Date Night Playbook - Naked Quickie - Episode 62

Ever find yourself on a date night that's more squabble than sparkle? We certainly have.  
On this episode of the Married and Naked Podcast, we're letting you in on the secrets that switched our date nights from battlegrounds to bliss. 

We're talking about the game-changing playbook that we discovered that's allowed us to side-step the typical tiffs about the kids, the budget, and the never-ending to-do list and help us leave our date nights feeling close and connected.

Isn't that the whole point of date night anyway?

Discover our strategies for knocking date night out of the park.

Your marriage is worth it.  

Transcript

Date Night Rules and Tips

Speaker 1 0:00

Sometimes we only have time for a quickie, so here it is, your Naked Quickie. Welcome in everyone to the Married and Naked Podcast. This is a Naked Quickie and I'm Joel and I'm joined by. I feel like I'm on the radio.

Speaker 2 0:17

That was so formal.

Speaker 1 0:18

Yes, I was so, and please state your name. You're not supposed to be laughing, Okay, sorry. Yes, go ahead. And your name?

Speaker 2 0:26

I'm hoping they know my name from the intro, but this is Tammy. I'm Tammy Green.

Speaker 1 0:38

Much better. That's what I like hearing. So the naked quickie yes. The idea here is to put Tammy on the spot and ask her something that she can give us some wisdom, some advice on. And we're going to make it a little personal now.

Speaker 2 0:46

Okay.

Speaker 1 0:46

All right, so Tammy.

Speaker 2 0:48

Yes.

Speaker 1 0:48

Question for you is what are our date night rules?

Speaker 2 0:55

That sounds so like not fun, right? What are your date night rules? You have rules.

Speaker 1 1:02

Yes, we do Freaking, love them, go ahead.

Speaker 2 1:07

Well, I guess a little backstory about our date night rules is that back in the day when we used to have date night, and then it wasn't very often. Obviously all those with kids know date nights can be really challenging because it takes time to plan, it takes money, you have to get a sitter, like it's a big deal to go on a date, and when we would go on these dates, what would often wind up happening is we come home and we would feel more disconnected than ever because on that date we would have some kind of argument or we would bicker about something and we would just leave it feeling so disappointed. And I honestly have no idea how these came about, do you?

Speaker 1 1:54

I mean, I don't. I feel like it all has to do with the time that we got intentional about our how we were dealing with our relationship.

Speaker 2 2:02

Sure, but I don't remember the genesis of it. These are specific.

Speaker 1 2:07

Yes, they are.

Speaker 2 2:08

Along the way. Somewhere we decided that our dates needed to have specific rules. It's really a rule. We need to keep certain things off the table in our communication on a date night At the time we had specific things that were really big triggers for us that we tended to argue about a lot and I'm sure most couples can relate to just having that same argument over and over and over. These were those for us. So we would argue about the kids. We tended to argue about work, because you and I work together.

Speaker 2 2:41

So it was a really big trigger point for us, and then we would also argue about money. So we decided that on these date nights we needed to take those things off the table because we realized it was just destroying that time we were having together. It was not allowing us to connect or to have that feeling of connection, and it's such hard work getting that date night and then you leave it feeling disappointed. So how could we navigate these date nights better to where we left feeling connected? And that was the idea that we came up with. Let's stop talking about all of the things that we wind up arguing about. Yeah, because they're landmines anytime we bring them up.

Speaker 1 3:24

Well, the question I'm sure that everyone is that's listening to this is probably asking is like what the heck do you talk about? Of course.

Speaker 2 3:31

that is the question and that's what led me to looking up conversation starters on the internet. I would, I would go on the internet and try to find just conversation starters, like if you're going on a first date, you know, like what are the conversation starters that you would bring, or icebreakers, you know. So I would look those kinds of things up and I would bring them with us to our date night, usually print out like a list of questions or something, and we would ask each other these really fun questions. They would either be fun questions or they would be like connecting questions, or maybe they would be sexy questions. But we found that by asking each other these questions really helped us keep conversation off all those landmines, but also very directed on each other. It helped us really keep a focus on each other and we just had such a good time with them, right.

Speaker 1 4:23

No to this day. We still do that, we still do it and we've been doing this for I don't even know well over a decade. Yeah, definitely well over a decade. Yeah.

Speaker 2 4:33

Not every date night, but most probably that's like our go-to is.

Speaker 1 4:38

we'll go and bust out some questions yeah, which I think is funny, because you're uh, if you don't follow tammy on instagram, it's, you know, married and naked on instagram and she. You went mega viral with questions right, right, right yeah like 60 plus million views on one of your posts with 10 questions that we've asked multiple times, that we pull out a lot, you know.

Speaker 2 5:04

Yeah.

Speaker 1 5:05

I think it's funny because obviously people online were connecting to the same things that you and I use in our dates.

Speaker 2 5:12

Yeah, and I think the idea that sometimes dates can be hard because you feel a lot of pressure. You know, if you've worked so hard to get that time together, then you feel pressure that it's got to be like this perfect night. You know it's got to go so well. And then you start talking about the kids and then you have different views about how to handle whatever, or they don't have the same response you want them to have, and then suddenly you're in an argument and you've kind of ruined that potential good time together. So I think it's a way of taking the pressure off and just really enjoying each other's company.

Speaker 1 5:45

Are there any other rules to our date nights?

Speaker 2 5:48

You tell me, are there any other rules? That's our main one.

Speaker 1 5:50

That's the main one, and I feel like the other one is taking expectations for intimacy out of the equation too, you know, I'm the one who we've said many times that I have more of the drive than you do, so I think that's more work on my side than it is on your side, but by me working on my side to take all expectations off the table, it allows you to feel relaxed I'm speaking for you but it has such a freeing effect on being together and connecting, which is why we're at the date to begin with.

Speaker 2 6:23

I would find myself not being able to enjoy those nights because I was feeling so much pressure about what was going to be expected of me when we got home and it just didn't go well, it didn't go well at all. And it just didn't go well, it didn't go well at all. So the minute that pressure can be off the table and say tonight there's no expectations from me, tim, we're just going to go have a good time. We don't need to have sex and mean it Absolutely.

Speaker 1 6:48

And mean it Absolutely. If you don't mean it, then you're just lying, because you fell in that too before. I did when you would say it, but intimate moments at the end.

Speaker 2 7:04

So, yes, it has to be 100%, truly off the table. And when I was, when you truly did that, then I could lean into really enjoying that time with you, because my love language is quality time. So I felt always stripped of that quality time because I always was feeling so much pressure about needing to meet your need of the physical touch.

Speaker 1 7:26

Yeah.

Speaker 2 7:27

Both equally valid, but yours tended to get more attention than mine, yeah, so I needed to have time just for me to be able to feel that connection with you. And that's what a date night is for me. Not that you don't enjoy it, you do. We have such a good time together.

Speaker 1 7:42

Yeah.

Speaker 2 7:43

But you're right, that is a crucial, crucial rule for us. Yeah, so you're right, that was a good one.

Speaker 1 7:51

Any others.

Speaker 2 7:51

Well, I think another really good one is to make sure that you are actually having regular date nights, and those don't have to look any particular way. You and I used to have date nights at home after the kids would go to bed, because going out was so difficult when they were young. The point is you can call it whatever you want. We called it date night, but really what it is is time to focus one-on-one with each other. It's quality face one-on-one time with each other, no distractions. Put the phones down, turn the screens off. That's 100% what we would do. This is not time for the movie. This is not time to be scrolling your phones. It's to really look each other in the face, to have some good conversations and to really connect. But, most importantly, make sure you're actually doing it. Put it on the calendar, stick to it. Don't push it down the road, because that is saying that your relationship isn't important and it needs to be a priority in your life.

Speaker 1 8:48

Yeah, I mean, it doesn't have to be weekly, it doesn't even have to be even monthly, as long as you, when you pick a date, you actually do it right.

Prioritizing Date Nights in Marriage

Speaker 2 8:56

Yeah, but I would recommend it being at least monthly, but it should be every other week. As often as you can do it do it.

Speaker 1 9:04

I just didn't want people to feel bad if they're not doing it that much. You're right.

Speaker 2 9:06

But if you're not doing it that much, then I do want to challenge you in asking are you prioritizing your marriage? Are you both feeling connected? If you are, and somehow you're managing in that without needing the actual official date night, great. But most of the time what you'll find is that people who are not having regular date nights do not feel connected, they don't feel close to each other, they feel distant, and that's because they're not prioritizing their marriage. So if that's where you're at, then those date nights do need to become a priority there you have it.

Speaker 2 9:36

That was good, baby, I forgot we had a lot of rules that I wasn't even thinking about. That's awesome. Well there, you go.

Speaker 1 9:40

That's awesome. Well, there you go. I'm married to Naked Quickie.

Speaker 2 9:43

Thank you.

Speaker 1 9:47

We'll talk to you soon, everybody.