I read a post over at Parent Dish titled “Romance Advice for New Parents - Make Date Night a Priority“. It is no secret that I am a huge proponent of a regular date night, so of course this article caught my eye.

This article was aimed at parents of newborn babies. Anyone who has had one of those (amazingly miraculous yet ridiculously exhausting) creatures knows all too well how their entrance into your world throws said world off of its axis. Everything you thought you “knew” about how you would parent is thrown out the window. So do all of your ideals about keeping your “couple time” intact. At least, that’s how it was for my husband and I.

We had our first born baby and then did not go on a Date Night for…six months. I KNOW. I mean, we did spend time together after the little monkey was in bed but we didn’t actually leave him with another human being until a time that we were staying with family. We went to dinner and a movie and called approximately twenty times in the span of four hours.

The thing is, once we got that initial outing behind us, it was that much easier to get out again (and again, and again). When our second son was born, we left him at three weeks of age (with his grandparents) for a long date night that included Christmas shopping. Yes, my chest felt like it would explode (Literally; with milk) but my husband and I needed that time away.

All of the above to say that Date Nights are not just for the newlyweds or the couples with older kids. You need to keep up the routine even when you are in the trenches of babydom.

I’d love to hear from you guys on this - were you able to keep the date nights alive when babies came into the picture?

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