I am amazed Mike hasn’t murdered me yet. Most men have to go through menopause once with their wife, I believe we have done it 2 times now and have been through Tamoxifen and Letrazole. Estrogen blockers are quite similar to going into menopause, at least for me. I will laugh, get extremely agitated and then cry within a 10 minute period. Over something like the dog puking on the carpet (not that my dogs ever puke on the carpet, they are too perfect for that 😉 ). Of course I don’t quite recognize the level of crazy I have going on, because telling a crazy woman she is being crazy is just a dangerous situation. Mike just tries to be as sane as possible while I am throwing fits over spilling something on my favorite t-shirt.
I eventually realize I am being “hormonal” and try to manage all of this, but it is hard on the both of us.
Cancer is hard on relationships, but it also teaches you to be better about not sweating the small stuff (when you aren’t in the middle of some random hormonal RAGE). I have learned in the struggles over the past 4 1/2 years that cancer has been in our lives, that I did marry the most amazing guy in the universe for me. We will be celebrating 8 years of marriage in a couple of weeks and I love every moment we have together.
Cancer likes to get in the way of us spending constructive time together. When I was at work all day and came home I was in too much pain and was too exhausted to do anything but watch TV. I didn’t have energy for conversations. I applauded getting food on the table (even if it was frozen ravioli from Trader Joe’s that I heated up on the stove). With so many interruptions in our lives we decided to implement date night so we could spend a night focused on each other. Cell phones have to be put away and the only screen that should be on is the TV screen if we are watching a movie. We had transitioning days on who decided what to do, which died fast because we would run out of energy to plan, so we would end up making dinner and watching TV.
I saw a date night popsicle stick idea in my feed one day and explored the concept on Pinterest. I wish I could share the link to the original idea I saw, but I didn’t save it. I did a simpler version (they had different colors that represented different groups of dates). So I went to the craft store and bought a box of wide popsicle sticks, a thin black crayola marker and a cute basket that had two jars – one for dates we haven’t done and the discard pile.
I researched date ideas all over the internet and put a list together on ideas that made sense for us. I added in some items from my list. I tried to mix in ideas for cheap dates and a few fancy date ideas The list is currently 67 date night ideas, but I have many more sticks to add more ideas in the future:
- Movie night – husband picks
- Movie night – wife picks
- Bowling
- Build a puzzle
- Video games
- Have a picnic
- Brunch for dinner
- Go to a comedy show
- Fondue night
- Brew beer & eat brats
- Make homemade cheese & cook with it
- Drive somewhere & watch the sunset
- Make dinner together
- Go to the museum & eat out
- Make homemade ice cream or sorbet
- Fly a kite w/picnic
- Dinner out, husband picks
- Dinner out, wife picks
- Go to a movie
- Pizza & boardgames
- Take dogs for a walk
- Dinner at a bar
- Make homemade pizzas or calzones
- Go to a play
- Movie marathon, 80’s movies
- Mexican night (food & activities)
- Italian night (food & activities)
- Computer game night
- Eat at a new restaurant
- Make a favorite dessert
- Make craft cocktails
- Go to a trivia night
- Aquarium
- Shop for something for the house
- Make origami
- Double date
- Go on a hike
- Go on a photo scavenger hunt
- Chili dogs and a comedy movie
- Planetarium
- Go see a band
- Korean BBQ
- Smores
- Go play pool
- Do something nice for someone
- Reenact first date
- Stargaze
- Asian night (food & movie)
- Build a blanket fort (& watch movies from it)
- Golf
- Make treats & drop some off at a friends
- Write each other letters
- Make holiday decor for next holiday
- Dress up and go somewhere nice
- Netflix TV show marathon
- Finger painting
- Go shopping & pick something under $10 for other
- Go buy a new boardgame & play it
- Buy a new video game and play it
- Act like tourists in own town
- Go to bakery and pick out treats
- Husband teaches wife hobby
- Wife teaches husband hobby
- Color in coloring books
- Make candlelight dinner
- Waffle night (fun toppings)
- Pirate themed date (YAR!)
We pull the idea a week before so I can buy tickets or plan. We have had some interruptions with other priorities coming up on date night, but we are going to get better at this! For next week I am figuring out how to plan a pirate date. I think Goonies may be involved. 🙂
With my energy up a little bit I have been crafting a lot more. Learning how to do needle point, painting, drawing, coloring and I need to stay away from Pinterest…
