Marriage should not be a ban on travelling with friends

There is a strange transformation that supposedly takes place after marriage. You get a spouse, perhaps a new home, a few additional responsibilities, and, according to some people, an automatic cancellation of your friends-only travel plans.

Before marriage, a weekend in Sylhet with university friends requires little more than a group chat, a bus ticket and someone trustworthy enough to book the hotel. After marriage, the same trip can suddenly become a family discussion.

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Who is going? Where are you staying? Why are you going without your wife? Why is your husband going without you?

Somewhere along the way, travelling with friends after marriage started looking less like a holiday and more like a suspicious activity.

But perhaps marriage does not have to mean that every trip must now be a joint venture.

For many couples, travelling separately is simply another part of maintaining an individual life within a shared one.

“Getting married did not suddenly make my friends disappear,” says Farhan Rahman, a software engineer. “I still enjoy travelling with them. My wife knows my friends, knows where we are going and knows when I am coming back. That is enough. Going on a trip without her does not mean I am trying to escape my marriage,” he laughs.

A common myth is that couples who truly love spending time together should naturally want to do everything together. But marriage does not erase personal preferences. One partner may dream of a quiet beach holiday, while the other considers waking up at five in the morning to hike a mountain peak.

There is also something healthy about maintaining friendships outside the marriage. Friends knew you before you became somebody’s husband or wife. They have witnessed your terrible haircut, your university disasters and possibly the phase when you thought you would become a professional photographer after buying a camera phone.

Why should marriage require abandoning that history?

"There is a huge myth that if you love your husband, you should want to do everything together," exclaims Nishat Tasnim, a school teacher who recently returned from a trip to India with her girlfriends.

"My husband stayed back managing our cat and office work, while I ate street food in Kolkata until midnight. When I came back, we actually had things to talk about besides grocery bills and laundry. My advice is to stop falling for the trap that independence equals a lack of commitment. Absence makes the heart fonder, not distant."

Of course, freedom does not mean disappearing without explanation. Separate travel works best when it comes with communication. Discussing the dates, budget, accommodation and responsibilities at home is not asking for permission. That is a kind of consideration that both partners should have for one another.

“If one person is always travelling while the other is handling everything at home, resentment will obviously build,” explains Adnan Karim, a business analyst. “The point is not that you should do whatever you want. It means that both people should have the same space to enjoy their friendships. Fairness matters more than keeping score.”

For couples with children or other family responsibilities, planning may require even more effort. Someone may need to manage school runs, elderly parents or household work while the other is away. This simply means that the freedom to travel comes with responsibility.

Moreover, travelling separately does not automatically mean that a couple is emotionally distant.

Sometimes a few days apart can be a reminder that two people entered a marriage as individuals before becoming partners.

“People sometimes think if your partner wants to travel with her friends, you should feel threatened,” says Rafia Chowdhury, a biotechnology professor. “I do not see it that way. Trust is not built by keeping someone beside you all the time. If anything, knowing that we can have our own experiences makes our relationship feel more secure.”

A married person going on a trip with friends should not immediately trigger a neighbourhood investigation. Nor should a wife booking a girls’ trip require a courtroom defence.

You can miss your spouse while sitting beside your oldest friends on a bus. You can spend three days eating questionable food with your college group and still come home excited to show your partner the photographs. You can have a life together without having to share every single moment of it.

After all, getting married should give you someone to come home to. Travelling after marriage does not have to give you a reason to stop going anywhere.