I don’t have the answer for this as I think it depends on each marriage, each couple but here’s what we did…
It seems that soon after you have a baby people start asking you when you will go out on a date with your husband. After all, your relationship with your partner is as important as the new member that just came into your family. However, a date night means leaving your baby and sometimes that is not easy to do, especially when you’re a first time mom…
I have an amazing husband whom I adore above all and sometimes I even wonder how I got so lucky. Not only is he the most handsome guy I’ve ever dated but he’s smart, funny, hard working, makes it possible for me to be a stay-at-home mama and best of all, I can talk with him for hours and hours. He’s my best friend…for real!
When our baby was born our lives totally changed…overnight! Having our baby made us realize that we were clueless during my pregnancy as to how much our lives would change. But somehow once our baby was here we figure it out, even if this meant doing things we didn’t think we would do.
Our baby was a very clingy little thing. She couldn’t stand being alone on her crib and the stroller seemed to have hidden knives stabbing her because she cried like crazy when we put her in it. Letting our baby cry was never an option so this meant we learned about safe bed-sharing and babywearing. Our lives became so much easier thanks to that!
Giving birth to my baby was also giving birth to my mama bear instincts. They tell you about them but wow! feeling them it’s amazing. You really feel an intense urge to protect this little one. I’m not going to lie, I even had issues with people I knew holding my baby when she was a newborn. It really bothered me – and this is why I never ask to hold a baby now.
As you can imagine I was a little (a lot!) protective and leaving my daughter for a date night was something I just couldn’t do. Maybe because it was my first baby or maybe because I’m that type of mom…
In the first months of her life, things were so crazy and we were so tired neither of us cared about a date night. But sometime around the time she turned 4 months my husband started asking me about it and it terrified me. Here I had a baby that nursed every hour and was very demanding. I just couldn’t do it but I didn’t want to disappoint my husband so I kind of ignored the subject.
One night we sat and had a very honest conversation about this. I told him how I felt, how I wasn’t ready, how I couldn’t trust anyone to watch her, how I wouldn’t enjoy it because I’d be so worried, how much I love him and how I don’t ever want him to feel he’s second… To my surprise he was very understanding! We both agreed that our baby is only this little once and this needy once and that we would have a real date night once we both felt ready. In the meantime, we compromised with having date nights at home, after she was asleep. At first they were short but they got longer and longer as she started sleeping more without waking up.
Even though my husband was ready to go out by ourselves sooner than I was, he was understanding of my feelings and OK with waiting a bit longer. At around 6 months we had our first early dinner date together with my parents in the shopping center next to us (haha!). As she got older and could communicate better I feel that I could enjoy a date with my husband without worrying about my baby. In all honesty, we haven’t had many dates alone yet but it’s what was best for our family right now. This might surprise a lot of people but we are happy with this decision.
Our relationship is not the same as before, it is better and it is stronger. By accepting how we feel about this we have learned to appreciate every minute we have together. Even those minutes when we’re visiting family and our little munchkin is running around with them…we get to sit and enjoy each other. We now enjoy our company so much more and we have learned to enjoy it in many hidden moments during the day. This has made me love my husband so much more and I hope he feels the same.
We now have 2 kids and once again we’re back to not having dates because this little one needs me right now but we both know as she grows older we will have more and more time for ourselves and in the meantime, we have little dates at home.
So, when is the right time to have your first date after having a baby? The right time will depend on you and your partner and possibly on your baby’s personality. For some it will come a few weeks after the baby is born and for other it will come a few years later. And that is OK.
If you’re feeling bad because you haven’t had a date night and your friends have had one, don’t feel bad. It’s normal for some of us to wait a little longer. Don’t listen to what anyone says. Listen to your mama instincts. Talk to your partner. Make sure you’re both on the same page. That is what matter.
How old was your little one when you went out on your first date?
I don’t even remember with my first son, he was maybe 18 months when we had our first date!!! I just couldn’t feel comfortable leaving him or being away from him before that. My second baby I was able to feel okay leaving much sooner, which makes me feel bad cause it sounds like I love him less but that’s obviously not the case! Something about the 2nd child, I feel more at ease with a lot of things. We’ve also never gone on a date longer than 2 hours…the average is 1.5 hours and the first few dates only an hour!! We shoved the food in our mouths and rushed right back lol. That being said, it DOES do us a WORLD of good to go out on dates.
It seems that all moms that have more than one kid say this. I think it’s harder with the first but gets easier when you have more. I think I’m going to have dates like you, where you shove your food down (haha!), and hopefully more often.