Concerned about my wife's lack of desire to expand her social circle

[Anonymous]

I'll start off by noting that both my wife and I would classify ourselves as introverts. I'm probably more introverted than her, but I'm more comfortable stepping outside my comfort zone than she is (if that makes sense).

In our mid-late 20's, we lived in DC, and we had a decent sized group of friends that we would hang out with every weekend, doing the typical going out to bars/dinner/house parties, etc. While we enjoyed city life, we knew that we'd move out to the suburbs to have kids. Also, my wife is close to her parents, and we knew that we wanted to live in the same area as them (like a 15-20 minute drive).

Eventually, as we reached our 30s, the dynamics of our respective friend groups began to change. Some moved out to the far-flung burbs of the DMV (or out of the area all together), while our friends that remained in the city seemed more into the drinking and partying scene, while we were starting to move away from it. This shift in our dynamic, along with changing jobs and getting ready to have kids, made us realize that we were ready to move out to the suburbs. In the spring of 2019, we moved; we intentionally picked a neighborhood that had a lot of young families, with the hope that it would help us reinvigorate our social life.

However, that didn't really happen. While there were young families on our block, most of them had older kids (between 4-10 or so), and we weren't able to really connect with them. In early 2020, we found out my wife was pregnant, which was exciting, as we hoped this would open new doors to our social life with being able to meet other new parents....of course, then Covid hit, which took away alot of opportunities for us to meet new people. Around the same time, my wife began to get disinterested in her group of friends. To sum it up, her friend group at the time was split between those who had kids, and those who didn't. She understandably had a hard time connecting with her friends who didn't have kids, and felt like her friends who did have kids were trying to live life as if they were still childless (ex. going out to bars). Her friends would invite her out, and more often than not, she'd say no, and stay at home. Because of this, a majority of our socializing since our daughter has been born has been with her parents and her sister.

Now that we're kind of out of the Covid fog, we've talked alot about making new friends. Our daughter goes to a pre-school that has lots of social events for parents in the evenings/weekends. We've gone a few times, and I've really enjoyed it; it feels really good to at least make baby steps towards building a social circle. However, every time I ask my wife about going to these events, she'll usually respond with "eh, I don't really want to, it's kind of awkward." It's frustrating because she will say from time to time that she wishes she had a close group of Mom friends, but now that there's as good of an opportunity to start to make those friendships as we've had since we moved to the suburbs, she doesn't seem to want to take advantage of it.

If you heard about this situation, you'd probably think it sounds like a textbook case of depression/anxiety, right? Well, a few days ago, my wife and I were talking, and she told me that she's felt that happiest she's ever been. I asked her why, and she said, "I don't have to spend time with my old group of friends, and I get to spend more time with my parents and sister."

So I guess I'm just frustrated that she doesn't want to expand her social circle. To be fair, she's very supportive of me making new friends/spending time with my current group of friends, but it sometimes feels like she'd be genuinely fine with her entire social circle consisting of her parents and her sister. And while her parents and sister are great to hang out with for sure, it's frustrating that she wants to make new friends, but doesn't want to step outside her comfort zone to do so.

[Anonymous]

Why don’t you go make neighborhood friends? Sure sounds like you’re trying to outsource that to her.

[Anonymous]

You need to stop micromanaging her. She doesn't owe it to you to have other friends, and you're not some kind of life coach who has to exhort her to excellence in this area. She's tired. She wants to spend her time with the kid and resting. You go socialize yourself if you like it so much.

Ask yourself if you're really pulling your weight on parenting and household chores. That might be part of why she's tired.

[Anonymous]

wtf OP. you have major boundary issues. why do you care? do you think it reflects on you? are you depending on your wife for your own social life?

fwiw I am much happier with a few close friends and relatives. “friend groups” are often shallow and exhausting. and parenting a young child also often fills the need for socializing.

[Anonymous]

So she's not holding you back, but you're frustrated? I'm not understanding this. She's not unhappy, she's not stopping you from attending these events, so what's the issue? Maybe if you make some closer connections at these events, you can do something with one or two other families rather than big social events.

[Anonymous]

If you are going to encourage her to make friends, those friendships should be based on your wife's interests and not based on your kids.

First, unless these kids are all going to elementary school together, these "friendships" are short term. So consider how much it is worth investing in people who you won't stay in touch with.

Also, as a mother who has BTDT, it gets very messy when your friendships are based on your kids friendships and there are falling outs among the kids or your kid is not considered "cool" and is excluded. Then, you are in the position of losing your friends and/or pushing your child to accept bad behavior from other kids to maintain the adult friendships. Certainly you can and should be friendly with parents at your kids' school, but be cautious about considering these people your true friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:wtf OP. you have major boundary issues. why do you care? do you think it reflects on you? are you depending on your wife for your own social life?

fwiw I am much happier with a few close friends and relatives. “friend groups” are often shallow and exhausting. and parenting a young child also often fills the need for socializing.

You can tell he wants her to find him a social life because it was all “we we we” until after Covid/his reasonable excuses for not having a better social life. Then suddenly it was “her her her.”

[Anonymous]

She's probably at her introvert max just from work and parenting. And mom social dynamics, especially at school, can be really cliquey and complicated in a way that you probably don't grasp.

It sounds like you want her to come with you as a social facilitator, and you should get over it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are going to encourage her to make friends, those friendships should be based on your wife's interests and not based on your kids.

First, unless these kids are all going to elementary school together, these "friendships" are short term. So consider how much it is worth investing in people who you won't stay in touch with.

Also, as a mother who has BTDT, it gets very messy when your friendships are based on your kids friendships and there are falling outs among the kids or your kid is not considered "cool" and is excluded. Then, you are in the position of losing your friends and/or pushing your child to accept bad behavior from other kids to maintain the adult friendships. Certainly you can and should be friendly with parents at your kids' school, but be cautious about considering these people your true friends.

This. So much drama when your "friend circle" is based on your kids, because if the kids don't get along or start drifting apart, the friendships suffer (or the kids do). I'd probably attend a few of these social events just because it's nice to know the parents of your kids' classmates, but I wouldn't be going for the purpose of making a group of friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So she's not holding you back, but you're frustrated? I'm not understanding this. She's not unhappy, she's not stopping you from attending these events, so what's the issue? Maybe if you make some closer connections at these events, you can do something with one or two other families rather than big social events.

This absolutely! You can go to the preschool parent events alone. Make dad friends! Knock yourself out! But it sounds like she's doing well with her level of social interaction. That may change when your child(ren) are older but it may not.

Also of not: there can be outgoing introverts and shy extroverts. Making new friends is a very different skill/dynamic than whether being with other people is exhausting to you. I'm an outgoing introvert -- I love meeting new people, I just only want to see people at all once per weekend. One of my good friends is a shy extrovert -- she finds new people challenging, but can't stand living alone. It might be that you're an outgoing introvert and your wife is a shy one. If you want her to expand her friend circle, make new friends of your own. Maybe once she gets used to them, some of them will also become her friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are going to encourage her to make friends, those friendships should be based on your wife's interests and not based on your kids.

First, unless these kids are all going to elementary school together, these "friendships" are short term. So consider how much it is worth investing in people who you won't stay in touch with.

Also, as a mother who has BTDT, it gets very messy when your friendships are based on your kids friendships and there are falling outs among the kids or your kid is not considered "cool" and is excluded. Then, you are in the position of losing your friends and/or pushing your child to accept bad behavior from other kids to maintain the adult friendships. Certainly you can and should be friendly with parents at your kids' school, but be cautious about considering these people your true friends.

This. So much drama when your "friend circle" is based on your kids, because if the kids don't get along or start drifting apart, the friendships suffer (or the kids do). I'd probably attend a few of these social events just because it's nice to know the parents of your kids' classmates, but I wouldn't be going for the purpose of making a group of friends.

I don't know. I made most of my local friends through my kids pre-school and during the early elementary years. Kids are now in high school and sure the friendships have changed/kids have drifted apart but the adults hang out without our kids, because guess what, they can be left home alone or have their own plans! Don't overthink it. Make friends where you can and deal with the fallout later!

[Anonymous]

Nobody HAS to socialize if they don't care for it. It's bothering you, not her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are going to encourage her to make friends, those friendships should be based on your wife's interests and not based on your kids.

First, unless these kids are all going to elementary school together, these "friendships" are short term. So consider how much it is worth investing in people who you won't stay in touch with.

Also, as a mother who has BTDT, it gets very messy when your friendships are based on your kids friendships and there are falling outs among the kids or your kid is not considered "cool" and is excluded. Then, you are in the position of losing your friends and/or pushing your child to accept bad behavior from other kids to maintain the adult friendships. Certainly you can and should be friendly with parents at your kids' school, but be cautious about considering these people your true friends.

All of this. OP, are you mistaking these friendships for real friendships? Some of them may *become* real friendships, but usually they don't. It's a lot of time invested for a poor return.

You need to focus on meeting your wife's introvert needs for sleep, down time, and alone time, before making your desire to socialize into another chore on her list.

[Anonymous]

I'm not an introvert, yet I was like your wife when our kids when infants and toddlers--I just wanted to hang out with my own family. We drifted a little away from old friends during this period. When the kids were a bit older and life in general gets easier, we're back to socializing more.

This is a season of life. Hanging out with my parents when the kids were little was easy and relaxing, and that's all that I needed or cared about at the time. I didn't need to work at it, and the last thing I needed as a mom of baby/toddler is more work.

[Anonymous]

Read this. I bet your wife didn't like your before-times social life as much as you think. She was probably doing it for your sake, but now with the kid she's no longer willing to cater to you in that way. Because you are a grown man, and frankly a rather clueless one, it seems.

https://www.drpsychmom.com/2017/11/06/introverthighly-sensitive-wife-got-difficult-kids/

If the kid isn't wearing you out, then maybe you aren't doing your share of the parenting.