Most of us lead very busy lives. For many of us, work takes up a big part of our week. With modern technology, mobile phones and email are hard to turn off so you often find yourself working even when you’re not at work! And then there’s managing a family: cooking, cleaning, shopping, ferrying kids to and from school, extra-curricular activities and who knows what else! Even if you don’t have kids, life is usually very busy.
Living in a busy world means it is often hard to make time for yourself. When you factor in making time for your relationship, there doesn’t seem to be enough hours in the day. While this may be somewhat easier when it is just you and your partner, when you add in the demands of a family, the relationship is often the first thing to go.
There are lots of reasons you may give yourself for not making time for your relationship:
It’s too hard to find a baby-sitter.
We’ve never left our kids with anyone before.
We feel guilty leaving the kids and going out somewhere.
We’re too tired.
We can’t afford it.
And the list goes on…
Nurturing Your Relationship.
While all of the above may be valid some of the time, if you don’t make a concerted effort to nurture your relationship, you can find yourselves feeling less connected to each other. Often, you may not even notice that you haven’t spent any quality time together as a couple. Life takes over and each day is as busy as the next.
When this happens, you may find yourselves working really well together as parents but what about your couple relationship? It is not enough to be good parents together. You need to nurture and grow your relationship with each other.
Think Of Your Relationship As A Garden.
If you plant trees and flowers, you need to water, feed and prune regularly to make sure your garden continues to flourish. You might be lucky and the plants may still grow without any attention but eventually they may not do as well as they would with more attention and care.
So How Do You Get Started?
Plan a date night once a week or fortnight. It could be an afternoon on the week-end or on a day off.
Take turns making plans for what you will do together. Surprise your partner.
If money is an issue, go for a walk together or a coffee.
Agree not to talk about difficult issues on your date.
Try not to talk about your kids.
And above all, HAVE FUN. This is your chance to re-connect with each other in a fun and positive way. Who knows what you might invite into your relationship….