My partner and I have been retired for a long time now, and we have finally adjusted well to sharing this stage of life. I enjoy that. There is something lovely about being able to spend time together without having to squeeze it around work.
But it took time. Knowing each other well didn’t mean we automatically knew how to share all those extra hours. We still had our own interests, preferences and ideas about how a day should unfold. Retirement gave us more freedom, but it also gave us more opportunities to discover that we weren’t always planning to use it in the same way.
I suspect this is an adjustment that doesn’t get much attention when we’re preparing to retire. We think about finances, travel and what we might do with our time. We may be looking forward to having more time with our partner. We don’t necessarily think about how much of that time we want to share, or what happens when one person’s idea of a good day looks rather different from the other’s.
Having found a rhythm that works for us, I can look back with a bit more perspective. We all need our own space at times. Understanding that, and making room for it, can take some getting used to.
You can share a life without sharing a timetable
During our working years, much of the day was already spoken for. There were places to be, responsibilities to attend to and routines built around them. Even when work was demanding, it provided a framework. We didn’t have to negotiate every available hour because there weren’t that many of them.
Retirement changes that. Suddenly, there may be a whole morning ahead of you, and two perfectly reasonable ideas about what to do with it.
One person might like making a plan. They want to know whether they’re going out, roughly when, and what else they can fit around it. The other might prefer to have breakfast and see what they feel like doing afterwards. Neither approach sounds particularly troublesome until you’re trying to organise the same day.
Then a simple outing can involve rather more discussion than expected. Apparently, having shared a life doesn’t guarantee agreement about what constitutes being ready to leave the house.
These differences can be easy to take personally. A preference for planning may feel like being organised by someone else. A preference for spontaneity may feel like being left waiting. Yet sometimes the disagreement is simply about how each person likes to use their time.
Being at home doesn’t always mean being available
I still write, create courses and make YouTube videos. I enjoy having something to work on, something I’m thinking about and trying to articulate. Retirement hasn’t removed my wish to concentrate on things that matter to me.
That can be an interesting adjustment when both people are at home. Physical presence is easy to mistake for availability. If someone is sitting a few metres away, it seems natural to ask a question or start a conversation. Personally, I prefer having a separate space to do my work and projects. I get absorbed in what I am doing and then love taking a break with my partner if he is around and avaiable.
I know how much I value time to stay with a thought. I also know that another person can’t necessarily tell when I need that time. Being familiar with each other doesn’t give us access to everything going on in each other’s heads.
There is a special type of kindness in saying what we need. It gives the other person something clear to respond to, instead of leaving them to work out why an innocent question has received a distracted answer or no answer at all.
Sometimes we just want some time to ourselves
I’ve always valued time to think and reflect. Writing and journaling are part of that, but sometimes I simply want to walk or be quiet. I don’t always want to talk through what I’m thinking about as I’m thinking it.
I imagine many people recognise this, although we can feel oddly uncomfortable admitting it within a relationship. We worry that wanting to be alone will sound hurtful, particularly when retirement was supposed to give us more time together.
But wanting an hour to yourself doesn’t mean you’re unhappy with your partner. It may mean you would like an hour to yourself. We can make that much more complicated than it needs to be.
Space doesn’t have to involve separate holidays or elaborate arrangements. It might be a walk,a bike ride, an afternoon spent on different interests, or the freedom to sit in another room without being asked whether something is wrong. Sometimes we want to be alone even when nothing is bothering us.
I think there is real comfort in reaching a stage where this can be understood without either person feeling they need to defend it. You can enjoy each other’s company and feel equally comfortable doing something separately.
It helps to make fewer assumptions
One of the tricky things about a long relationship is how much we assume we already understand. We know each other’s habits. We’ve made countless decisions together. Surely we shouldn’t have to explain what we mean by a quiet morning or a day out?
Yet retirement can change the circumstances around familiar habits. Something that was easy to accommodate when we had separate working days may become more noticeable when we’re together much more often.
There’s no need to turn breakfast into a planning meeting. Most of us have attended enough of those. But a little clarity can prevent one person from waiting for a shared activity the other didn’t realise had been arranged.
It also leaves room for an invitation to be an invitation. Suggesting a walk together doesn’t have to mean the other person is obliged to come. Declining it doesn’t have to become a comment on the relationship. There can be another walk, another conversation, another opportunity later in the day.
Adjusting takes time, even when you know each other well
Looking back, I’m glad we gave ourselves time to adjust. We have found a way of sharing retirement that works well for us, but I wouldn’t want to imply that it happened simply because we’d known each other for years.
There is something new to learn when the pattern of daily life changes. You may discover preferences you hadn’t noticed before. You may find that you need more time alone than you expected, or that you would like more shared time than your partner had imagined.
Those things deserve a conversation. If one person is feeling lonely while the other is enjoying independence, it helps to understand that too. Making room for separate interests also means paying attention to the time you both want to spend together.
And what works can change. Travel, family commitments, health and new interests can all alter the pattern. Finding a good rhythm doesn’t mean there will never be anything else to discuss.
There is room for both of us
These days, I appreciate how well we’ve adjusted. I can enjoy the time my partner and I share while recognising the value of having some time to ourselves. It feels good to have reached that point.
If you’re still finding your way through this adjustment, I wouldn’t assume that difficulty means you’ve got retirement wrong. Sharing more of the day can take some learning, however long you’ve been together.
It may help to begin with something small: say what you’d like to do tomorrow, ask what your partner has in mind, and see where those plans fit together. There may be things to share and things you each want to do separately.
After all, you’ve both retired. Both of you should have some say in how you spend your days. And sometimes, having a little time to yourself means you can come back and enjoy being together all the more.
