Couple Dating
He said: So there’s a huge difference between single dating and couple dating. The problem lies in the fact that people want to group them all together. Now when you’re single, it’s a one shot deal — make plans, pick her up, pay for date and drop her off. Easy! You can plan ahead and take time to put thought into a nice outing. Even the interaction with the female is different. When you call/text a girl to take her out, she says “Sure how about next week? I need to get a sitter…” or something like that. She’s compromising and understanding and even patient. Most times she keeps her word and doesn’t stand you up. She’s actually looking forward to spending time with you. You guys go out, have a great time and you’re both looking forward to seeing each other again.
But when you’re a couple…. things start to ADD up, such as:
- All of a sudden the places you’ve went before aren’t good enough or the places you’ve went with everyone else in the world aren’t options anymore.
- Now you have to run everything by them because they’re picky about what they want to do. For the record, this takes the spontaneity out of dating.
- You become more hesitant about taking her out, like you do want to plan a date to make things better. You think that this could be a waste of money if she’s still going have a funky attitude. There’s a thin line here and it’s always a gamble.
- This part some females don’t understand — a man that cares for his woman will do little things and sometimes big things to make her life easier. You may buy groceries, pick something up on the way home, order pizza because she’s too tired to cook. Maybe you offer to go to the movies tonight, then buy her the new J’s that drop on Saturday and you buy a jacket that would look crazy on her son. You even consider your kids and maybe her kids, use more gas to see her often, or do more mini activities like Happy Hour and Monday Night Football at a local bar.
Finally, money is more of a factor now. You have to check your bank account because you want to do something nice for her or take her out, but you pretty much have just enough to make it to the next paycheck. So then you hold off. Sometimes you do have enough money but you aren’t sure if she will act up because she’s been acting real funky lately. So you say to yourself, “Man Imma just hold off on that right now.”
When you find yourself cutting back on a lot of things, the fun of dating is taken away by rules and regulations. I don’t like boundaries when it comes to enjoying your company. I try to still keep dates a secret. I say “Listen babe Friday we’re going out, wear a nice dress….” and leave the rest up to your imagination. The more you try to control the situation the more uninterested I become. #HeSaidSheSaid
She said: I think once you are a couple (married or unmarried) the frequency of dates decreases over time. Once you both decide to be exclusive (dating ONLY one person or said “I do”), dating behavior stays the same in the beginning. He and I are still very much into each other. I would say we are going out at least twice a week for the first year. The frequency of dates begins to change based on our schedules.
After the first year, I noticed we are going on less dates. When we do go out, it is mostly around special occasions, birthdays or holidays. But the weekly dates do not happen anymore. We start to go to the movies separately — he goes with his friends to see his movie and I go with my friends to see mine. Restaurants dates are replaced with meals at home or at our parents’ house. We start to do more activities as a group or at home (i.e. game nights with friends/family or rent a movie). We get too comfortable with each other. I am not putting much effort into keeping the romance going and he is not taking me out anymore.
In theory, it’s important that a couple (married or not) date on a continuous basis. It is hard to make time for dates — especially if the couple has children, your partner is far away or one person works two jobs. My solution is commit to at least one date per month. Once a week can be too much, especially if the couple resides in the same house. I think the monthly date should be special — like visiting a place he or she always wanted to go to (i.e. the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in D.C.). These dates should be well planned and money should be set aside for them.
