Looks like you will have lots of time right now.

I don't think I see anything on the calendar after 7pm on any day. If you were to spend 3 hours with your husband on UA, 7pm to 10pm, you would have 21 hours of UA.

UA doesn't mean you have to leave the house. In fact, if you are a stay at home mom, it's probably more cost effective to do things at home.

Do you play games, cards, puzzles? Craft projects, restoring an old car, just getting projects around the home knocked out.

Then of course there is SF. That could be an hour a night right there. That could knock out 7 hours of UA all by itself.

I don't think the problem is time, unless I'm missing something in the schedule. I think the problem is an inability to see solutions and opportunities. An inability to think outside the box.

Maybe one night a week you get a sitter and go out, or you meet other moms and swap child watching duties, you watch for them on one night, or during the day if they need someone to help while they work. They take a night with your child. Pump some milk if it concerns you, and go out for four hours.

Everyday has 24 hours. If you sleep 8, that leaves 16. Even the busiest day you describe for your husband only lists 12 hours used, leaving four hours that day for UA.

Don't tell us what you can't do, what CAN you do?

Thank you.

See, this is what was confusing me. You are telling me we CAN have the UA time at home, which is what I was struggling with. I have no problem staying up until 10pm,11pm, etc. if it means we can have that "UA" time - the problem I had, was that I am being told that it MUST be outside the home, and that spending 2-3 hours in bed together or cuddling on the couch simply "doesn't count"? Am I missing something? I feel I am being told two different things. We absolutely have 15,20, 30 hours of available UA time that I can easily see - but it's just not as easy as "leaving the home" (particularly on week nights when there's nobody to babysit and nothing but a gas station open anyways)

**edit**

The key is not WHERE, it's WHAT and HOW. It's undivided attention.

You can do that at home, in the bedroom with nothing but candles, a feather duster, and chocolate syrup.

You can't sit on the couch and watch TV because the TV has your attention.

You can play a game of cards with your spouse because you are interacting with your spouse. You can't each get out your laptops and play individual games of solitare.

You can go out of your home, but if each of you has your nose stuck in your iPhone, then it's not UA time, even if you are the last ones in the restaurant.

Ditto for a movie. I guess a movie is better than the iPhone, but doing something may be even better such as a museum, the zoo, taking a walk, talking over dinner, racing one another on a go-kart track, talking trash as you putt on the mini-golf course.

It's about focusing your attention on your spouse, with no outside distractions.

Okay, thank you, this is all making a lot more sense to me now. I apologize for before, I think MB can work for us - it's just the idea that we had to leave the house so frequently and hire various babysitters/nurses to care for our child at night didn't seem reasonable for me (again, breastfeeding the newborn is the least of my worries, my son has medical problems, he cannot just be left with anybody) and honestly didn't make any sense from my POV. If all these things, that can be done inside the home can count, then I have no problem fitting 15,20,25+ hours of UA time. My husband refuses all overtime, I left work/school, we really do spend every one of his non-working hours together, we're just tired with an ill child/one on the way and need ideas to help continue UA time in an effective but realistic manner.

Alis, in order for UA time to be effective the majority of it needs to be spent AWAY from home. UA time at home is not effective so Dr Harley suggests spending your time AWAY from home. What enlightened ex told you is incorrect.

Dr Harley wrote this about spending UA time at home:


Dr Harley has discussed this issue for the last 2 days on his radio show, alis. He discissed it again today. Again, the MAJORITY of UA time needs to be spent away from home in order to be effective. Half measures will avail you nothing.

And this does NOT count for UA time. Obviously you could not have fallen in love while dating if you spent your dates at home with kids.

Nor does time after 10-11 count as UA time because it is when a couple is exhausted.

You don't disagree with ME, you disagree with Dr Harley and just basic MB concepts. That has no place on this thread. Would it be ok if we help this poster with MB concepts instead of your own agenda?

A reminder to posters to help this poster with Marriage Builders concepts. I see a lot of personal philosophies being promoted instead. Please stick to MB or refrain from posting. Thank you.

Are you really saying it is better to do nothing than to try to get as much UA time and live by MB as much as possible?

How many hours per week does it take to MAINTAIN romantic love in a marriage? Does it take 8? 12.5? 15? Will one remain in love if they only have 8 hours?

You have been here longer than me so I am sure you know the answer to that.

Do you have a link for this? I'm looking in the Policy of Undivided Attention and the two letters from couples that don't spend enough time together, and none of them specify that UA time has to be outside the home. No kids, no friends or family, and focus on the four intimate EN's, but none of them say where.

So does this mean that having SF at home does not count as UA time?

My point is that it takes 15 hours to MAINTAIN romantic love, so if the goal is romantic love, 8 hours will not achieve that. And it is not fair to mislead this poster into believing it will.

My H and I, for example, are romantically in love. I don't just say that, it is the result of the romantic love test. But when we drop below the 15 hour threshold, we can tell a difference. We begin to feel detached.

So hopefully you see how it would it be a mistake to tell someone that 8 hours will be effective when it clearly is not. It takes 15 to maintain and 20-25 to create.

"How much time do you need to sustain the feeling of love for each other? Believe it or not, there really is an answer to this question, and it depends on the health of a marriage. If a couple is deeply in love with each other and find that their marital needs are being met, I have found that about fifteen hours each week of undivided attention is usually enough to sustain their love. When a marriage is this healthy, either it's a new marriage or the couple has already been spending that amount of time with each other throughout their marriage. Without fifteen hours of undivided attention each week, a couple simply can't do what it takes to sustain their feeling of love for each other."http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3350_attn.html

He recently wrote that over on the weekend forum. But he also has talked ALOT on the radio show about this very thing recently. He spoke of it yesterday and again today. I would go pull up his show from yesterday because how he spoke about he and Joyce went out many nights a week when their kids were little. While some UA time can be spent at home, the bulk needs to be away from home to have an effect.

And of course he doesn't discount SF at home. What he says is that the majority of UA time should be spent away from home, away from kids. The idea would be to go out on a date for an evening, meeting the top 3 intimate ENs and then come home and have SF.

Okay, a few things I am reading:

"Corollary 1: Privacy

The time you plan to be together should not include children (who are awake), relatives or friends. Establish privacy so that you are better able to give each other your undivided attention. "

And of course, this which I do agree with:

"First, I recommend that you learn to be together without your children. This can be very difficult for many couples, especially when children are very young..."

And then in another link
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/mb.cfm/4/32/283

He says that 1 hour per night is fine as long as you make up for it on the weekend (which is very doable).

So I guess I am still conflicted as to whether UA can exist at home or not. It seems, from his first statement (taken from the UA policy link) that it DOES, as long as it is 'proper' UA, but I am also hearing that it does not.

I wrote that ^ before you responded Melody, I see what you are saying, thank you. My husband is training tonight but I have invited grandpa over for that time, I am going to ask him if we can set up a more regular babysitting schedule for the weekends. He is really our only one who can do it right now as we have just moved here and have no friends/community. I am a stay at home mom but I also don't speak the local language (I'm not in the US) so it will take me some time to reach out for any sort of childcare-sharing groups. Local daycares all reject us because of our son's medical needs.

**edit**

Last warning! Stop disrupting this thread.

Ok, you do understand he is talking about 1 hour DATES in that article, right? He is saying 1 hour DATES during the week and that would leave you 10 hours on the weekend.

And again, I have posted his quote several times saying it needs to be spent away from home.

Alis, thanks for asking this question for it has been on my mind as well. I opened a thread about a week ago with a very similar topic. How to have UA when you both work andhave a young child with some special needs. We also can't leave our child with any person. We rely on family. I've found we can have UA time during the week at home in the evening, one weekday lunch at hubby's workplace and with one weekend evening outside the home. That works really well for us. If we had to do UA time mostly outside the home, it would be very difficult for us given our work schedules and reliance on family sitters. I love MB, but MB has to work for our situation as well. I can't quit my job and neither can my husband. We'd be fools to put our jobs in jeopardy in this economy.

Elswyth, how many hours does that get you TO? The basic issue that I am seeing is that cheating on UA time only cheats the result. It is not something that is going to reap results if you chop it back to 8 or 10 hours. And yes, you can decide how much or little time you spend, but you are not going to maintain the love in your marriage if you go below 15 hours for long.

And quality does matter. Couples dont fall in love by sitting around their homes in their sloppy clothes with all the distractions of home. Quality UA time is spent out when you are energetic, dressed up, feel good and look good.

Dr Harley even states in his book, Effective Marriage Counseling, that he will not see a couple who won't commit to the 15 hours each week because "my program won't work without it." if they won't do that he tells them to find someone else.

My point is that this is one area where corner cutting just cuts the intended result because Marriage Builders WON'T work for your marriage without that step. Dr Harley is very honest about that.