To think people today aren’t really interested in other people’s partners

[ChorltonCreamery]

I am now heading towards 40.

Of course my husband and I have our own friends and two or three couple friends but over the last few years especially after Covid we are getting individual invitations where I would normally expect to be invited as a couple.

At the weekend another wedding invitation arrived just for him from a colleague to the whole day. This colleague became a friend of DH’s because of shared hobby and had been to the house several times.

A cousin of DH’s invited him and his siblings away for the weekend without any of our families.

One Of my own cousins got married again last year and they only wanted me to go.

Friends that we make seem uninterested in getting to know us as a couple and don’t have an interest in introducing their own husbands.

When we first got together everyone seemed more eager to mix and expand social circles.

Is this just my experience ? Have the norms and protocols changed?

Or there’s a cost of living crunch and people can’t invite dozens of +1s and afford to cater for them at weddings?

I wouldn't expect to be invited to a wedding of my husbands work colleague. The cousin one is normal in my family because there are so many of us. Space and cost implications

Maybe the sibling wanted a sibling only trip. Couldn't get worked up about that either. I go away with just my mum and my sister a few times a year.

No, the situation you describe is normal in my friendship group and I am nearly sixty.

I prefer to do some things separately.

we had a ‘nobody we don’t know’ rule at our wedding. Family and friends only. Only partners if they were also our friends.

I think for weddings it's a bit rude to only invite individuals without their partner. Most other events fine.

This isn't something I recognise @ChorltonCreamery DH and I are pretty much always invited together for things. I mean if it's just a friend of mine who wants to go for coffee, then of course he isn't asked (and wouldn't want to go!) But any social event with multiple people - of course we are both invited. By his friends and colleagues - and mine.

Maybe it depends how long you've been together. Even so, even when DH and I had only been together for a year, (and weren't even living together,) we still got invited to things as a couple.

Partners should be invited (IMO) especially to weddings when you often don't know a lot of other guests.

But that said I am not interested in other people's partners at all really.

I would expect to be able to bring my dp to a wedding. I have also noticed friends don't want to do stuff as couples, it's nearly always women only in my social group. Occasionally husbands/partners have said they'll go only to drop out last minute. My dp has come along and been the only male! I'm not sure if it's an age thing with some couples that have been together a while no longer wanting to socialise with each other 😬

Sounds pretty normal to me. If that colleage needed to invite everyone at work (could be 30 people) and suddenly becomes 60 people with a +1. Work colleagues kind of go as a team in this situation, they all know one another. Totally wouldn't expect to be invited to a partners colleagues wedding, although I have been. I also haven't been. And vice versa with my work place.

Going away with cousins, yeah also normal if they are friends too. (Is this a female cousin with your male DP and you've posted about this before?)

I sort of get where you are coming from OP in that ‘plus 1’ seems to be largely a thing of the past and couples are only invited if the host knows both people reasonably well.
I’ve noticed it most with work related events - 10 years ago bringing your partner to a work event was normal (some places even expected it) whereas now the number of events has drastically reduced and they almost never have a plus 1. I actually do not mind in the slightest, spending the evening making small talk with people I had nothing in common with was never my idea of a good night out

I think it’s quite an “old fashioned” way of socialising, not in a bad way but I think it’s something that isn’t really done anymore.

I know my grandparents always socialised as a couple and my nan was often horrified when my mum would go to work parties and nights out by herself, without my dad. To be honest I wouldn’t really want my partner to come to a works party as they are my friends and I’d be constantly checking in to make sure he was okay. But we do still have couple friends who we do stuff with as a group.

For us this changed when we had children. No family to help and babysitters are expensive do we started doing nearly all our socialising separately.

I don't know if it's a new thing, but it doesn't bother me - or OH - a bit.

I wouldn't expect to go to my partner's colleague's wedding - I don't know them.

Perhaps it's also because weddings are ridiculously expensive nowadays, and people rarely just do a buffet in a local pub as was more common in the 70s/80s.

I'm not sure if things have changed but no, I'm not really interested in socializing with other people's partners. Would you rather spend time with a friend, or a friend and a stranger? I'd choose the former. Sometimes it's fun and everyone has a laugh, other times it's awkward and the conversation is a bit stilted. And the partner looks like they'd rather be anywhere else.

Me and DP have never really socialised with each others friends. We had a baby very early into our relationship, and long before our friends decided to have kids. (I was 24 when we got together and DD turned up 10 months in, very much to our surprise)

So socialising individually was very much a case of necessity, someone needed to be home to look after DD. And on the rare occasions we did have a babysitter, we generally preferred to have a date night, just the two of us, as we'd kind of missed out on that whole stage of our relationship.

And of course, now that DD is older and we can leave her home by herself, all of our friends have young kids so the socialising as couples still doesn't really happen often.

We do it on occasion, and we each like each others friends, but to be honest we'd both rather be out with our own friends, so I can't see it becoming more frequent for us.

Same age bracket as you, OP. I wouldn't expect to bring a partner to any of the events you describe. Wedding guest lists would get out of control pretty soon if everyone started inviting their colleague's partners (or even their cousins partners, if you have a large family to begin with).

I like spending time with my friends without their partners - they are lovely but the dynamic changes when DPs are around. Happy to also see the DPs, too but not on every occasion.
Some DPs I have know since university days, where we have all gone out drinking and dancing together which is different scenario to DPs that have come through friends’ work, dating sites, mate-of-mate etc

Hmmm, I can't actually think of a single event that my husband and I have ever been invited to as a couple, with the exception of family events hosted by our parents and also the weddings of two people that we were both independently already friends with through a shared hobby.
I think the era of couples chaperoning each other socially may have passed?

I don't think you need to be interested in each other partners to invite them but i do believe if you respect people's marriages one will recognise that they are a couple and likely to want to do some types of socialising & share experiences together e.g attend a wedding. I also feel if 'family members' are doing the inviting they will feel some affinity for the partner after all they are related by marriage and all those solemn declarations (if you said them) 'We promise to help them uphold their marriage', will include fostering good relations with both of partners who are now one or else what exactly does it mean?

Personally, it seems there's a strong move to degrade what marriage means. There's generally less respect for it, and very many have no regard for the vows said including the guests, and this is what is playing out. People scoff at the idea of them 'being one' or it's sanctity. With that gone, they are thought of as simply individuals, you can pick one and disregard the other. Saying that, no one is obliged to invite an annoying partner! just putting that out there.

You see it would never occur to me not to invite partners to a wedding possibly ok for an evening so all colleagues.

As far as I am concerned cousins’ partners are family and they should be invited.

Both his cousins and mine want to get together with our children but are not interested in the children’s other parents. Blood seems to matter to them.

I did ask my cousin if DH was invited as they had both come to ours, she concede that my daughter could come to the evening for a dance. Clearly not interested in my boys.

I am absolutely not saying all the time; it would be weird for a partner to just turn up for for example, to a women only lunch etc; it would change the dynamic.

I am talking about occasionally, for every one partner who might be bored there might be several who make genuine connections.

I totally concede about finances( we were only able to have the wedding we wanted as DH had an inheritance) but surely there are get togethers that don’t cost much.

I used to host a buffet towards Christmas inviting partners and kids yet most just turned up with maybe the child who was closest to mine. I think it’s sad people don’t want to expand their circles.

@Spotlightt the cousin is female but I’ve not posted before about her.

@BestZebbie It’s not a question of chaperoning I just think it’s nice to include partners; not all the time just sometimes.

@LadeOde Exactly how I feel. Yes!

I know the ‘annoying partner’ was tongue in cheek but I don’t think either of us is annoying.

We both have friends of our own… just want a bit of mixing.

I actually think it's a bit off to expect a partner who isn't a friend of the bride and/or groom, to get a wedding invite - that's potentially loads of extra randoms at a wedding if you have to invite all the partners you've never met. And why only partners - do single people get to bring a random friend too? Same goes for cousins - I don't know my cousin's very well, and while I'd invite them to a big family do, I wouldn't extend that to partners I'd never met before.

I have always felt a little uncomfortable mixing my social circles. This summer DH and I have had a family wedding,my work wedding, an out of town family 90th birthday and still upcoming my high school class reunion (USA). DH didn’t attend any of these fabulous events. The only one he seems to want to attend is the one I don’t want him to attend which is the class reunion. It’s so much easier for me to socialize if I don’t need to introduce him…support the conversation flow.. point out shared interests check “he’s ok”. I thought I was odd in that I have difficulty mixing my social circles. We get along fine just us two but introducing him into certain social circles makes him awkward which is worsened by the fact he won’t acknowledge this fact. I do notice more women solo at events even tho there is a partner and I like it.

@Tophelleborine You're actually confirming what I said when you talk of a spouse as 'a random'. Each to their own as it were, personally i'd never invite a friend to something as important as wedding or other big anniversary without including their spouse whether we've met or not.