How to keep the spark in your relationship alive

How to keep the spark in your relationship alive by Lou Lavery

Full disclosure – this is not going to be an article from one of those glossy magazines. You know the ones! You see them when you’re doing your best Walking Dead impression at the supermarket with someone else’s snot in your hair and smelling suspiciously of milk and vomit.

“How to be your BEST self – today!”

“Keep your marriage STEAMY with these secret moves!”

“How I got my body AND my groove back two weeks post-partum while writing a novel, tiling my own roof and becoming an Instagram influencer who exists exclusively on kale and the power of my own self-esteem!”

Yep. Definitely not one of those.

Those headlines all imply that the reason you feel so tired and over-it-all is that you’re not trying hard enough. You’re lacking in some way so you need advice (in the form of a numbered list because you are clearly an idiot) to get you ‘back on track’ to being the ‘perfect little wifey’. Everything is your responsibility. Your life is hard because you don’t know how to perfectly balance the needs of every single person around you at all times while making sure you have zero body hair, the pert bottom of a teenage boy and rock-solid self-confidence.

And, when you’ve finished that never-ending list of impossible tasks, the ENTIRE RESPONSIBILITY of keeping the spark in your relationship alive is ALSO up to you. Sheesh!

Sound familiar?

What is this ‘date night’ you speak of?

The words ‘date night’ get thrown around like the Holy Grail of Parenting. It’s like this magical land that you’ve heard whispers of in mother’s group. An urban legend. A mystical fairytale. Adult women leaving the house, at night, wearing shoes and not carrying baby wipes and tiny underpants in their handbags. Going out where the other people are and eating meals that are hot, drinking out of glasses and going to the toilet by themselves.

I’m here to tell you that it’s true. These places exist. You can go to them. You deserve to go to them.

But it’s not that simple for all of us. Many families don’t have a support network to help care for the kids during a night off. Many of us have very strict demands on our times and our wallets that mean leaving the house for a night of frivolity just isn’t on the cards.

There’s a way, however, that you can invite some of that magical spark into your home without having to leave it. And it doesn’t even involve tumbling through the back of some weird wardrobe to meet up with a little hairy man with goat hooves. Clop on, Mr Tumnus. This calls for…

How to keep the spark alive at home for exhausted parents

It’s a simple recipe.

1. Apply pyjamas. The earlier the better. Clean ones – treat yo’self.
2. Apply children to their beds. This may take a little while. Suggest exhausting them in the late afternoon if possible.
3. Once children and their beds have combined, allow to marinate for half an hour. Be very quiet during this time. Suggest doing a Buzzfeed quiz on “Who would be my Game of Thrones boyfriend?”. Be excited that answer is Tormund but celebrate in silence.
4. Combine:

• 1 x couch
• 2 x glasses
• 1 x bottle of liquid of your choice (Wine is a popular choice, chocolate milk a close second)
• 2 x adults

5. Talk about things that are not the kids. Laugh a lot. Remember why you chose to have kids with this person in the first place.
6. Confirm decision to be partners as well as parents. The responsibility to keep the whole family moving should not fall to one or the other parent – you’re all in this together. Apologise for accidentally quoting High School Musical.

Can you keep the spark alive?

Keeping the spark alive when you’ve got small kids isn’t about wining and dining. It’s about working together and making sure no one feels taken for granted. Date nights are possible but, for now, they look a little different. And that’s totally okay.