My H and I have been doing regular UA time outside the house for about 4 years. It has not restored the love in our relationship but I think it's helped our marriage a lot.

I'm pretty close to withdrawal but I want to do everything I can! My husband puts time with my at a pretty high priority and that shows something, I guess.

Anyway, I'm not enjoying our UA time. I read constantly here that we are supposed to be having fun and meeting intimate needs. I don't know how to go about doing that. I'm looking over the recreational enjoyment inventory my husband and I filled out a while back. I'm confused about so many of the activities. We have small children so I have zero illusions about having fun at home while they are here. I am also the type to get distracted by stuff around the house (one of the reasons I've persisted with MB is that Dr. H describes me to a T. I'm totally typical) We do have a huge UA chunk several Sundays a month when the kids are out of our house.

Anyway, we have been using UA time in the car, walking, eating nice dinners, hiking, and shopping, bowling. My husband does not make these activities enjoyable which is the main problem, I suppose. But honestly, I'm bored of those activities and doing them with someone else doesn't sound fun either. (But I haven't tried it. I've focused on making my H my main companion)

According to my H, he is enjoying our dates. I don't feel like I'm being love busted really on our dates...

So I'm looking thru this inventory and I don't see how many of these activities can be done outside the house and involve IC or Affection. We don't do either on our dates so it's moot but I know that's the whole point of UA!
Here are some examples that got a zero or higher for us:
Watching sports
Bicycling
Checkers
Chess
Rock concerts
Cribbage
Monopoly
Movies
Plays
Poker
Pool
Rummy
sculpting/pottery
Woodworking
Puzzles
Scrabble
Comedy shows


How does anyone have IC with other people around??

CG, first off, how many hours per week are you getting? your UA time should be spent doing things you both love to do. My H and I have great IC on our dates in the car on the way to the destination. We also have great conversation at restaurants when have dinner.

I would focus on the quality of your UA time because that seems to be the big miss.

Are you actually scheduling and counting the hours you spend together on the worksheet?

What is he doing that you aren't enjoying your time with him? If you don't find the activity enjoyable, with or without him, that defeats the entire purpose of UA time.

He does not practice any of the friends of conversation. He is not loving or affectionate. He seems bored. He thinks about/talks about work the whole time (he is very talkative) He knows our marriage is falling apart. I have sent him the conversation article. Two dates ago was actually decent (but I was still bored) our last date was pretty bad. We were on a beach vacation.

I can't find anything in Dr. Harley's writings about leaving in the absence of abuse or infidelity when you have small children. It doesn't seem like straight-forward neglect when he spends all his time with me with and without kids. He will drop anything to help me. He just struggles with IB and need-meeting. We have signed up for coaching twice. It didn't work, even our coach(es) seemed puzzled.

Dr. Harley did not answer my question on the private forum.

Yes, we have 15 hours of babysitting. We sometimes get less than 15 hours but that is because H wants to end our date early so he can go to bed etc. But for 4 years we have been getting pretty consistent UA.

So for 4 years, I plan, dress up, do my hair and we drive for a while and then eat somewhere nice and them shop and drive home...or we hike/shop/eat etc.

4 years is a long time to feel sad and heart-broken after every date.

I would discuss this with your MB coach and have her help your husband become an interesting date. Who is your coach?

Our coaching has expired. Sandy tried for a year and then thought Kim could help. We never got past lesson 1.

My husband does not want outside coaching. He wants me to give him feedback.

Do you give him feedback about not meeting your needs on dates? It sort of defeats the whole purpose of dates if he isn't going to meet your needs. Does he want you to be in love with him?

My husband expends enormous energy doing the things he thinks should make me love him. He's completely familiar with MB.

He *maybe* thinks I *should* be in love with him?

He's mentioned that it's too hard?

In the past he's mentioned that he's resentful of having to do extra work now to make up for mistakes of the past.

Tomorrow night is another date night. What exactly should I do?

Try relaxing and just having fun.

Sorry this got off track...
Are there some activities on the recreation inventory that satisfy only the EN of RC?

Where should we go to play board games, for instance?

Why are there activities on the inventory that blatantly don't meet the requirements for UA time?

Did Dr. H ever respond to your recent private forum question? It is buried now. You should have lifetime responses there.

He did not...

But I'm trying to ask a different question...

Have you ever dealt with depression? Do you enjoy other facets of your life? Living in a bad marriage can make you depressed, but sometimes when you are depressed, you CAN't feel positive emotion. Assuming that you don't deal with clinical depression, which would be a small exception,

then maybe the problem is clear: Your husband is getting his needs met, and you aren't.

The RC/SF is usually more for the husband's need, but then the AF/IC for the wife. It sounds like his side of the 4 hour perfectly planned UA date is being met. That's why he might be happy and you are left wanting.

Out at dinner in a quiet corner with hubby facing the wall. LOL. But actually, I like having fewer distractions too.

Or on a long walk, or even a long drive. But he has to be willing to contribute the Intimacy/Feelings to the conversation and also something for affection.

How about supplying him an affection/IC potential list at dinner and asking how he would feel about trying a couple that are easy for him?

Right. But I had noticed your other one, and was really looking forward to seeing Dr. Harley's response. Probably not as much as you.

I had to make an affection list as part of our online program. I refer him to it. He has never once done them all. They are easy and not dissimilar from Dr H's suggestions. The coaches weren't able to get him to do it.

I think I get where you are coming from, and it really depends on how each person's preferences. If your idea of affection is making out, and whispering sweet nothings, then that would be tough to do, although possible while kayaking.

For us, it is really tough to find the right RC. But what works for us is often different from what works for others because of personality types and lifestyle. In our case, Dinner meets IC/AF for me, a Movie meets RC and relaxation for hubby, with some AF for me during, and then SF. However, if we sat in the movie and my spouse was glued to the screen with no affectionate overtures during, it would not count as UA for me, but it would relax him enough that we could then move forward with IC/AF/SF after. Most of the activities which my husband enjoys would be difficult for me to be his favorite companion. We have been willing to try some new things, and are surprised at what we have enjoyed the most! Some of the things we have enjoyed are:

Listening and discussing MB Radio together
Playing non-competitive tennis
Picking berries (One of our favorites!)
Planning home projects (now that Lovebusters have diminished) Quick drives
Picnics at private parks
Internet Christmas shopping/Salad restaurant
Building puzzles together. (Try this! If you sit next to each other, it is very relaxing, calming and can potentially create an environment of affection if your husband can utilize it.)

Dr. Harley says that you need to get out of the house to enjoy UA time. I agree with this. However, something like playing a game or building a puzzle would be difficult to do on the go. So, we have made a corner of our room dedicated to IC/UA/Planning etc.
Sometimes we take a drive and do our planning in the car, but do our UA time at home. It can be a more natural flow to affection and SF due to privacy. For us, just the walk from the car to our bedroom can potentially destroy the mood.

If you do decide to try some of these activities geared toward privacy for IC/AF, I would make sure not to quit the physically active RC because it is really important for men (and women.) We are working also to try to find things which can work for us.

I would love to do games or puzzles but it is posted here daily that UA time at home does.not.count and is totally pointless.

I'm not sure that needs would be met but they aren't being met by going out to dinner anyway...

Yep, it is posted here daily. Because that is the ultimate goal. And the only reason that we have done it differently is because we dealt with extenuating circumstances which made going into public a more negative experience than staying at home. And had we not done that, we would have had NO need meeting because for various reasons, the going out wasn't working. Intimacy was sorely lacking in our marriage, and home is where the majority of that could happen. Having said that, going out is really important too, and we are still working on that transition. I would suggest that you forward this question on to Dr. Harley. Because what I have to say may or may not apply to you. I am only sharing what I have experienced with the challenges in this area of UA time.

Coffeegirl, I can hear how disheartened you are. It feels hopeless, especially when your husband is complaining about how much work it takes to make you happy. Geez, being divorced, he will trade one type of hard work for another, and fail repeatedly at need meeting in future relationships.

It sounds like he has pretty much given up. Do you think that this is because he feels defeated, he doesn't understand, or because he doesn't care anymore? Did you see ANY progress after 2 years?