Eight weeks to find your footing again as a couple: a plan

This plan does not assume that you have more time. It assumes that for eight weeks you change one thing per week, and in this order. The order is not random: the first four weeks lower the load, and only then does a change in the relationship stand any chance at all.

Two mistakes are the most common. The first: starting with week 5. Two exhausted people do not have good conversations. The second: putting something you do together at the very start, going out for dinner one evening or going away for a weekend. That comes last, not first. Two people who are no longer interested in each other will sit side by side in a restaurant too, and go home just as much strangers as before.

Before you start: the one rule

One thing each week. Not two. Whatever worked from the week before stays. Whatever did not work gets dropped and is not repeated.

If a week falls through because the baby was ill, then it falls through. You do not start again from the beginning, you carry on where you were.

Week 1: Sleep

The step: This week, each of you gets one night when you are not on duty. Not the same night for both. Whoever is off duty sleeps somewhere else if possible, or at least in another room with earplugs.

Why first: Lack of sleep does not reduce love, it reduces the ability to be generous. With enough sleep, most of the conflicts in this phase would not be conflicts at all. Every other step works better once this one is in place.

What goes wrong: The mother gives her night back because it feels wrong. Do not do that. One night a week is not a luxury, it is the foundation for everything that follows.

Week 2: The list

The step: Separately, each of you spends ten minutes writing down everything that comes up in a normal week in this family. Everything. Including the planning, the thinking ahead and the remembering. Then you compare the two lists.

What comes out of it: One of the two lists is almost always missing an entire area. That is not ill will. What you do not do, you do not see.

The rule for the conversation: Nothing gets redistributed this week. You only compare. Whoever starts negotiating straight away ends up arguing instead of understanding.

Week 3: One area changes hands

The step: One complete area of responsibility goes to the person who has not had it so far. Not a task, an area. Examples: everything to do with the paediatrician. Everything to do with clothes and sizes. Everything to do with authorities and forms.

The sentence that matters:

“From now on this is completely yours. I will not check up on it.”

What goes wrong: The appointment gets missed, the size is wrong, and the task gets taken back. Whoever takes it back has it for good. Let it go wrong. The child will come to no harm, and the other person will learn more about your load this week than in ten conversations.

Week 4: One break each

The step: This week, each of you gets two hours that are not up for negotiation. Not at the same time. Not together. And not only for the one who happens to be struggling more right now.

Why both: If only one of you gets breaks, a tally of debts builds up, and in the end that costs more than the two hours were worth.

The rule: In these two hours you may not do anything that would otherwise be useful to someone. Shopping does not count. Tidying up does not count.

Week 5: Interest, not outings

The step: From this week on, twenty minutes a day in which you take an interest in each other. No appointments, no money, no housework, no parenting questions. And not just sitting next to each other, but asking.

Why exactly here: This is the smallest step back to each other that actually works, and it comes before anything you do together. Not going out for dinner, not the cinema, not going away. First, wanting to know again what is going on inside the other person.

If nothing comes to mind: That is the information, not the obstacle. Start with a question that has no routine answer:

“What has been on your mind this week that had nothing to do with us?”

Then ask a second question on the same subject, instead of answering with your own version. That is the whole difference.

Why daily and not one evening a month: Because one evening a month carries too much expectation. Nobody makes up for half a year on a Tuesday.

Week 6: The interrupted argument

The step: This week you agree on two things for when a conflict comes up.

First, an exit sentence for when it tips over:

“I am too wound up right now. Give me half an hour, then I will come back to you.”

Thirty minutes is no accident: that is how long the body needs to come out of alarm mode. Ten minutes is not enough.

Second: if an argument is interrupted by the baby, it gets an appointment. “Sunday after the nap.” Otherwise unfinished conflicts pile up, and at some point it is no longer about the dishes but about everything.

Week 7: One sentence of appreciation before anything is asked for

The step: This week, each of you tells the other once, and specifically, what you see. Not “thanks for everything”. But rather:

“I noticed that you get the bag ready every morning without anyone having to say anything.”

Why this is the most uncomfortable point on the list: Because it feels unfair to give appreciation when you are not getting any yourself. And because it works anyway: a person who feels seen gives more. A person who only feels criticised withdraws.

It applies in both directions. That is why each of you does it once.

Week 8: Taking stock, and the first thing you do together

Part one: Sit down once and go through the seven weeks. Three questions, each of you answers:

1. Which of the seven things changed the most?
2. What made no difference?
3. What do we keep, and who makes sure it happens?

The third question is the most important. Anything that nobody is responsible for stops after three weeks.

Part two: Now, and only now, arrange something for just the two of you. A walk is enough. It does not have to be an evening or a weekend.

The reason it comes at the end and not at the start: after seven weeks it is no longer a rescue attempt. It is simply a lovely hour, and that is exactly why it works.

What usually comes out of it: Two or three of the seven steps worked, the others did not. That is normal. Keep the ones that worked and let the others go.

What this plan cannot do

It cannot treat depression. If one of you has felt no joy for more than two weeks, feels cut off, or cannot sleep even when sleep would be possible, then this plan is not the first step. Your midwife, gynaecologist or GP is. In Germany, support is also available from Schatten und Licht e.V. and from the TelefonSeelsorge on 0800 1110111.

It cannot change a pattern that is older than your parenthood. If you were already having the same argument before the baby, this plan will lower the load, and the pattern will stay. That needs something else.

And it does not apply if you are afraid of how your partner will react. Then this is not a question for the two of you as a couple. You can reach the “Violence against Women” helpline (in Germany) around the clock and free of charge on 116 016.

What I want you to take with you

Eight weeks sounds long when you are exhausted. At the same time, it is the shortest route I know.

The reason for the order is the heart of this plan. Most couples start with an evening together, and it disappoints, because two people who are no longer interested in each other have nothing to say to each other in a restaurant either. Others start with talking, and that fails because of the exhaustion.

Once sleep, then the load, then responsibility have been sorted out, interest in week 5 suddenly becomes possible. And the evening together in week 8 is then simply a lovely evening.

Start with week 1. Just that.