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u/gee-man-1961
My (51M) wife (47F) is a workaholic and she has been since I met her and this is something I love about her. She has a job that will and does take as much time as she’ll give it and she does because she’s passionate about it. I frequently have to remind her to take breaks so she doesn’t burn out, get enough sleep, etc. We’ve been together about five years and I love our relationship. She has a friend - by which I mean she has ONE friend. She is very close with her team at work but in terms of friends, she doesn’t have any, male or female, that she sees outside of work. The entire time I’ve known her, it’s been like this.
This friend (57F) is also a professional contact but they started hanging out outside of work. I’m really happy she has a friend because I think everyone should have friends in addition to their SOs. The amount of time she spends with this friend keeps increasing exponentially. She texts her friend at all hours of the day and night. I’m sober and my wife loves wine so she and her friend took a weekend trip to Napa. The friend lives a lot closer to their work and my wife stays over at her friend’s condo once or twice a week - sometimes three times - after they have dinner so that my wife isn’t driving home so late at night.
Is this a lot of time to spend with a friend? My wife grew up with brothers and always told me she struggled to make friendships with women, so is she just really excited about this friendship and is going in really hard? Does it just seem like a lot because she spent so much of our relationship not spending time with any friends? Maybe over time it will even out. Her friend is single so maybe it’s just because she’s free from other relationships and has the availability. But the friend also has a very demanding job, so I just feel surprised that they both are able to make so much time for hanging out. Maybe I’m feeling a little insecure because she never detached that much from work to spend time with me even when we were first dating or first married. The trip to Napa with her friend was the first time she took PTO for something not family-related in four years. I’m genuinely happy that she has a friend and I genuinely love our relationship and I didn’t feel like we didn’t spend enough time together but now I kind of wish she and I spent more time together too. Maybe I should just tell her I want more together time. I absolutely don’t want her to stop spending time with her friend but I just can’t shake it that it feels like a little much. I don’t even have the words to talk to my wife about it because I don’t want to sound jealous (because even if I am a little, that’s my problem, not hers).
Anyway… am I overreacting? Should I talk to my wife? Should I just let it go?