What to do if your spouse doesn't support socializing at work?
I have a really nice co-worker who invited my wife and I to dinner at his house with his wife and him. We are all about the same age (late 20s), me being slightly older. We've never hung out before. I got a promotion to manager recently, so he now is junior to me on the project, although I'm not his direct manager. I just told my wife about this, and she wasn't happy about me accepting the invitation. My wife absolutely does not want to socialize with any of my co-workers anymore, having been burned by my last two jobs, which I admit were over the top with socialization (but we were young and new to town and didn't know anyone). One dinner will not be a problem, and we would not need to reciprocate. My wife says that they'll expect a reciprocation, it'll be rude not to reciprocate, and that she can't trust me to set a boundary and say no if it ever got uncomfortable. She also says that it's not a good idea to socialize with more junior co-workers at the exclusion of others now that I'm a manager. I had already accepted the invitation, and now I can't decline and have it be awkward, and my wife agrees it would be weird to say no because we'll have to eventually accept. He's an amazing colleague, so I can't upset him by not going in case he leaves the company because he's upset (he had confided in me that he had gotten a job offer at our direct competitor but was staying because of me). I don't see how this one time will hurt either. How should I navigate this? What do you do if your co-worker extends an invitation to your spouse but they don't want to go?