I want to hike the AT and/or the PCT someday.

I just really do not want to leave my wonderful lady behind for six months. And she just doesn't want to walk 2200-2400 miles with me -- at least not yet .

I suppose I should man up and just go...

I'm not sure I want do that.

So, my question is, how do those of you who are married leave your S/O home for multi-week trips? Does it make a difference if you're married vs. engaged vs. dating? Have you ever declined to go on a trip (or put it off indefinitely) because you didn't want to be away from home that long?

Note: I think this has wider application than thru-hiking one of the long trails. For instance, you could be hiking two or three shorter trails over, say, six to eight weeks, or perhaps doing a significant chunk of the AT or CDT or PCT.

I have been the one leaving, and the one left. It definitely is easier before and after you have children.

My first husband and I worked separate NOLS courses for several years, before children, and it really was no problem for us. Each of us was qualifed to be a course leader which meant we made lots more if we worked separately. Neither of us wanted to take a "demotion" to work as a lower level staff just in order to be together.

Then we had a child. He left for Alaska for three months. I stayed home. It was tolerable, but not great. Problem was that we both were scheduled for the climb of Denali and set up of the new Alaska branch, so not only was I alone I felt I bore the brunt of us deciding to have a child because I had to forgo a real goal of mine, and he did not.

Then a year later, we were broke again, and the best option for making money was for us both to be course leaders on separate NOLS courses. My mom kept our daughter. I missed my baby more than my husband!

You will note "ex-husband". However, we did not divorce because of these times apart. Each time we were apart we really agreed to it. That is the key. Had I known what parenting a baby was all about, I probably would have not agreed for him to go to Alaska for three months. But a deal is a deal, and I was not blaming him because it was more of a job than I had expected.

Our "apartness" was always due to needing a job to make a living. I think that is easier to understand then someones desire to be gone just for recreation.

Scroll forward 30 years. My current husband knew very well when we met that I would be gone to the mountains for long periods. Three years ago I left for 2 months to backpack in the Wind Rivers. Two years ago I did Roper's High Route for 35 days and he joined me on one 10-day strech. This summer I am going to Wyoming again for at least 40-50 days, alone. He has a lot of interests and activities and work he enjoys. His sons and grandkids are closeby. I also do a lot of 2-week trips to visit my aging mother and grandkids in Colorado. For me, being apart is a LOT easier when you get older. I at least, am not as "needy" as I was at 20 years old.

With today's technology, unlike in the past when being out in the mountains really meant no communication for a month, now you can send text messages and even write a journal while on a trip. Since you will be resupplying, why not have her join you on a few stretches. Yes, it will slow you down, but in the big picture is it that critical?

I think you need to both really agree on it. Then, when it is her turn, for whatever she wants to do, you have to "give back" that freedom that she gave you.

Just do it before you have kid! Or stay in shape and do it when you are old.

Hmm I can relate to this topic. I am looking at retireing in six years at age 54. My wife and I have been married for thirty years this Sept! I took backpacking back up after my Pops death 3 years ago! He and I backpacked together. I want to tru hike the at as well. My wife would like to but knows she cant and it isnt for her, She knows Iwant to when I retire.
For now I am starting a section hike. My oldest son and I are doing Georgia section of the trail this spring. I think being away from my wife is the hardest part of a trip for myself. I have spent allot of weekends fishing up North etc over the years. I am not sure when the time comes I will be able to hit the trail for that long a time. I am sure she will rondevue as much as possible. Will that just make more difficult to finish? Time will tell. Better to try and fail, than to never try at all!
If it comes down to trail or wife? Goodbye trail!

I am not in you situation but offer this as a thought, not sure if it is a good idea or not.

Could the SO drive a support vehicle for at least portions of the trip so there is a feeling of doing the hike together, even if both aren't hiking together?

Good post, and something I've been thinking about as well. I have this nagging desire to do the AT some day, but now that I'm in a serious relationship, it definitely feels like it would be more difficult to actually make it happen. It will be a few years for me anyway, as I would have to finish my residency and PhD first, I suppose!

There's more than one significant variable here, and I think it perilous to generalize any one persons experience. But perhaps reading about various peoples experience at this can help give a sense for the different ways such a separation can go.

As mentioned before, age and "life situation" is certainly significant, whether children are involved, the level and type of commitment between the temporarily split couple. And just how solid the relationship is, and how comfortable the "left behind" person is in managing the various day-to-day aspects of life. For this latter issue, I figure the upside is that should I die first, my wife has had a good deal of practice at soldiering on without me! :-)

I have a friend who for some years had literally never spent a night apart from his wife, and the prospect seemed daunting to them both. In contrast, I've done three thru-hikes now, for the most part without my wife involved, though she did train and join me for stretches on two of them, and visited me mid-way on the third. These "reconnect" times were certainly helpful. But we've been married for over 30 years, and our "relationship" is pretty darned stable --- kids are grown, we still like each other quite well (!), but can make do on our own for extended periods. Just makes us appreciate what we have when we're back together.

All that said, I speculate that I won't do any more multi-month solo trips, but rather do a combination of shorter (up to a month or so perhaps) trips and trips that she and I do together.

I've known various folks that leave a S.O. at home while they thru-hike. Relationship stresses is certainly one thing that can derail a thru-hike, so I guess in general I mostly know about success stories. It's certainly more about the attitude and expectations of the person left at home, though certainly some long distance hikers find themselves more homesick than anticipated.

I might add that nobody know for sure what their reaction will be until the event occurs. A few years ago, I had a lifetime opportunity - join a caving group for a month of exploration in China (all expenses paid). I immediately asked my wife, standing at my side, if this was OK. She promptly said "yes." Off I went.

I returned to a spouse with a different attitude. She had spent the time mothering a one year old, and doing little else. While she wa happy to be a mother, she also had an exploratory side and also would have loved going caving (that was how we spent our honeymoon). We adjusted and got things back to normal, but I rarely bring up my dream trip to China in conversation.....

Like everything else in a relationship, you must work through these things as a team.

Yes, of course! But it is not that simple as it depends on your relationship. And it is much easier on everyone if there are no kids. Once I left on a 2 week surf trip to the tip of Baja when we had two young ones. We talked and talked and everything looked good. I got back from a GREAT trip and as soon as I pulled up I was getting hammered by my better half; turns out she was sick the whole time she is such a worry wort. She must have yelled at me for a good 60 minutes (while I was going over tube rides, great food, and great people I met along the way in my head. Come to think of it, that's probably why she yelled for so long :D). Over the years she has gotten used to being left behind to where she is now very supportive of my adventures. It helps that I have the SPOT and check in at least once a day. I keep her as involved in my treks as much as possible so that she is part of the team. I think this helps the most.

All that said, a 3 week plus trip is out at this point. That is more than she can handle. Its got to be 2 weeks or less. I am not willing to put our relationship under that much stress to do one of the big three (AT, PCT, or CDT) even though I would love to. It's just not going to happen. I have to settle for "lesser" adventures.

So, Barefoot Friar, you may need to use that least used of all male skills, sensitivity, to figure this out. May the force be with you!

I got nothing for you at all, but I think the responses are great.

Ironically, I do have a daughter who's boyfriend has the hankering to take big trips and she's having to deal with this same thing right now. He just got back from a month in New Zealand, wants to do a NOLS course this summer, and talks about the Himalayas after that.

I think I'll ask them to read this thread

Wow, lots of great responses. Thanks.

I am a bit two-minded about all this. On the one hand, backpacking is as much a part of me as my vocation is. Backpacking is one of my three passions. And ordinarily she has no problem with me going on short trips; I am going out with my youngest brother for four days in March and she's good with that. So looking at it from that perspective, I think that this is a dream of mine that stems from something about which I am passionate, and therefore I should be able to pursue it.

On the other hand, she is very important to me, moreso than my backpacking adventures, and I choose to give up some things I want in order to be with her. She has chosen to give up going to graduate school in Washington, DC in order to be with me. Neither one of us demanded that of the other; it was just a natural extension of being in love. As a matter of fact, I offered to move up there with her if she wanted me to, and she declined.

I hate being in long-distance relationships. Been there, done that... didn't end well. And I'm not sure how feasible it would be for her to meet me at various stages of the trip, especially if I were doing the PCT or the northern part of the AT. I'm certain she'd be great at mailing stuff to me as I needed it, keeping up with my money, etc. And I think she would be brave enough to NOT call in the cavalry if I didn't call her right when I said I would, but would wait until the agreed-upon time, etc. (You know, contengency plans.)

But even more than me missing her, I think she would miss me more. Gives me warm fuzzies to think that someone actually loves me that much. I know myself well enough to know that I'd think about her an awful lot, but I could cope and focus on the hike and be successful. I'm just like that. But I don't know about her.

I guess I'm just saying that I don't want to be apart from her for more than a couple weeks right now. And that's ok. It's where we are in our relationship. Later, maybe. But I'm still intensely curious about what others' experiences are, which is why I asked.

Life is all about tradeoffs and choices - on both sides of a relationship. There is more to the adventurous outdoors than hiking the long trails. Consider a more intense, shorter trip like a mountain summit or a challenging cave trip; or backpacking through any number of extensive wilderness areas for a week or so.

I suspect that more many of us, a break of about a week is fairly easy to handle on both sides. Stretching beyond that can get dicey.

Whether or not you have children, when you get married you sign a document indicating your intention to take care of your spouse, to have and to hold - yeh yeh; so then not holding them afterward is marriage fraud (reason enough for a marriage anullment). My experience with climbers is that you either marry a wife or marry your hobby. It is unfair to make someone who loves you sit alone (unheld by you) while you wander off to fulfill a dream.

I DO believe that it is a spouses job to see to it that their spouse flourishes and to encourage change and to accept change, but abandonment is a good reason for divorce, especially if you are doing something that the awaiting spouse considers dangerous enough that you might not return.

Short trips of course are different, but I think most marriages are gonna be slight jerked by one member being gone over 2 weeks, unless of course its to make lots of money.

Good luck
Jim

I grew up in a military family. My dad was gone for extended periods of time-sometimes as much as 3-6 months due to his work. Military familes get used to that, it's part of the deal. Our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan are deployed over and over for months at a time in combat. My dad wasn't in combat, just on temporary assignment, so we didn't have the added stress of worrying about him getting killed in combat. During Viet Nam, troops served for a year over there without the convenience of the Internet or Skype which today's troops often have. Their families often had no idea what was happening to them for extended periods of time. Modern communications make it much easier, regardless of the reason, be it military or civilian work, such as business or government service.

I don't have any real advice except this-if you can't figure out whether or not it's okay for you to go, it isn't.

Jim- your viewpoint is a bit dated. I think it is mainly a matter of how open you were about your intent when you marry. I happen to personally know a very successful world-class climber who's wife was the one who told him to quit is job and climb professionally. He did extensive Himilayan climbing being gone for months. They are still together, raised three children, and are very happy. I personally do not need my husband to take care of me. I did it fine alone for many years before we met. If he wanted to go off on a 3-month archery hunting marathon, something I do not wish to do, that would be fine with me. I think each couple has a unique view on what "togetherness" should be. My view certainly has changed over my lifetime. My husband and I are both very self-sufficient, both of us somewhat being loners and introverts. Honestly, we have both had failed relationships in the past because they were too clingy and required too much drama. I just do not think you can generalize.

Every marriage is different so I'll just speak for me. If my wife & I were together 24/7, we'd probably wouldn't be very happy together. We are two different people who have enough different interest that if we didn't let each other go every now and then to do our own thing, we probably wouldn't grow very much as individuals. Sure it puts a strain on things at time, but it can actually strengthen things as well. Its really hard for me when my wife goes of on her retreats but it wouldn’t be right for me to hold her back from her passion just as it wouldn't be right for her holding me back from mine. Leaving my wife and kids behind for 3 weeks of backpacking was a tough choice for both me and my wife. But having that time away from each other actually helped us appreciate each other even more. As for the kids, that was a tough one as well. Yes, I missed and worried about the kids, and they missed and worried about me, but isn't that one of the tougher lessons in life we all need from time to time to develop at least some kind of independence. Obviously 3-6 months would be a lot harder, but we all have to live out our dreams if possible and if that means hiking 3000 miles to do it, one should try to find a way. A supporting spouse is part of a marriage that gets swept aside way to often. Some would call it “give and take”, or “give and receive”, why not just call it “letting each other fly”.
And then there's the reunions, the joy of rediscovering each other, the reminders of why we are together and why we need our space and to respect the space of others.

P.S. Having a dozen roses delivered to my wife and kids was very well received. And finding a few letters hidden deep in my pack was very well worth the added weight. Ok, so I cried..

Extended absences pose a problem for couples. How they go about resolving that problem and dealing with their feelings will either strengthen or weaken the relationship. You always face problems and what is important for the relationship is how you go about dealing with them. There is no pat answer.

I often left unexpectedly (for relatively short periods) on SAR operations. This helped demolish one relationship, but it strengthened others.

A bit?

Relationships are made or broken by the mindset(s) of the people involved - if both parties are accepting of the distance and can come to an agreement over communication and safety, and contingencies ("if you or one of the kids gets hurt I'm coming home for sure") there's no reason a long backpacking trip can't work for them. There's always the risk that the separation will have unintended results, of course. But there are plenty of other circumstances that can damage relationships. The initial hurdle is for the non-backpacking spouse to understand that the desire for a long trip is not a reflection on the relationship. Unless, of course, it is - in which case there are deeper problems afoot that aren't being addressed, that have nothing to do with backpacking.

I go out on short trips with a few retired gentlemen from time to time whose wives are grateful that they are with my group - even a short trip is intimidating for some spouses. Perhaps a test trip longer than a weekend (5-7 days) would help answer questions before the Big One.

While I don't disagree with either of your comments or observations, I disagree that Jim's are dated.

My 26 year old daughter is struggling with this right now too, and a big part of the reason is she wants to be "Held". She's a strong, confident young woman who's a manager at a local retail store with three men working under her, but she wants a partner that will be there with her most of the time, not someone who's going to be chasing their dreams for months on end, year after year.

That isn't old fashion or an out of date attitude. That's still normal and isn't likely to ever change.

I think I do have some advice for the OP now...

Look around you, true love is not that easy to find.

At 53, my wife and our kids are my closest friends. You'll be my age sooner than you think, you might want to consider what that will be like for you based on your choices.

So, I say don't blow off a loving relationship for a long distance hike, and don't give up on the dream that you'll do it someday. Dream a little bigger and who knows, you might end up doing it with your son, or daughter, or a whole slew of your kids.

In the meantime, I think you can resolve the conundrum by doing a month on the trail of your choice and see how that works out for you. If you don't bust a turn for home before the month is past, and if you're heart is breaking down because you have to leave the trail, and if you know in your heart that you would rather stay there and give up that woman for the rest of your life, then you have to man up and tell her you don't love her enough to be with her for life and you ought to ramble on.

What's dated is the notion that it's an either/or proposition.

We are all fully capable of making decisions for ourselves - men or women. If we can accept the strain of having the SO gone for six months or come to some compromise on how to make it work - we can.

If we know for ourselves that it won't work, we have the option of telling the SO "that won't work for me, if you go you're probably not going to find me here when you get back" - and hey, that's a choice for the you to make, too.

Your daughter's struggle is not in any way a contradiction to that. There are people who can, and people who can't, and you draw your boundaries accordingly. It's a healthy thing.

I'm not going to make the call on behalf of the OP's wife - that's a conversation for them to have all to themselves. I don't know if their relationship can take it. That's not my business and not my call.

Bill, Lori, WD,

I'm still happily married to my first wife of 34 years. I guess I have a dated atitude.

When considering having a "modern atitude" about a marriage, separation, and your hike, you should filter the advice given by the advisors apparent ability to maintain a relationship.

Jim

Huh?

I agree with Lori (married to my first and only husband ) for ... (gets the calculator out) 16 1/2 years (together for 22 years.)

My contract (obviously not writen) with my husband about... well everything... changes periodically. First 10 years the contract was I would freak if he was gone longer than overnight. Now... yawn - 3 weeks, whatever - I'm just not that clingy anymore. Does that mean our relationship is on the rocks, nope - just different. And that is the key word in this thread - Different - your milage may vary - hike your own hike... do what works for you and your SO. Does that make your advice any less useful? No - the OP can read all of this and formulate their own (hopefully workable) solution.

What this does mean, is looking at those years you posted, you just might be getting old <evil grin>

Doing a once-in-a-lifetime hike such as the AT is different from being gone for weeks at a time as a regular thing. There are many more instances where one partner is a work-a-holic and just as distant and unavailable and in this case, it never ends. It is all a matter of balance. If your spouse knew that you were a backpacker when you met, then why would they not encourage that important part of your life? There are times, like when children are little, that you may have to put backpacking on hold, but it is all give and take. Also, it would not be a good idea to go do the AT and put your family in financial risk. I believe the OP was about doing the AT, a one-time goal. You also have to balance the impact of NOT doing the trip- are you going to later resent your spouse or hate yourself? But, the good news is that if you stay healthy and in shape, you can still do the AT in your 50's or 60's, so time is on your side.

WD that s what I wanna do. This is getting confusing.
Reminds me me of the Movie Grumpy old men,
Pop: "It just goes ta show ya" "What"?

I think the core idea here (to answer the OP's question) is that the conversation has to be had with his spouse BEFORE making the commitment to go.

"Manning up" does not entail abandoning your love ones (abandoning being different than leaving behind). Abandoning family is the antithesis of manning up - and the "traditional" marriage vows.

If the OP's spouse can't handle the idea of him doing an optional deployment, than perhaps the AT isn't in the cards for now. If she can, then it might be. It depends on their ground rules - which he needs to go talk with her and set.

If long seperations are going to be part of the marriage, I'll share a Marine MSGT's very good advice to me about marriage - do a deployment first, then get married, not the other way around.

Steadman

Lori, I think your comments nail it exactly. And if we only get to opine on this based on number of years of marriage, chalk me up for 31 years so far --- still married to the first girl I dated.

Wandering Daisy said:


I certainly agree with this too; I did my first thru-hike at age 51, and have hiked with people in their 60's that I had a hard time keeping up with.