How do you re-kindle a relationship?

[pamelat]

we've been together 13 years, married 6. Dd 5 and ds 3.

Things haven't been great for 3 years or more

We haven't coped well with the stresses and chores of life as parents.

We love our children dearly but in coping with sleepless nights/redundancies/family upsets and a few significant fall outs of our own (he abused my trust quite badly when ds was a baby. He didn't cheat as such but left me in doubt ...)

Anyway, he's a good dad and helpful around the home.

I've struggled on and off with untreated mild depression.

Life has started to get easier now that DC's getting older and DS sometimes even sleeps (!!)

It's left me with time to reassess "us" and we come up lacking. DH agrees.

We do not appreciate each other, we resent one another and squabble about chores. I'm nice to everyone bar him!! We fit our lives around one another and I quite like the nights that he goes out :(

I feel sad about this and would like us to learn to be nice/friends/get on again

He says that he loves me and still finds me attractive and wants to work at this.

I've probably shut off more but want this to work. We were once the best of friends and I know we can get on but don't remember how?!

Ideas for re-kindling?

date nights, get someone to have your children overnight (once a month at least) and go on a date, a movie, a meal, ice skating,,a picnic go karting - something that you would not normally do, somthing even childish, just whatever is fun. if someone can have your children overnight you dont have to worry about being up early in the morning.

if you can even stretch to a weekend away once in a while??

Absolutely agree. Time away together. With no pressure to do anything other than sleep, eat, drink & talk. Everything else does follow but you just need some non-parent time to start you off. Next trick is how to incorporate romance into routine...entirely possible but Stage 2 I think.

Can you get overnight babysitters?

Oh and the trust issue needs puttingti to bed. Could you imagine talking & moving on or is it too big a deal to resolve any time soon?

I think you can't beat nostalgia. Think back to when you first met. What attracted you to each other? What places did you go? What did you do pre-kids? Between you (because re-kindling is a two-man job) try to recreate the conditions of your early, child-free, mortgage-free, hassle-free relationship.

I recently recommended the following communication technique to someone here. Set some time aside when you're both relaxed, without distractions, to talk and take turns to start a sentence 'What I like and appreciate about you is....' - it'll make you consciously think about your partner's positive qualities. Follow with 'What I'd like to see more of is....' and this lets you raise any niggles in a constructive way. "I'd like to see more structure to how we share chores so that we don't squabble" for example. Finish with another 'like and appreciate' point. Do this regularly, combining compliments with (constructive) criticism and it can become a nice habit that makes communication easier.