How’s your social life? Do you feel like you have community?

r/

I feel like between my girl friends and I (40F) we have a strong community. We regularly get together, even though we live far apart we’d still fly to visit at least a couple times a year. We take trips together. We text frequently.

My husband has a group chat with his friends, but it kind of stops there. Mostly we just see them for big life events like weddings and baby showers.

I try to encourage him to make plans, I offer to organize it for him. We have kids and I don’t mind watching them so he can take a guys trip. Literally all he has to do is just float it in his group chat and I’ll handle the rest so he can have some bonding time with his buds, but he wont. He implies that he wants to see his friends more, but takes zero action to make it happen.

It seems like a lot of my friends husbands are kind of this way. They mostly stay at home with family unless they’re forced on a double date with another couple or something.

I guess in my mind, we’re social creatures and I think a lot of the issues in our society has come from replacing technology with actual human interaction. So I worry about the long-term negative mental consequences of lacking fulfillment there. But maybe I’m overthinking it… ?

Those of you with wives and kids. Have you maintained your communities?

Comments

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  2. a__t__o__m__i__c Avatar

    I am disconnected from civilization. That’s me. Triple exile. But there has clearly something gone wrong with community and socialisation in the world.

  3. slwrthnu_again Avatar

    It’s fantastic. A group of my friends put on the largest cars and coffee in my area. I am constantly going to local punk/hardcore shows so that’s my other group of friends. My two main hobbies are incredibly social hobbies. A couple times a year I get to the point where I skip a few things just cause I need some time to just be home relaxing.

  4. turtleben248 Avatar

    “Literally all he has to do”

    “He takes zero action”

    All of this ignores the reality of how men are taught to socialize. Men aren’t taught to be vulnerable and to be intentional about seeking intimacy and connection. So, you have the right intentions, but you need to recognize that he wasn’t taught to socialize the way you were. It isn’t true that all he has to do is reach out and suggest plans. There is mental and emotional work that a lot of men need to do

    He might feel uncomfortable because this isn’t something he’s done in the past, and he was never taught how to do it. If it isn’t something his group has ever done, this is also reason for him to be uncomfortable

    Instead of encouraging him to reach out to his friends, it might be more fruitful to talk to him about what he seeks in his friendships, and if he feels he can get his needs met with the friends he has now, if he feels comfortable being vulnerable with them, if he actually connects with them

  5. Husky_5117 Avatar

    I have a group chat titled “me and the wives” that I use to coordinate trips with my bros. Love them but they are next to useless when it comes to planning things that does not have their wives/girl friends included.

  6. SpicelessKimChi Avatar

    We live in Mexico where it’s not hard to make friends but you really have to put forth the effort. So basically I have acquaintances, but they’re more just `dudes I see at the bar’ when I go, which is rare (maybe once a week or every other week). We’re learning the language slowly so that opens up more possibilities in terms of going out with our neighbors and whatnot.

    I’m one of six (actually now five, we lost one) super tight-knit friends who pick a city every year somewhere in the world and all meet there for a weekend of drinking and stupidity. I will admit the drinking AND stupidity have tapered off as we’ve gotten older, but it’s always a great time. We all chat every day about life and relationships and depression and work and geopolitics and everything under the sun. It’s a good support system even though we’re nowhere near each other geographically.

  7. GoorooKen Avatar

    I have some “homies” but I wouldn’t say I have community. I’m the dad of the group not just that I’m a parent but I feel like I’m their dad some days. It’s not an age thing as much as experience probably. Leaves me feeling like a single rose in a field of tulips.

  8. Resident_Decision_30 Avatar

    What I have seen with me and my friends: what we’d really need is some external reason to gather that doesn’t need constant organizing but has a fixed schedule. Depending on the personality a weekly game night. Or a regular time to play (or watch) some group sports together. Basically a third place that feels both familiar and yet isn’t burdened by too high expectations.

  9. Unusual-External4230 Avatar

    I can’t speak for him obviously but I feel like a lot of men have become kindof socially calloused.

    I have, over the past decade, had so many friends come and go that it has become wearisome to even try. I just don’t feel like putting the effort forth to build relationships with people who are probably going to decide after 6-12 months they don’t like me for some reason then never talk to me or my wife again. It’s become like clockwork and I observe the same thing with a lot of other people. Building friendships just isn’t worth the effort and dealing with the feeling of abandonment when they become distant or disappear. Most relationships we’ve had the past decade have just been transient. I realized most non-family relationships just don’t view other people as important.

    I had the first night away from our kids in 3 years last weekend and I realized that she’s the only person in my life I can count on and she fulfills the need for relationships for me. The problem is we have kids, one with health problems, so I don’t get that either. I’ve largely just accepted loneliness and I feel like I’m hearing more and more men say the same thing.

    I guess the summary is, for me anyway, it’s just not worth the effort to try and fail again. There could be a lot of other reasons, but that’s it for me.

  10. Lil_Shorto Avatar

    Look at big apes, what do you see?

    Exactly.

  11. Terrible_Door_3127 Avatar

    I’m not really interested in that.

  12. unpopular-dave Avatar

    I have about seven friends that I regularly communicate with.

    I don’t live in the same state as any of them. It’s just me and my wife and my son where I live. But I don’t feel like I’m missing out on anything

    I’m curious what issues you think are arising from lack of social interaction?

  13. imkvn Avatar

    Ya, your overthinking it. When a man has a wife that’s all he really needs. Once a guy gets a SO in the group he breaks off to start another venture. Sometimes they come back, but it’s usually the SO over bro’s. Pussy whipped isn’t a bad thing.

    Guys should have a handful of friends, most are colleagues. We usually group chat, game, or call.

    Once you have kids most of the disposable income goes to wife, kids, food, toys.

    We’re pretty simple creatures.

    I also know ppl that got burned so they don’t like ppl much. Life for them sounds miserable, but better than being used or not acknowledged.

    Community is what you make it. It’s hard to meet ppl when you’re older bc we’re so opinionated.

    Life as a man is to accept being alone and comfortable with yourself. We live to work….. Asking some ppl what they do for fun.

  14. ngknm187 Avatar

    Male 32. No social life at all. Total disaster.

  15. Matts4wd Avatar

    I’m not relevant to answer but my brother who is 40, married with kid does not talk with his friends much at all, guys he was close with growing up, went to all their weddings and bachelor parties speaking with them a couple times per year, and when he comes home sometimes doesn’t even reach out to grab a beer or catch up…boggles my mind. He just goes to work, comes home, sleeps, watches movies and does father things with his son.

  16. Music_For_The_Fire Avatar

    Most men depend on their wives/partners for social interaction. Not married (anymore, at least) but my girlfriend seems to always have something planned with a friend of hers and I’ll tag along.

    But with that said, I have a solid group of friends independent of her. We’ll grab coffee, see a movie, get some food. I feel like I do most of the planning, but that’s ok. Girlfriend says that I have more friends than any other guy she’s known. Make a bit of effort into inviting your friends for things and, even if they can’t make it, hopefully they’ll reciprocate.

    A lot of men don’t know how to plan things, so they always seem shocked when I do it. It’s not hard. I planned a modest birthday celebration at a baseball game and almost everyone agreed. I think men need more social interactions with each other but just don’t know how to make it happen.

  17. afiveouncebird Avatar

    To be honest, the more I’ve been using this site the more disconnected I feel. It’s just people shouting into the void because of anxiety and economic turmoil and housing and employment.

    I mean, isn’t everyone terrified about the state of the world?

    Edit: I don’t want to end on a negative so seeking out groups weather for hiking or reading or whatever would be a better investment of time than this website. That’s how I feel about reddit.

  18. Enough_Zombie2038 Avatar

    Wrong approach for this person it seems.

    Have you tried loosely planning it for him quietly. Like don’t actually book it but basically arrange it all and one day be like: oh hey Hun so you know how I love spending time with you but I know it’s important to have guy time? What if you go to (just picking anything here for an example) ski in __. There is this nice lodge __(see here). Looked and totally affordable and open __. There’s a bar and good food in the area too it looked like. I was chatting with “Bob” wife she laughed and was down for the idea too, gives us girl time.

    (He makes some comment thinking you’re playing some kind of test) No test, you need guy time I need girl time.

    Anywho, that might come off as really sweet and get the ball rolling now and the future or it may not.

    Many of my friends come home exhausted and with this indirect guilt from their spouses saying do more that they never want to leave. Meanwhile their partners call me and ask me to get the out of the house for them for space.

  19. Wolf_E_13 Avatar

    My small circle of guy friends all live here, so I see them somewhat regularly for breakfast or lunch or we sometimes go mountain biking or hiking or whatever. That’s the extent of it though. The last time the guys got together for a weekend away, I could not get home fast enough. Getting 5 guys on the same page for 4 days in Cabo is harder than you think, especially when our personalities vary so much. Few hours here and there, no problem…spending days, never again.

  20. MissyMurders Avatar

    Well put it this way, it was my birthday yesterday and the only person I heard from was a friend of a friend who messaged to tell me she bought another house. I’m currently homeless.

    It’s most likely my own fault, but that’s apparently the “community” I have these days.

  21. Terakahn Avatar

    I have one friend from junior high that I still try to connect with regularly. All other social contact happens at work. Life is busy and it’s hard to make time. And I don’t really like anyone enough to make new friends.

  22. werepat Avatar

    What is the opposite of a community? That’s what I have.

  23. jasonhn Avatar

    well i used to have good friends i grew up with until I moved 8 hours away from my hometown and over a couple years lost touch. then it was my now wife’s friends and her brothers friends but after covid that kind of died off. I work from home alone so no chance of making friends there. making new friends was never something i was good at. now when I try to do social things I find I don’t care for it much and just look forward to it being over. I do wish I had kept in contact with my old friends but what kind of relationship can you have when you live 8 hours away?

  24. Highrise_Lowrise Avatar

    I end up planning all the bullshit for my group. I just stopped asking and started just telling them what was happening, and it’s been working great for years at this point.

    It’s never a mandatory thing or anything, it’s just planning something without sitting there asking a bunch of guys “well what do you wanna do?” For 3 days on end

  25. Able-Candle-2125 Avatar

    I have no friends. Just people I work with. I think mostly that’s fine. I was always a bit of an outsider even as a kid. People like me, but don’t want to hang out. I think I could be alone for a long time and be just fine.

    I’d love a good friend though. Just haven’t met one in awhile.