To want to travel on my own to meet with friends and not have to involve my dh

[Pleasehelpmefindagoodusername]

I belong to a group that started in lockdown. It's a book club. We are online but a group of us communicating on WhatsApp aswell now. Next year some of us are going to meet up at a book/fiction related event. We are going to stay in a hotel and make a weekend of it. I am so excited. I have never in the 25 years we have been married done anything like this just me without my husband. And certainly not since our kids have been born. Aged between 16 and 20. My dh has been like great we can travel up together and I'll take ds2 (who'll be 17 then) and we'll do this and that and we can meet in the evening and do stuff in the evening and the next day. He doesn't seem to understand that its a weekendaway forme without him. When I've told him that he said but the tickets are only for a day it'll be over in the afternoon and then we can do stuff together. Am I being unreasonable to want to make a weekend of it if everyone else is? He doesn't seem to understand why I'd want to at all

He's not "offering" to come along, he's bulldozing his way into your trip away.

Have you spelled it out to him?

Have you told him very clearly "no DH, this is a trip away for me, I'm meeting friends, I don't want you or any of the DC tagging along. I'm going on Friday and will be back on Sunday. You are not invited and I'm not discussing this any more".

Different..... not dodgy!! 🙄

"Sorry DH but as women, sometimes we just need a break away from home life. I plan to see if anyone in the group wants to make plans for the rest of the weekend and try to make a bit of a girls weekend of it. If you're keen for us to go away together then pick another weekend"

Tell him those plans with DS are great and can be at a different location to where you are going

I feel like everybody on MN is less grumpy than me or have nicer spouses. The only way I have stayed married for over 25 years is by going away frequently on my own. But so does DH!

They are all women in the group. None of us are local to the event so we are all planning to make a weekend of it and meeting up afterwards etc and staying in a hotel for the weekend

im just stunned you’ve not been away without your family! Of course you need to stand firm and tell him you’re going on your own.

Just tell him that it is a book club weekend away with no partners.

This ^^. You can say that you’ve realized that no one else is bringing partners/children so you don’t want to change the dynamic, it’s not fair on the others.

As PP’s have said, many couples have weekends away without their OH’s. We didn’t much when my children were young, but it started increasing about five years ago. Now they’re 19 and nearly 16, it’s a few times a year for both DH and I. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and all that. 🤣

Just tell him you're going on your own. Shut down any conversations about him and DC coming and tell him you're a grown woman and you are capable of having a weekend away alone. You need to be assertive about it.

You will never stop being anxious unless he leaves you to do stuff on your own. He's enabling you, really.

Just say no, you're going with just your friends. If he wants a weekend away get him to organise something for you, him and DC entirely separately on another weekend.

You absolutely must do this on your own, OP, because it's nothing to do with your husband.
And I can't imagine the misery and feeling of suffocation if I never spent any solo time, without the spouse. It's totally healthy to have your own, independent life.

YANBU. Just tell him nicely bit firmly that you want to do this just you and your friends, and that this weekend is not for him and your son to join

Tell him that you need to do this for yourself (and it sounds like you do). Wishing you lots of fun and a super weekend!

This !

Please please please stand firm on this. It will be so easy for you to give in and relent and if you do, you'll regret it and probably never get an opportunity like this again. I think this will be so important for you and your independence. Do you feel comfortable saying no to your husband??

Have you not told him all this? Have you told him not to come?

Seems like a 2 minute conversation and its all cleared up.

Does your nearly 17 year old even want to go?

It sounds like a lovely trip. It won't do your husband any harm to realise that you can cope without him for a weekend. And there are fifty-odd other weekends in the year if he wants to arrange a getaway for the two of you.

Yes!

Stand firm op.

Me too!

YANBU to want a weekend away with friends.

Assuming this is not an aspect of a controlling relationship or an overly needy partner, I think it’s nice that your DH wants to go on the trip and meet up in the evenings. Having a partner who still likes spending time with you after 25 years and looks for ways to maximise that is kind of sweet and testament to a pretty good relationship.

But that doesn’t mean you can’t go off for the weekend!

Hopefully he just hasn’t realised it’s not just the ticketed event and as soon as you explain that the idea is for it to just be book club members for the whole weekend he’ll get the picture. He’s maybe a bit excited about the idea of a weekend away. Perhaps suggest he takes DS2 off somewhere else - it would probably be great for them.

It would change the entire dynamic of the weekend if you knew they were there waiting for you to finish up what you are doing so you can meet them to do XYZ...you'd feel pressured to go off and find them, when maybe you might have got chatting to people and want to go and have a coffee with them, or whatever it is you want to do. You need to be allowed to have some spontaneity and not have everything planned down to the last minute. Its about you this trip, not him and your child.

In a way I feel saddened that you have never done this in 25 years, and indeed that your DH has not done similar, again because of an interest or hobby that is something you have no interest in.