When you think back to the days you and your spouse were dating, can you remember the things you said or did together that sticks out in your memory as something you will cherish for the rest of your life? Can you remember the days of holding hands; romantic candlelight dinners; talking quietly together while sitting by a roaring fire; picnics for two; walks in the park under the moonlight; laughing and joking about nothing in particular? How did it make you feel? Did you feel safe and secure, valued and appreciated? Truly loved? Can you remember the specific moment that you realized you had fallen in love with your now-husband or wife?
No matter how many years you have been married, keeping the romance alive and the fire embers burning bright in your marriage is something that is not only doable, but fun as well.
While it may be true that the initial passion and spark begins to wane after a period of time, fueled by the responsibilities of caring for children, laundry, jobs, the mortgage, soccer practice and dance recitals, many couples tend to forget that their first priority is to their spouse and marriage.
Keeping the fire alive in your marital relationship may be challenging, and sometimes it’s more work than we want to do, but the rewards are well worth the effort you put forth each and every day.
How to Keep the Home Fires Burning in Your Marriage:
Communication
Remember and maintain your friendship with your spouse with open and honest communication. Making time to be alone with each other MUST be a priority. Agree to not discuss the kids, jobs, bills or other stress related topics, but use the time to really connect with each other as friends and lovers. Express genuine appreciation and gratitude for the things your spouse does; compliment and FLIRT with your husband or wife!
Relationship experts agree that couples who understand the importance of maintaining and nourishing a healthy friendship with each other have the most satisfying, long-lasting marriages. It is not the responsibility of your spouse to read your mind and make you happy, but it is a relationship trap many people fall into because they are not communicating their needs and feelings
Tip: When disagreements occur, hold hands throughout the entire discussion without letting go, as this works very well in greatly reducing the chances of saying something you may regret later. Trust me, it’s not as easy as it may seem.
Good and effective communication includes being a good listener, paying close attention to the spoken words but also the tone of voice and body language used, in order to get a complete understanding of what is being spoken. Have fun together! Be silly and goofy with each other, laugh a lot and enjoy the pleasure of each others company and one-on-one attention.
Let’s Get Physical
One very obvious sign of a couple lacking fire and romance in their marriage is when physical and affectionate touch has virtually ceased to exist in their relationship. Seeing elderly couples continuing to hold hands while walking or sitting closely together always puts a smile on my face, with my husband and I happily visualizing ourselves continuing to do the very same thing as the years go by.
Just sitting on the couch together watching television is an excellent opportunity to physically touch each other, hold hands and get the romantic sparks flying. Be affectionate and increase physical touch in your marriage (even if your sex drive isn’t what it used to be), along with creating a romantic environment in the home that is conducive to wanting to make love. Hugging, kissing, cuddling, giving each other back rubs and massages, all help to ignite fire and keep romance alive
When you climb into bed each night, affectionately cuddle and hold each other for several minutes, rather than immediately turning away from each other to fall asleep. The more you practice spending time being affectionate and feeling more connected, the more your passion for each other will grow. See “How to Please a Woman in Bed” for sex tips!
Bring Back the Fun!
Be spontaneous! Do something unexpected to show your husband or wife that you are thinking of them. Schedule a weekly “Date Night For Two” where you do things together you both enjoy. Play free romantic couples games! Leave little love notes where your spouse is sure to find them. Does your spouse have a chore they despise? Do it for them!
Is your spouse meticulous about keeping their vehicle clean inside and out? Clean it for them, or take it to be done professionally as a surprise. Take a bike ride together. Go ice skating or roller skating together. Take a leisurely walk around the neighborhood while holding hands, talking about fun and happy times from your dating days.
Create opportunities for fun. Think back to the fun and exciting things you two did together while dating and recreate those occasions. Buy some naughty adult games
Monotonous routine can easily douse the romantic fire in any relationship or marriage, so change things up with creative surprises. Keep your focus on what is MOST important in your marriage; the two of you. Feed the fire that keeps marriage alive and passionate, and it will sizzle.
How do you and your spouse keep the fire alive in your marriage? What tips can you share that work well for your relationship?
Further Reading:
Sex Every Day for Married Couples – 30 Day Sex Challenge
How to Spice Up Your Marriage: Fun and Easy Ways to Add Romance to Your Relationship
I went through trying all other suggestions and still getting a divorce. one day my ex just looked at me and said you know your just too damned nice. followed by I want a divorce.
Three years later I met my wife.
Hard as it was I was determined not to be “too nice”.
(To my amazement) in the first few weeks of our relationship, I told my (then) girlfriend, I have a rep, and I’ll never say “I love you in public” . To which she replied ,”what will you say?
after a second of thought I replied, I’ll say “shut up bitch, you talk too much” (It must be said right here that timing is everything, It must be said only when she has said absolutely nothing before that).
In short form, she bought it, and I have been telling her that for 15 years now .
I do other thing for her. to let her know I love her. When we’re not in public I’ll sneak in a “I love you” (Maybe whispered in her ear).
I have never been happier with a relationship, and she says she hasn’t either!
The short of the point is, Love is a crap shoot.
Have all the fun you can with it. Be happy, and be free. Be nice, but not too nice!
Todd
Something we haven’t done in a long time is take a long walk on a moonlit beach. Thanks for reminding me.
Hi Todd, your comment initially caught me off guard, leaving me to wonder why would he say that to his girlfriend. I guess it’s one of those things where you have to be there to get the joke. I’m glad it worked out for you!
HM, those long walks under the moonlight are very romantic. We don’t have a beach anywhere nearby, but we do take nice walks together in the park and hold hands all the time.
OMG!! Lots of things there… how do u sum it up in such a composed way? gr8
This is such an important topic for married couples, to continue to do the things they did when dating and continue to court each other throughout their marriage, in order to prevent the common mistakes that lead to “drifting apart” and getting divorced.
Great stuff here. My wife and I are about to have our second child so life is about to get extra cluttered. I think men have a harder time with things like this than women do, or maybe I just think that because I am a man.
I’m having a contest to see who can guess my baby’s birth date so that will be fun. Thanks!
Hi Jeff, thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment. You may be right when you say that men have a harder time with this sort of thing, but not doing these can often land people into divorce court. Good luck with the little one!
Nice post. In the end I think I’ve distilled my relationship down to spending time together. I love grocery shopping with my wife, we ballroom dance together, watch TV together. Whether its the good times or the bad times, getting through those times with her strengthens my respect and love for her.
You’re a good man, Periapex. Hopefully more couples will realize the importance of spending time alone together in meaningful ways, rather than having virtually no connection throughout the day and then expect hot sizzling sex at night. It just doesn’t work that way, at least not for long.
Hi there:
Oh I love this post! My husband and I have been married almost 2 years. However, we’ve known eachother for 17 years. He is my best friends ex husband.
I know, I know… yes, we are still best friends and she is the one that MADE us go out together. Oy vey!
Anyway, I’m lucky as all get out. I have an AWESOME ex-wife I get to deal with (’cause I just love her!) and my step son has been in my life since he was born. Easy as pie!
He and I have 4 kids total – none together, so when you say the time together is important – boy you aren’t kiddin! We really feel it when we don’t get it.
I liked what you said about holding hands when in an argument… or discussion. My first impulse was ACK! But it sure makes sense!
Thanks for the thought provoking post!
Love and Light,
Monica
Hi Monica! Sounds like you’ve got things going very well for you and your hubby. Good job!
Yes, holding hands during a…errr “discussion” when tempers are a bit heated really does calm down the emotions. It’s VERY hard to do when one or both are upset, but boy oh boy…does it ever work!
I appreciated today’s post. Even those of us without children can easily find ourselves trapped in monotonous routines. After some 13 years of marriage, my husband and I decided to negotiate new rules to ensure that we give each other undivided attention when communicating and spend time together that isn’t fettered to a household chore!
Hi Brenda! You are absolutely right, even couples without children also need to be sure to cultivate ways of keeping the spice and newness alive in their marriages.
The mundane, everyday chores of life affect couples that don’t have children just as much as those who do.
These are some good things to do, I spent 23 years with my ex from 1983 till 2006. These things really do help/Except for the holding hands while arguing. I did hold her hands, but it was to keep from getting that wack upside the head. A very nice blog here.
Hi Dwayne!
Yikes!, the holding hands suggestion was definitely not meant as a means to protect yourself from getting whacked upside the head.
Thank you for your comment and for stopping by. I really appreciate your time.
My hubby is a truck driver and so we spend most of our time apart. For us, several calls throughout the day even for silly things keeps us connected. Also, spending hours alone in bed just talking about anything and everything. We have to work hard to keep things strong. We spend every moment we can together when he is home to make up for the times he isn’t.
Hi Janera, it’s wonderful that you’ve found some romantic ways to stay connected even though you have to be apart due to work. I’m so glad you shared this with us.
My wife says that all of her friends are jealous of our relationship. We have been married for almost 10 years and we were and continue to be best friends. We talk about everything together, we spend time doing everything together, we plan dates without the children and we have an active social life that includes a few couples we have known for a few years.
Mostly, we love and support each other. This love and support is also shown to our children between us and them.
A babysitter works miracles. We had to wait a couple years after our marriage to find one. We also pay pretty good, so she is at our door with a phone call just about any time of the day.
Hometown Quotes, I apologize for the delay in approving your comment. It somehow ended up in the spam filter, but it’s fine now. I’m so glad that you and your wife are able to keep the romance alive in your marriage, and are remaining close friends. Keeping the friendship part of it is more important than many people realize.
Hiya Stephan! Giving babysitters a nice incentive to want to keep coming back for more babysitting gigs definitely has it’s perks, eh? haha Keep it fun!
Thanks for contributing this post to this week’s Carnival of Family Life, hosted at This Full House. Be sure to stop by on Monday, March 10, 2008, and support your fellow participants by checking out all of their wonderful contributions.
I agree with pp. The tip on holding hands during an argument really stuck out to me. I am the type that likes to walk away, but this would force me to confront the issue. We will have to give this one a try.
i read through ur writeup and iam impresed, infact the tips u suggested really save my marriage. please i want more tips on how to ones marriage work. thank
Mayowa, thank you. I will definitely be providing more tips and information on keeping the romance alive in marriages very soon. Stay tuned, and be sure to subscribe to my blog if you haven’t done so yet.
i wish to subcribe to ur blog, what are the procedure? is it free? please let me know
Mayowa, click on the big green button at the top left side of my site, and then you will be given the option of subscribing by email or by RSS feed. It is always free. Thank you and welcome to Telling It Like It Is.
Both of us are 100% committed to making it work. We realize that not everything is going to go smoothly, and there will be some rocky times. We’re not always going to agree about everything (that’s for sure!). But in the end, we are both willing to make compromises. It isn’t about getting your way everytime. Sometimes you have to let your spouse get their way.
Vince, Compromise is so important in marriage, rather than insisting on getting our own way about everything. Whether it is working through the hard times or sailing through the easy times, it’s very important to not have a “me, me, me” attitude.