Couples Retirement 101

Check this cartoonist out. Graham Harrop gets retirement.

The New York Times has a weekly read recommendation that grabbed my attention this week. The article, written by Susan Dominus, entitled These Couples Survived A Lot. Then Came Retirement, was timely.

I think I have been transparent about how Joe and I are faring in our retirement. Dominus’ article perfectly captures some of the same issues we have faced and dealt with, and this feels comforting. We are not alone.

Adjusting to unlimited time together, as opposed to the career and child-rearing years when time together was limited, is a challenge that few are prepared for in retirement years. I thought I was. This is the part where you can laugh aloud for as long as you like.

The NY Times article hypothesizes that relationship problems that existed before retirement become magnified in retirement. I get that. I had a thought while reading the article, with a lot of AHA moments on my own part, that what the article doesn’t talk about are two other factors that come into play during retirement.

One factor is that retirement usually happens when we are over sixty. This means that there can be biological factors at play. Hearing loss is one obstacle I have had to biologically overcome. I am also far less active than Joe, which limits our choices in activities. Joe is very patient with me as I continue to find ways to improve my physical capacity. I appreciate his support.

A second factor is communication styles. Over the years Joe and I communicated fine. Until we were in a car driving around the country in 2023. Talk about magnified issues! I continue to work on improving my communication style. Joe is a literal and linear thinker. He tells me he needs the details. Moving into our new house where everything is stored differently than our old home means I am using more descriptive communication. The Tupperware is in the third drawer on the left-hand side of the kitchen island. He will then give me a blank look. I repeat myself. Another blank look. Then me, losing out to extreme irritation, “The kitchen island is that long counter space in the middle of the room.”  He gets that. He also looks at me like, “Well you could have said that in the first place.”

In his defense, we did not have a kitchen island in the old house.

By now I am feeling very insecure about how to talk to him. Then when we sit down at the end of the day, we communicate simply fine about the day’s news, or how we are feeling, or talking about our children or grandchildren. I recognize that it is experiencing a new situation, for us, that creates the need for a different language during certain interactions. Maybe it has nothing to do with retirement at all.

This realization allows me to be a bit more patient with Joe. We have always had differences in the way we deal with situations. Joe is methodical and a fact-gatherer. I am a fact-gatherer as well; however, my processing speed is much quicker than Joe’s processing speed. I must slow down and remind myself to breathe, while he works out an idea, strategy, or plan. I KNOW his need is reasonable and I try to reign in my impatience with his processing.

I have unpleasant habits to overcome now that I have time on my hands in retirement. I think this is healthy. In fact, I would say that I feel emotionally healthier now that I have time for reflection.