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This is the first sunrise of the New Millennium.
Don’t
Spook the Spouse
We tend to think of retirement as a personal thing
and our initial thoughts can easily overlook the impact on our spouse.
Almost everyone will have discussed their retirement with their spouse and
included them in the various aspects of planning. It is easy to believe
that if you have been married for decades that you relationship is in a
stable equilibrium. However the spouse might be wary, but not be able to
pinpoint the source of concern. In some cases it could be a stressful
transition for them. In the following paragraphs I'll examine some specific
situations.
Historically the man worked outside the home and the wife took care of the
home and children. The wife is the chief domestic officer, the home is her
domain and she has be used to have autonomy there. After her husband
retires it might seem to her that he is invading her turf. Just the fact
that he is there puts demands on her. She can easily feel he is in the way.
Does she have to make him lunch? Does she have to tell him where she is
going whenever she leaves the house. Does she have to cleanup after him?
Will he get more involved in domestic decision making? The husband has much
more available time and he might very easily be used to participating in
discussions related to decisions. He can very easily get in the way and
feel resentful that his presents is resented. Another source of potential
conflict is the wife feels that since the husband is now retired he should
do a larger share of the work around the house -- laundry, dishes, and
cleaning, all things almost no one likes to do.
Another situation can occur when one person retires and the other doesn't.
The non-retiring person can very easily feel a substantially increased
burden for providing financial support. These feeling in my experience are
more bases in perceived effort than in actual financial numbers. The
retiring person may receive more in pension that the working person earns,
but the working person will still resent that they need to go to work every
day while the retiree "lounges around in their underwear watching soap
operas". Another stress from this situation is that the retired person
is free to travel or do other activities that the working person is
prohibited from doing because of work. If the retired person wants to
travel how should they deal with the constraint of their spouse's work.
This is an occasion for reverse resentment.
Another possible conflict in our society where work and employment is
strongly perceived to be related to a person’s value. The spouse may feel
the retiree has less value now that he doesn't "do anything". Or
perhaps worse if the retiree has a sense of lost value, he may project
these feelings onto his spouse whether she actually feels them or not.
When I retired I told my wife that I would still leave the
house about the same time every day and return maybe a little earlier in
the evening. I also agreed to be responsible for dinner once a week. I
highly suggest a proactive approach to spousal relationships. In a
carefully measured way place emphasis on the most positive benefits to the
spouse of retirement. And finally the most important thing you can do is to
"clean up your own messes".
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