Date Nights...Keeping Love Alive In Your Marriage

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You make a lot of promises on your wedding day, but there is one promise that often gets overlooked, especially when you have children. Promising each other time to keep love alive is one of the hardest to keep – yet it is one of the most essential.

It’s amazing how quickly life becomes too busy for a couple to have time for each other. Work, family and financial commitments become priorities, and couple time gets put on the back burner. The trouble with the back burner is that things put there quickly dry up! But there is a way to keep love alive.

Start by reorganizing those priorities and give couple time more prominence. Sit down together and work out the when, where, why and how of keeping your love alive. That may sound like a pragmatic approach, but this is just as important as any other subject you make time for, like problems with the kids, or the budget.

The kids and the budget are probably the major factors when it comes to keeping your marriage fresh and romantic. Who will look after the kids? How can you afford fancy restaurants and baby sitters? Discuss the matter of the kids first. Many parents find this one of the hardest factors to overcome. If you have willing family members living near by, you can stop right there. You can call grandma or aunty and suggest that the kids go to their place one night a week or so, to give you some time alone together. But for many parents this is just not an easy option. Family members may be unwilling for some reason, or live too far away to be easily accessible.

That’s where the neighborhood comes in. Ring around your friends, many of whom may be in the same position, and offer an exchange night. In exchange for one night a week minding your kids, you will reciprocate. It doesn’t have to be an overnight stay, just a between friends free baby sitting service so each of you can enjoy some time as a couple. Even if the money you save won’t shout you a night out on the town, there are still ways you can keep the romance alive at home.

Make your Date Night whatever you want it to be. Drive out to a romantic spot in the car, taking an impromptu picnic, or go to a movie together. Make sure it’s not a `family’ movie! This is your time together, so sit at the back and make out like you are teenagers. If expensive restaurants are out of the question, stay home and cook dinner. Cook something you wouldn’t serve for a family meal, set the table with candles, buy a bottle of wine, and discuss anything but your kids’ school grades, or money! Even couples that have been together a long time can still discover something new and exciting about each other.

Have a movie night at home. Rent some grown-up (as grown-up as you please) movies and snuggle down with the popcorn and the soda pop. This is no time for in depth relationship questions; it’s time to just enjoy being together. Maybe movies aren’t really your couple `thing’, so experiment. Play strip poker or Twister, share your interests, but don’t go off into separate rooms to scrapbook and fiddle with model airplanes.

If your marriage really needs some spice, a boudoir night is on the cards. Make the bedroom an inviting place to be, not just a place to crash after another exhausting and busy day. Use soft lighting, plump up the bed with pillows and cushions, banish everything electronic, and have a copy of the Kama Sutra or the Joy of Sex for some inspiration. Banish all stress and pressure too; the idea is to relax together and enjoy each other’s bodies with no fear of being disturbed for a glass of water.

Whatever you do with your date night is up to you. If the budget will stretch to a ritzy night out, go right ahead. The important thing is to make each other feel special again, and to recapture the first heady days of the relationship. Never think you have gotten too comfortable together, or know too much about each other, not to be surprised. When it’s your turn to have extra kids over while another couple has a date night, you can enjoy that as well, knowing that you are all doing your bit to keep love alive in marriage!


by Gail Kavanagh