Speaking of marriages and divorce and relationships in general. How much is too much time spent together?
I’ve have guy friends I have been friends with for about 17 years. Since high school. We’re still the best of buddies. We have disagreements and arguments and good times together. But we also don’t see each other every single day. We don’t call each other every night. Nor do we tell each other who we are allowed and not allowed to hang out with and when. As a result, we’ve been best friends for all those years.
In contrast, my longest relationship was about 6 years. The last three of which felt like a ghost of a relationship. We were bored with each other. We saw each other every day, knew everything about each other and what the other one was doing. Everything was locked down. I felt like I couldn’t even glance at another woman on the street without getting the stink eye.
We ended up in divorce and it was a relief.
Yet we continue to put ourselves into these kinds of relationships. They end up becoming more work than pleasure because of what is expected of us. Those expectations become burdons after a while and eventually we snap and the relationship ends. It doesn’t matter how good we were, that we never cheated or never lied. We lost the passion because we over saturated ourselves with each other. Like eating the same meal every night. Eventually, no matter how much work you put into trying to enjoy it, you lose the taste for it.
“Even lovers need a holiday” – Peter Cetera (Chicago)
But is a holiday enough? Or even a girls/guys night once a week? That still leaves six days of the same thing over and over again broken up only by a day or so here and there. In contrast I’ve gone weeks or ever months between seeing my best friends. We may talk once every week or two. But when we get back together it’s as if there was no gap in time at all. Perhaps this is too long for a relationship, but where is the happy medium?
What is too much and too little time spent together?
Those are good questions, and I think it depends a lot on the people involved. Generally, I have found that if we both have our own set of interests and activities, and our own groups of friends, we don’t get tired of each other nearly as quickly. But if I am the only one who has interests and activities outside of the relationships, or if all our friends are the same friends…
I’m bored.
It all depends on how much time you spend together. You and your best friends still get along great because you don’t see each other all the time. With relationships, it is way harder because you’re expected to be with each other most of the time.
hmm….that’s probably why I have a new bf about every year. I expect more and get bored. each new man that I’m with is infinitely better than the previous though, so I’m okay with the upgrade
but after the breakup, the guy that I thought was better, wasn’t, and the next new guy is who I put on a pedestal. it is sort of like the trendiest new phone; you bought what you thought was hot, then the next new and better version comes out and the phone you have seems rather boring and not that good, but you have gotten used to the functions of the phone and developed a bond with it, so it is difficult to let go
hmm. good quesion. I’ll go with optical noise’s answer. it depends on the person. My marriage, while it’s not over, was 20 years with the same person. While this is not the place to say why it ended, I can definitely say it lasted so long in part because for almost all of it we had our own lifes — business trips, sports, interests, and much time apart. We were not stuck together at the hips, so to speak. And that was healthy. When we were together (the good years) it felt good & right…but still nowhere near 24/7.I have often wondered why dating sites, like match.com, try to “match” people by the more similar interests they have.Feels like hogwash to me, lol. I like it that my current bf is surfing while I am horse back riding. The thought of us both doing everything together feels a little “sickening!”
I think you just have to feel it out. My boyfriend and I lived together for the last year, almost exactly a year, and while we didn’t spend a lot of time together we were always in the same space and it kind of drove us crazy. If we saw each other less but spent more quality time together… well, anyways that is what we’re trying to do now. I think it’s good to create distance to remind each other why it is that you like each other. To leave room for some ‘wanting’ and ‘missing’. This would have been possible if I’d been working as many hours as him, or if one of us left the country or something I think… but our lives didn’t really work like that.
Well I do not know what to tell you everyone needs space but I not knew boredom with my husband at all. I will ask my mother but they seem to enjoy each other company….
Yep you need to talk to those who have done it. with 60+% of all first time marriages lasting until of them dies you need to hear from the majority who seem to succeed. The minority who fail tend to be overly vocal and there advice is likely not the best. I can’t help because I have only been married 4 years, of course we still find each other exciting
I agree with optical noise.
time spent apart is very good for relationships. trust me, i know from experience. longest relationship 11.5 years and counting.
i don’t spend too much time with my friends.. the little that i have. friends are always there even if you’re not. some supernatural shit. earth is a very busy place and i always try to make time to spend quality time with my friends. they’re all i got, cause my family just don’t get it.
my husband is in the military…. lets just say the days he is away its a nice break and it keeps us interested and then we have stuff to talk about…. time apart is def a plus in this relationship…been together since late ’04 things are only getting better…
GREAT QUESTION! My answer. See very little of each other so that when you do see each other it is HOT and PASSIONATE!
@opticalnoise – I think you are right about that.
Provoking (totally spelled that wrong didnt i?) questions you have there my friend…
It depends on personalities I think. I like to spend as much time as I can with my husband…mainly because that fits my personality and the time we spent apart due to the military (well over 50 months in total) has caused me to treasure every moment we have. He likes a bit more space…but we work things out. It just depends on the couple.
I’ve never been bored. Been married over five years now.