Making time to talk...
Hard finding the time to talk?
Here are some ideas from other couples:
- Talk in the car when you are travelling
- Do housework and gardening together, rather than separately, and spend the time talking as you work
- Go out for a dessert or a drink together, and sit and talk somewhere comfortable, away from the distractions of the home and the telephone.
- Talk in bed at night – but avoid arguing! Some couples have a ten-o’clock rule that any conflicts or difficult conversations should all stop at ten o’clock so that they can wind down for sleep.
- Call each other for a half hour chat in the middle of the day, or whenever things are quieter for you both.
- Meet each other for lunch, even if it’s a homemade sandwich in the park.
- Email each other.
- Have a weekly ‘partners committee meeting’ to discuss the week’s routines, future plans, and different topics that need addressing. Take it in turns to choose the topics for discussion. Save your ‘business’ items for this meeting so that they don’t interrupt your enjoyment at other times.
- When you talk together notice what you do that helps you to feel closer together, and calmer and what pushes you further apart, or makes you feel angry and frustrated.
