When Work Ends, Who Will You Spend Your Time With?
Relationships in Retirement
When you imagine retirement, who do you see yourself spending your time with?
Your spouse? Your children and/or grandchildren? Friends? Or perhaps… yourself?
For many of us, retirement brings a surprising realization. We spend years imagining what we’ll do when we finally have more time. We’ll travel. Take up hobbies. Relax.Volunteer. Finally get around to all those things we’ve been putting off.
Retirement changes more than how we spend our days. It can change our relationships too.
But we don’t always spend as much time thinking about who will be there with us.
And sometimes, that question becomes much more important than we expected.
Changing Social Networks
One of the biggest changes that can happen when we leave work behind is a transformation in our social network. After spending decades in meetings, conversations, and working with colleagues to achieve common goals, that may be the first shift that we notice when we no longer have a place to go on a Monday morning. The social activities, lunch dates and coffee breaks are no longer convenient and sort of fade away. Relationships in retirement do not look the same.
This is not a “good” versus “bad” statement – it does not mean that anyone has done anything wrong or that those relationships weren’t meaningful. Many of our former colleagues may still be working or have found themselves taking a different direction once they retired – the once timely opportunities are simply no longer present. It’s a natural evolution.
And sometimes, we don’t realize how much of our social life was connected to work until work is gone.
Our Children Grow Up and Move Into Their Own Lives
The same thing happens in our relationships with our children (and nieces and nephews) as they become adults and begin forging their own paths. I remember a conversation with a lady about 25 years ago where she said that our children are only ours for about 20 years. At the time, I was shocked by the comment and a little saddened by it.
As life evolves, that’s exactly what happens whether we are ready for it or not. The lives of our adult children become their own time consuming efforts (just like ours did!). As the parents of adult children, we play less of a hands-on role.
If this sounds familiar – Congratulations! That means that you’ve raised independent people. Cue “Cats in the Cradle“….
The adjustment can still be difficult, though.
The most challenging change for me personally has been missing the regular presence of my own children. I have to admit that I was a little in denial for a spell as I expected them to make more an effort – as if it was all on them. But this lack of self-awareness eventually gave way to two realizations:
- My children are responsible for their own lives and have the right (and responsibility) to determine how they spend their time and with whom.
- I have a life to live as well and when I try to make myself available for anything that comes up for them (like a standby “problem fixer”) then I am not living my own life.
Marriages can change in retirement too
Suddenly having my husband around, and doing his own thing more often, was another adjustment. Especially considering that we were separated for five years and saw little of each other during the first two of those.
I was semi-retired and actively working as a coach when he began his own retirement 2 years ago. Unexpectedly hearing the sounds of his electric guitar blaring through the amplifier as I was in a Zoom call in my home office was not always welcomed or convenient. (I’ve learned to give him a heads up when I’ve got something scheduled.)
For us, we spend a lot together AND we are pretty independent with our own interests and pursuits which works beautifully. I still have many things that I want to do as does he. (For instance, he recently played a “once-in-a-lifetime” golf course while I practiced some watercolour techniques.)
Because retirement doesn’t mean becoming one person with one calendar and one set of interests.
Life Does Not Stop at Retirement
We’re NOT DONE YET!
And this is where I think retirement can become incredibly liberating. Yes, some relationships change and people may drift away. Our children become busy with their own lives and our work friends may no longer be part of our everyday routine.
And sometimes we experience losses that change our world in ways we never expected. I’ve just experienced a wonderful summer filled with visits with friends and family and I still wasn’t able to fit everyone in. In a bittersweet turn of events, losing both my mother and mother-in-law this year has also opened up time and space that I hadn’t expected (or really wanted).
Life changes and, with it, our relationships and calendars change. Retirement gives us an opportunity to ask a question we may not have had time to ask while we were busy building careers and raising families:
Who do I actually want to spend my time with now?
How much time do we spend with other people?
In general, as we move through different stages of our lives, we spend time with different humans and the statistics confirm those changes. Sahil Bloom offers some thought provoking graphics in his 2025 book “The 5 Types of Wealth” He presents statistics that relate the average time per day spent with others versus our age in life. (The statistics were pulled from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and I think that they offer a good baseline.)
Stretches spent with the family, that we are born into, drops from about 4.5 hours/day at 15 years of age to about 1 hour daily by the time we reach our late 20s. After that, it hovers around an hour per day for the rest of our lives.
In my case, I left home for university at 18 and returned for holidays and summers. My first full-time job took me almost 300 kilometres away and then a transfer added another 1200 kms to the distance. Visits became shorter and more infrequent as I married and started a family.
Time spent with our children peaks when we are raising them, and then declines to roughly 1 hour per day by our late 50s. We see that, on average, time with friends actually peaks around the age of 18 and then dips to just under an hour a day for the rest of our lives.
Conversely, time spent with a partner increases, as does time spent alone, over our lifetime. For the latter category, it increases to almost 9 hours per day by the time we reach 85 years old.
So – it makes sense to enter retirement liking both ourselves and our spouses!
So, you have this time now – who do you spend it with?
Who are you spending your time with now? Sometimes the people bring the activity and, at other times, the activity brings the people. This is worth thinking about intentionally.
Consider:
Where do your favourite people live?
What does your role as part time babysitter for grandchildren look like?
Who, in your circle, practices the same activities as you (travel, run or refinish furniture)?
What hobbies do you love to do by yourself, and truly enjoy?
Which of your people are helping you advance your purpose in retirement?
How do you feel about fishing?
Feeling stuck? Not sure how to build and strengthen your social network?
Do you have a great social network but something is missing? If you are feeling a little bored or lonely, it may be time to re-focus on an existing relationship, reconnect with friends from your past or meet new ones through a common interest. Here are a few prompts to get you thinking about one thing that you can start with:
What qualities do you value most in a friend?
What do you consider a “perfect date” with your significant other?
How can you include a friend in your latest interest?
Who is the one person that you miss talking with?
Would you be friends with you?
You’re Not Done Yet
If you’re within a few years of retirement, or you’ve already left work and your calendar looks empty, you are not alone.
Work, and our stages of life, gave us the opportunity to be around a variety of people. That proximity was instrumental in building friendships. Retirement creates different opportunities: chances to develop relationships through family, friends, neighbours and voluntary activities.
I see this reflected in my own life. I spend more time with my husband than anyone else now. And my frequent contacts now are most likely to be people that I took courses with post-retirement and neighbours that I met while dog walking. My volunteer activities bring more people into my circle..
Together, in Remarkable Retirement, we explore your values, identity, purpose, resilience, relationships and what matters most to you now, so that retirement becomes more than an end to your working life.
It becomes the beginning of a chapter that feels meaningful, intentional and unmistakably yours.
If your career has ended but you know you’re not done contributing, creating, growing or experiencing life, I’d love to help you explore what’s next.
👉 Explore Remarkable Retirement or book a conversation with me to see whether it’s the right fit for where you are right now.
You don’t have to have your people figured out right now.
You just need to be ready to begin.