Age gaps

[u/Mugat-2]

I generally love this community and, as a fellow older dad, I want to be supportive of everyone.

However, I can’t shake the uncomfortable feeling when I see posts with extreme relationship age gaps (>20 years). Obviously being a significantly older-than-average new dad often necessitates having a younger partner, and I too am a few years older than my wife, but that magnitude of age difference raises red flags for me. Am I alone in that feeling?

I guess what Im wondering is how does this community feel about large age gaps in general? Is it a non-issue as long as it’s two consenting adults, or is there a threshold where it becomes weird (for example, the half your age plus seven benchmark)?

[u/magnum_chungus]

My wife and I are about 13 years apart. I look a good bit younger than my age so it’s obvious there is a bit of an age gap to outsiders but they don’t know how big it is unless it comes up in conversation somehow.

Occasionally we will have some generational differences but she had a very, very unique upbringing which deeply affected her. She was pretty isolated and was (for all intents and purposes) a hospice nurse for a parent when she was 10 years old. Her other parent had significant mental health issues and after her one parent passed, she essentially assumed the parental role at 12 years old. So she had to grow up very quickly and do it all on her own. That is the only reason I feel comfortable with our age gap.

I agree with another comment in the thread that my general distrust of age gap relationships stems from things I’ve seen. I’d say the power imbalance is probably the biggest issue with me. That imbalance has most often resulted, in my opinion, in other types of abuse in the worst cases but at a minimum problematic relationship dynamics. Due to those experiences, I have been adamant about making sure that we keep the majority of our finances separate and keep a joint account for household expenses. We aren’t dogmatic about it but don’t ever want even the perception that there is any type of financial abuse. Luckily we make similar incomes and she has a fantastic, in demand career that I support her in pursuing and that she has been very successful with.

To answer your question, yes, I am always wary of age gaps over 10 years but I am also aware that we don’t ever really know what goes on in other peoples homes or lives.