You don't bring it up. People need to figure things out like this for themselves, otherwise it doesn't stick. Create the space for her to figure it out and set the example of you enjoying your hobby.

And unless you like sleeping on the couch, don't bring up not exercising.

People change and evolve. We all go through phases of commitment to hobbies and endeavors outside work and family. That's normal.

Maybe you could find something the two of you could do together?

---

Suffer Well.

You can't change someone who doesn't want to change. Tell her you are concerned that she doesn't do enough for herself, that you want to be sure she is happy, and then support whatever it is that she wants to do. Be prepared to be blamed for the fact (in her mind at least) that she "has to" do all the stuff she is doing because you won't and for it to turn into a fight over that instead. Good luck.

I can relate. Wife wants to work out more but won't really commit to do what it takes, fitting it in between full time work and kid/family stuff. I think it's extremely important to pursue other interests; I would be a miserable fuck if I didn't have my little collection of interests (gym, cigars, baseball, motorcycle, etc.) to retreat to. She's not showing the strain of that hamster wheel routine, yet, but it's not a sustainable way to go about doing business.

I encourage her to do whatever recreational things she expresses interest in. When she brings up the possibility of attending a girls weekend somewhere, I schedule work accordingly so I can handle kid duty while she's gone. She has carte blanche for outside activities, with anyone, anywhere, no questions asked. I know how important that kind of outlet and freedom is for me, so I extend the same to her.

Listen to what she's expressing interest in, or has in the past, and make suggestions for ways to pursue it. It shouldn't be contentious unless you're offering it as a prescription.

---

The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

I'm pretty sure that your concern about a hobby is a symptom and there's something more that this is actually about. That deeper thing bubbling below the surface is what needs to actually be addressed, otherwise it's just going to be a drawn out fight that doesn't address anything of substance. Or maybe you know what that deeper thing is and it's not worth addressing. Whatever it is, can you live with it if it doesn't change?

Ar most, you ask if there is anything she wants to do for herself, and only VERY occasionally.

How old are the kids? That's pretty normal for a spouse to be highly focused on kid stuff, they're needy little beasts. Plus I find that women (gross generalization to follow) tend to talk about work outside of work hours more than men do.

But overall, it's her choice to do what she wants for fun. A regular hobby may not be "fun" for her at this point in her life, especially if the hobby adds stress to her daily life.

---

Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

Could you persuade her to run with you? What about signing up for a 5k or 10k race together? Setting a goal may help to motivate her to get back to running...

Otherwise, what about a book club? Does she have 'girlfriends' with whom she could set up a book club to meet once a month? She could then listen to audio books while walking or running too.

Agree everyone needs a hobby, if your life revolves 100% around kids and work you will be bored when the kids get older. Wife has noticed this with her mom, her life revolved around kids and had no friends other than her sisters, now that she is older she has no hobbies or friends (other than her kids and sisters).

My wife felt like this about 6 months ago after our 2nd kid, she wasn't getting out enough and becoming an isolated homebody, she didn't want to become her mom. She recognized it so she made it a new years resolution to get out more. I do my best to help, I never deny her a chance to get out for a dinner with friends, I will re-arrange my schedule or skip a workout so she can go to the climbing gym. I push her to try new things and take classes (pure barre, yoga, etc.) I also make sure she knows money isn't an issue in her hobbies.

To answer your question, its hard to bring it up, they need to recognize it. I'd be supportive in anything she does, hint going to a happy hour with friends or co-workers. Maybe bring up getting together with old friends, offer to watch the kids or take them away for a day or something.

The best might be to be supportive of things. Generically speaking. "Oh, that sounds fun" etc...

It's not like it's one of those things like "you suck so bad without a hobby that I can't stand you". It's just that I don't want them to slip into that for too long to later realize they invested all their self worth only into our kids.

Yeah, I guess that's par for the course (no offense, an observation in our circle at least) that the ladies talk about that stuff a LOT, and the men pretty much not at all.

For now, I may quietly encourage the gardening thing further. I see a little ray of light there. The other day I wasn't thrilled in my own mind about spending on a bunch of landscaping ground cover stuff but I went with it fully because I could see her interest.

That may be a good one for now. Support that one the best I can.

Yeah, basically don't back down. Encourage a full green house set up in the basement. Let her spend a few hundred on a setup. Look for a gardening club or class in town...look it up yourself and present it to her.

My husband and I sort of went through this, especially when he got back from deployment. I was “doing all the things” family-wise and working full time. Not much time for anything else, and I was always wiped out. What changed it was him telling me he was taking our son to the park, or wherever, so I could do what I wanted. No “offering”, no “asking”. And no expectations whatsoever from him about what I should be doing with the free time. It’s so easy when you’re in the mindset of doing it all to be the martyr, saying “it’s ok.” I’m forever grateful that he took that burden from me - without asking me if I wanted him to, or if I needed him to - so that I could be more of a complete person. We still work on that balance, but it’s much easier now.

I think it boils down to, how can you create space for your wife without putting the burden of asking, or tasking, on her. Or ... maybe she just wants to take a 3-hour bath without a kid barging in asking for a glass of milk!

This is more or less our arrangement as well. We both work our asses off, the last thing we should need to do is justify some R&R time with the spouse. Hobbies and free time are strongly encouraged and supported in our household, and I love that part of our relationship. I feel a lot of my friends need permission from their wife to do anything away from the family unit. It's embarrassing to watch.

For the OP, it sounds like the problem (in your mind) isn't a lack of hobby but a lack of exercise. Some here are saying not to bring it up, but, I disagree. If you can't bring that sort of shit up with your spouse in a constructive way, you have bigger communication problems that need to be addressed.

---

Long Chile was a silly place.

As a working mom this is great advice. Tell her you want to spend Sat Mornings (or whenever) with the kids and plan something fun but not too fun so she knows they are getting quality time (I.e. not sitting on iPads) but doesn’t get FOMO about it. See what she does with three hours and all barriers removed. Maybe the first few weeks she will nap. Let her. She may in your mind “waste” her time- let her. Eventually she will find herself. You can’t find her for her but you can give her the space and support to do it. It’s a hard transition. Text her a fun pic midway so she isn’t worrying.

As others have said its hard to change people, they need to come to that realization.


My only concern is the highlighted above. Is that out of necessity or choice? In essence, is she dropping the other things(hobbies) because she feels like she need to carry the kid/work load herself?
Example of myself recently, I've been dealing with a lot of stress at work. My wife thought she would help out/she had to take on more of the home responsibilities. I saw this going on and her getting stressed and so I started taking back some things. She picked up on this a doubled down(trying to be helpful). This miscommunication on our part lead to some high stress situations between the 2 of us until we talked about it and figured out what was going on.
Maybe she needs your help freeing up some time for hobbies or maybe there is some other issue causing her to just focus only on kids and work.

My wife and I have been having some of the same conversations. She is now play Pokemon Go. Sigh...

Look up motivational interviewing.

 
Another idea is to find something that you both enjoy and can involve the kids in without creating more work for your wife. My wife and I do not share many hobbies. I like CrossFit and cycling, she has a bike but won't ride it and flat out refuses to do CrossFit even though she will happily waste three hours in a normal weight room walking around with an oversized jug of water.

We had a bit of a rough patch 2 years ago and were advised to reconnect on Sundays, which meant we needed to find something to do together. We discovered that we both like hiking, so we went exploring on Sunday afternoons and it was great fun. On one of our hikes it was bloody hot so we hiked to a mountain lake. At that lake we decided a boat was in order so we bought one last year and hit the lake every weekend till Fall. She won't wakeboard, ski, or so anything I deem fun behind the boat, but she loves being out there so we still get some quality time together on the lake.

Maybe a conversation about possible mutual hobbies is in order. Much more fun when neither party feels forced into doing something they don't like.

You are going about this all wrong. Your job as husband is to solve any problem that comes up. So, find a hobby that she should enjoy, and push her into it whether she wants to do it or not.

I was kidding for those who were sharpening their pitch forks.

Something to consider is asking her what she could do if she had several free hours a week to do nothing but think about her wants and needs. As others have suggested, let her do the things that she enjoys.

All of that. I think I tend to push the boundaries a bit more than does she, in that regard, which is why I always make it clear that I wouldn't take liberties that I wouldn't extend to her as well.


That's never a good look. And I think those relationships tend to be more volatile and less suited for the long term. We're very much equals in all the ways that matter, and there's nothing to be gained by one trying to exert control over the other. Jealousy is one of the most self-defeating impulses I've ever experienced. I put it aside years ago and never looked back.

I somewhat regularly get together with people from work, and very often I'm the only guy there. If she wanted to meet up for drinks with a bunch of guys from work, she won't hear a word from me about it.

---

The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

My husband and I have had this conversation a few times. We have a toddler and i am eight months pregnant. We both work. Although he does his best to help around the house and encourages me to get out and do my own thing, I rarely do it. I find working, parenting and managing our household to be exhausting and Now that I’m massively pregnant, pretty much no hobby appeals to me other than napping.

When I wake up on the weekend, I’m not thinking about what fun thing I’ll do but when I’m going to wash the floor and whatever household chores need to be done. Things that never occur to my husband. His pushing that I need to go do something fun was directly interpreted as “I think you’re boring”. Maybe your wife feels the same way?

I understand where you’re coming from, but don’t push her. Just give her space, take the kids out by yourself and see what she chooses to do with her time.

I always ask her before I do anything that is outside of my regularly scheduled programming. I don't "need permission", per se, but I'm also forgetful as hell so I like to doublecheck that I'm not going to miss something that we've already committed to, or that my taking time to do something isn't interfering with her desire to do something else that hasn't been communicated yet. It's not asking permission, it is just treating each other as partners.

---

Swimming Workout of the Day:

Favourite Swim Sets:

2020 National Masters Champion - M50-54 - 50m Butterfly

I agree, and what you describe is different then what I'm talking about. I'm talking about one partner more or less dominating the decision making, scheduling, etc of the other's every waking moment. It's like when you're a kid and you have to ask your friend's mom if "Jimmy can come out to play".

We find ways to accommodate one another.

Last may I took a week long boys trip to Cuba. We talked about it, adjusted our schedules, and made it happen, but she was always pushing me to find a way to make the trip happen and not find excuses to back out and work more. Never once did she guilt me about it, even though she was 7 months pregnant; she took on a lot of extra work around the house to make that trip happen for me.

This weekend, she's meeting some girlfriends for a weekend in Vancouver, her first trip away from the baby. She didn't just announce that she was going, again we talked and worked it out, I used a ton of my points to fly her so her trip over is 20 min instead of 4 hours on the ferry, and arranged work around the trip so she wouldn't have to rush home. I'm going to hire a cleaner so she comes home to a spotless house and can just relax and not feel guilty about going.

The difference with some of my friends is it seems like those negotiations are more combative and less "how can we make this work" and more "plead your case and maybe I'll allow it".

---

Long Chile was a silly place.

Had you said she spent all her time on the internet obsessing over Donald Trump I would have thought you were married to Kay Serrar.

As for your wife, maybe her "hobby" is your kids. Some people like raising kids, I have a couple sisters who were the same way. Once the kids were in HS they both found ways to spend their time which made them happy.

This.

No deployments, but my husband works long/unpredictable hours and the bulk of house/kids/life falls on me (and I have my own full time stressful job).

Having a hobby is great, finding the energy to have a hobby is overwhelming/exhausting.

I hate that my husband asks, "what do you want me to do?". It should be obvious that the kitchen is a mess, there's laundry to be put away and toys to be tidied up. I desperately don't want one more person to manage/direct. Find a task and do it. Take the kids with you when you run errands - this one is a double win.

 But I feel like my <90% of the people i know> focuses too much on only work and/or kid stuff. It dominates 99% of all her conversation topics. You have to have an outlet for yourself and to blow off steam.

I am amazed at how little some people have going on. I have a friend who literally only talks about politics related to his kids 10 year old sports teams. Who's on this team, what parent said X, did Joey start the game. omg, it drives me crazy.

---

----
Don't hold back