Date nights?

JulyMomma2U2 · November 2013

So, I'm just curious.. how often do you and your DH/SO make time to go out kid-free?

I have a super difficult time with this.. we both work so weekends are our time together as a family.. I don't like spending time away from my kids unless I absolutely have to. Plus, I always feel guilty asking family to watch our boys.. especially now with the two of them, I feel like the routine can be tricky to someone who's not used to it.. ie feeding them both dinner/bottle at the same time, bath & bedtime routine, etc..

DH and I have gone out maybe 4 times in the past 16 months.. and, most of those times (aside from one overnight for a wedding before DS2 was born) have only been for 2 hours tops. I had friends of mine over last weekend and they were talking about how they go out semi-often and how great it is to have time with just themselves, etc.. so, it got me thinking.. I have such a hard time leaving my kids with anyone.. even family.. I know handing the two of them together can be tricky, and I just feel like that's a lot to ask of someone.. plus, I'd feel guilty if I left them, and then whoever watched them did have a tough time and it resulted in my kids crying all night.. that's not fair to my boys, either.. idk, I'm weird I guess..

JulyMomma2U2 · November 2013

theresat858 said:

We are lucky that my parents live a mile away and offer to babysit. So we go out every couple of weeks - sometimes they watch her for the evening (we go to dinner at 6 and stretch her bedtime until 8), and sometimes they watch her overnight. I don't feel too guilty about this couple time bc we've spent the day with DD, and often she is just going to bed anyway.

This is why I don't understand my own issues!! LOL. My boys are both in bed by 7:30.. so, if we were to go out at 6, I'm only really losing an hour and a half with them.. the rest of the time they are sleeping.. but, for some reason, I still feel super guilty! This all came up because last weekend we had my parents watch the boys because we had a celebratory dinner for my SIL passing the barr exam.. (too nice to bring 2 littles).. anyway, we were going to go to a movie afterwards, but I ended up just saying I wanted to go home because I felt bad being out.. except the kids were already sleeping anyway..! But, the flip side, I feel like I could "watch a movie" at home after the boys are in bed.. or, read a book at home (we had stopped at Barnes and Nobles before the movie).. so what was I really gaining by being "out" except making someone else have to sit at my house? Idk.

MJM3108 · November 2013

We've been out twice since DS was born. Once was just for dinner, and that was back in May for DH's birthday. The most recent time was this past weekend. We were gone overnight (I cried so much when we dropped off Ben at Barb's house) to a friend's wedding. As hard as it was to leave him, the 24 hours to just be husband and wife, and not mommy and daddy was something we really needed, and I am so grateful we got the opportunity.

When we picked Ben up from Barb's on Sunday, she told us she wanted to institute a once a month date night for DH and I, and that she will hang with Ben. She even gave us a gift card to our local movie theater so we "don't have any excuses to not go out."

I want to spend all my time with DH and Ben, so going out without him isn't really that high on my priority list... I do, however, get a couple hours each Tuesday, for choir practice at church, and DH has gone golfing a few times.

ProfessorPedals825 · November 2013

I feel the same as you about leaving my baby with anybody. I feel like the evenings and weekends are our family time together. I wonder if our take on this topic is a bit different because we're Loss parents?

Now having said that, we have gone out a bit here and there but really only when visiting family. When we visit my grandmother (we've visited twice since she was born), she practically begs for Phoebe to stay and since we don't see her often we've let her watch her for a few hours. We've done the same when visiting DH's parents and my mom too. We either wait until she's gone to bed or do it during the day because I don't trust anyone with her bedtime routine, but once she's down she's out for the night. Her Godmother does live about 45 mins away and loves to do a Saturday afternoon at our place while we catch a movie, but again she's only done this twice.

ksyknelvr73 · November 2013

We go out about once a month together, and we are able to do things for ourselves maybe every couple of weeks (like DH wants to go to a football game or I want a girls night). I don't ever feel bad about girls night b/c DH is the one taking care of DS so I know he's got it under control. My parents live 15 min away and my niece (who is 15) babysits for us on occasion as well, so we are fortunate that we have a couple resources close by.

I WILL say though - we didn't go out much and we definitely didn't do any overnights without DS until he was about a year old. I was way too sad to leave him and super paranoid about anything happening to him. I gradually got over it.

salsa_wifey · November 2013

I'm probably the worst person to reply to this one. We get out without kids maybe twice a year. Seriously. We don't have parents we can count on and we haven't (until recently) been able to afford a sitter. DH would rather have the kids with us so I have to fight for my annual holiday party to get out without the kids.

adoxyinherear · November 2013

Every couple of months, maybe? But really not very often. DD does not sleep when we leave her anywhere, and we don't have a regular sitter to come to our house while she sleeps. Easiest gig in the world, though!

martinimomma · November 2013

I'd guess 6 times in 2 years. Now with DD here I think it will be even less frequent.

My parents watch DS on Fridays so I try not to double dip with them on weekends. We have no siblings. We live in a fancy suburb and sadly kids here are not interested in babysitting because they are handed everything on a silver platter (not a good thing on a lot of levels - we are not loaded so our kids will need to earn some money and I see a booming babysitting business in their futures). Our friends all have kids older than ours and none of them live nearby.

So we are stuck in kid land with no real alone time. It sucks.

VeilSdeGTO · November 2013

Never.

We both work and by the time DH gets home, he maybe gets 1-1.5 hours with DD. Both our moms are about 45 mins away and they still work. We also don't have someone we trust to be with DD. Weekends are spent with DD running errands and just spending time with her.

DH and I had discussed this early on since so many of his friends kept saying how crucial it was to have "date night." We realized that going out to a movie or dinner without DD wasn't something we NEEDED to do for our marriage. We are still able to spend quality time together at home once DD is asleep.

There have been times that required us to be away for some time at night (DH's work Christmas party, DH's cousin's wedding, etc) but just one of us would go. If one of us feels like we need a night out, we coordinate that accordingly.

MickeyM04 · November 2013

We probably go out just the two of us once every 3 months. So 6 times since DS was born. There were probably an extra one or two in there because I know we've been to 2 weddings. But I can honestly only think of maybe 4-5 times that we've gone out the two of us not for a wedding since DS has been born.

ETA, I kind of regret that time when DS started sleeping through the night at about 5 months on a regular basis, and was in bed by 7:00, not going out with DH more. Because we literally could have put him to bed at 7:00, gone out for dinner, and had a sitter there for a couple of hours without DS ever even knowing about it. But for some reason I was always paranoid about leaving him until he got older. Now he goes to bed at 8:00 though and I like to be the one to put him to bed, so there's really not much of a way for us to go out these days, unless I want to be out from like 8:00-10:00, which even 10:00 is late for me!

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