/2019 21:43

DH is going out this evening (Friday) just with DS. Shockingly leaving DD and me at home.

It's a Dads and boys get-together for DS's football team.

I have no interest in don't want to muscle in, and of course DH wouldn't dream of turning the invitation down, just because I wasn't coming.

I am wondering how some people on here would handle this perfectly normal social situation, which only involves some members of the family.

I sense it would send some into a tailspin - infringing on precious family/weekend time, and only involving some of us. Rather than just saying, 'yes thanks, sounds great, we'll see you there'.

SudowoodoVoodoo · 04/07/2019 21:47

The "mum" friends I made through pregnancy/ early baby days, I tended to see solo including the weekends. We moved house when DS was a baby, so it worked well for DH to get some quiet time to do DIY. Equally there were plenty of weekends that we stayed in or went out as a family. DH is happy to get some quiet time that is neither work nor family.

Meeting as family groups is fine if it's clear that that's what the agenda is. Changing the tone by springing a spouse into an arrangement at late or no notice is not OK.

We have mutual friends that happen to have DCs of similar age and often see each other in 3s or 4s as families. Sometimes we meet in child-free, single sex pairs It is a different dynamic in each combination.

DH and I are happy enough with our independence that we have travelled away seperately when an opportunity was not mutually convienient, and happy enough with each other's company to have spent months happily travelling together with little external company.

Having lost a parent prematurely in childhood, it was an enormous comfort to my widdowed parent to have an active social life and be used to socialising independently. Obviously there are no guarentees, but statistically I should outlive DH by a significant number of years; I don't want my last years to be desperately lonely because I've lost the one person that my entire social life was entirely pivoted around for decades.

that25cUKHeatwaveof2019 · 04/07/2019 22:05

They're also able to fly by the seat of their pants

as repeated many many times on the thread, most of us are perfectly able to do everything alone. It's just a choice not to.

Why do some posters insist on pretending there's no difference between "want" and "can"? I am just curious. Never got a reply on that one.

SushiForAmateurs · 04/07/2019 22:14

So how would your DH handle something like the get-together my DH and DS are going to?

If your DH can go somewhere without you, but doesn't want to, would he turn that down, thereby meaning your DS misses out?

MsTSwift · 04/07/2019 22:22

People are being weird. Obviously we do stuff all the time without the other one. Almost too much. Which is why for a day out with kids at weekend scenario we would probably all go. I wouldn’t want to go with a random new neighbour and not dh

SushiForAmateurs · 04/07/2019 23:04

Clearly you do things like go to work without each other.

But the whole thread discussion is that no, actually, you don't do anything socially alone.

Which seems inconceivable to me, and now it almost seems as if there is some back-tracking.

I've also had a bit of a lightbulb moment.

A few people have mentioned how the dynamic changes, depending on whether the social group is mixed, just women or just men. And of course, it does, very much. It's that different dynamic that makes various social engagements enjoyable.

I have realised that this 'different dynamic' means absolutely nothing to the joined-at-the-hip types. Grin They have no idea about the different dynamics, never having experienced them. So they blithely bring Nigel along every single time, blissfully unaware that sometimes it might not be appropriate, or he's really not welcome or appreciated, as lovely as you (naturally) think he is.

My question about the DH/DS outing remains unanswered. I suspect some of the posters here would've just rocked up as well, again blithely unaware that it isn't quite the done thing.

MsTSwift · 04/07/2019 23:09

Bringing a man to an all female meet up is weird too and socially inept.

that25cUKHeatwaveof2019 · 04/07/2019 23:20

What a lot of time and energy spent by posters like SushiForAmateurs to sneer at couples who chose to socialise together.

It seems to bother you an awful lot if you get that worked up about it! Any particular reason?

TipsyToasty · 04/07/2019 23:32

I don’t like this either. It changes the dynamic totally.

I had a birthday dinner once with my girlfriends. One friend walked in with her husband...so I celebrated my birthday with my 9 closest friends...and Dave! Poor guy, I’m pretty sure he was dragged along in order to be the driver 😆

jennymanara · 05/07/2019 00:00

@SushiForAmateurs Yes they have not experienced the different dynamics I agree. My lightbulb moment in this thread was realising that some women do this on purpose to prevent emotional intimacy with friends. Their DH acts as an emotional buffer and ensures things stay very superficial.

Quintella · 05/07/2019 00:04

Bringing a man to an all female meet up is weird too and socially inept.

Absolutely.

SushiForAmateurs · 05/07/2019 00:59

And still you don't answer the question about whether you'd wave your DH and (perhaps for the sake of this argument, fictitious) DS off (what most people would happily do), whether your DH would decline such an invitation, or whether you'd rock up with all the other Dads and sons. I suspect the latter.

It doesn't bother me - I'm just curious as to how this pans out in real life. It seems completely unfeasible to me. Either that, or you must have a rock solid indifference to social mores, unspoken cues and non-verbal communication.

Because it's not just about you. Yes, you love spending time with your DH, but that doesn't mean everyone you bring him along to also does.

I can't think of a husband of my friends that I don't like. Some of them I really like! They're great to spend time with. But I don't always want them at every get-together we have.

Which is the situation the OP is describing.

MsTSwift · 05/07/2019 06:11

I dont think anyone normal is joined at the hip to their dh. But yes after a long week of shops in the night if there’s a family day out somewhere abit special like a zoo damn right I’m going with my husband and kids and not just taking the kids and going with a new neighbour Hmm

MsTSwift · 05/07/2019 06:14

Ships not shops

Mummadeeze · 05/07/2019 06:33

My partner doesn’t want to do anything with me so I arrange things like this with other Mums on purpose occasionally. Some come on their own, some have brought their husband (on a weekend activity with kids). And I was honestly fine with both. It was nice getting to know the husband too. If I arranged a girls night out in the evening then that would be completely different but on a weekend day out with kids, I think it is nice if the Dad wants to be involved too.

LucheroTena · 05/07/2019 06:33

Being joined at the hip is a bit weird, yes. It’s nice to have some separate days out. I don’t know anyone who has to bring their partner along to everything.

MsTSwift · 05/07/2019 06:36

thats sad mummadeeze so he never joins in with the family? I would be questioning what the poison being together was tbh

user1480880826 · 05/07/2019 06:39

My husband usually comes on weekend play dates. So do the husbands of the people we socialize with. Otherwise it’s the 1950s, right?

BertrandRussell · 05/07/2019 06:53

So was it the “1950s” when my dp used to take the children swimming and for breakfast on Sunday mornings, meeting friends (usually other dads) at the pool and I stayed home? Should I have gone too?

Biancadelrioisback · 05/07/2019 07:01

So you always go to all children’s activities together? When do you get time on your own?

Two evenings a week when he works late and at the weekend if I want? I'm definitely not one who does everything with my DH but stuff to do with our child tends to be both of us. We both work long hours during the week and both want to spend time with DS. I wouldn't take him away for a full Saturday and not invite DH and vice versa. Or at least not discuss it first to see if the other person would mind.
That doesn't mean I don't do things with my friends without DH or he with his.

Biancadelrioisback · 05/07/2019 07:01

So you always go to all children’s activities together? When do you get time on your own?

Two evenings a week when he works late and at the weekend if I want? I'm definitely not one who does everything with my DH but stuff to do with our child tends to be both of us. We both work long hours during the week and both want to spend time with DS. I wouldn't take him away for a full Saturday and not invite DH and vice versa. Or at least not discuss it first to see if the other person would mind.
That doesn't mean I don't do things with my friends without DH or he with his.

Biancadelrioisback · 05/07/2019 08:03

Sorry for the double post!

Biancadelrioisback · 05/07/2019 08:03

Sorry for the double post!

DecomposingComposers · 05/07/2019 08:40

If he was taking the children with him I think most people would be up for that. Leaving the “sad baffled woman to her own devices” grin

So socialising independently of your partner is contingent on taking the children? So if a partner wants to meet friends, but not take the children then that's not ok?