With a few more weeks of quarantine left ahead, chances are you and your partner are starting to get on each others’ nerves. During this challenging time, it’s crucial to focus on building friendship and intimacy within your relationship so that it not only survives but actively thrives. Here are a few tips to help you with this:

1. Set aside some alone time

At first, you may have been happy seeing more of your partner each day. However, as time went on, you likely started feeling a little less enthusiastic about spending all your time together.  

According to Marriage and Family Expert Hannah Eaton, ‘One of the challenges that couples in long-term committed relationships experience is learning how to navigate contrasting desires for individuality and togetherness.’ This is particularly relevant now when the impact of being confined to a single place together removes the element of choice. This could result in frustration, anger, and resentment.

To ensure this is not the case, work together to formulate clear boundaries on when you will be together and communicating and when you will be separate and not. An effective way of doing this is to follow your previous routine – working in different places, if possible. Make sure that each of you has sufficient time on your own to do what you need to.

2. Make your together time count

In his book The Intentional Family, Bill Doherty talks about the importance of having certain “rituals of connection.” These are the things that you specifically do together that help solidify your relationship. Some of these can fall by the wayside when your daily routine is disrupted as it is now.

Chances are that you already had many of these within your relationship. Perhaps you would kiss your partner goodbye before they left for work, take time in the evening to chat about your day, or set aside one night a week to do something special together.

Aim to bring back as many of these as you can. Setting aside deliberate time together is particularly important now. The Gottman Institute has some great suggestions for date night activities to help you and your partner reconnect.  

3. Get to know your partner – again

According to Dr. Gottman’s Sound Relationship House theory, marital friendship is what sustains relationships. This is established when partners have a clear understanding of each other’s inner worlds – their hopes, dreams, interests, and feelings

Even if you have been together a while, this is still something you need to work on because people are continually changing. This pandemic most likely has had a significant impact on both of you. Take time to find out more about what’s going on inside your partner’s head right now and how they are feeling about things.

4. Talk through your concerns

Leading on from the previous point, it’s highly possible you could be suffering from symptoms of stress and anxiety in these uncertain times. If not worked through correctly, these could cause go on to cause issues within your relationship.

An effective way of ensuring that this is not the case is to make sure you are regularly communicating openly and honestly with one another. Dr. Gottman emphasizes the importance of turn-taking and active listening, alongside suspension of judgment, empathy, and avoiding problem-solving in such importance stress-reducing/ intimacy building conversation.

5. Show your partner that you care

This enforced time together presents you with an excellent opportunity for focusing on all the things you truly appreciate about your partner and for allowing them to know how much you respect and value them.

According to Zack Brittle, author of The Relationship Alphabet, ‘sharing fondness and admiration in intentional, consistent, faithful ways is the antidote to contempt and, more importantly, it increases the amount of affection and respect in a relationship.’

References

Brittle, Z., & Lmhc. (2020, January 21). Share Fondness and Admiration. Retrieved from https://www.gottman.com/blog/share-fondness-and-admiration/

Doherty, W. J. (2002). The intentional family: simple rituals to strengthen family ties. New York: Quill.

Eaton, H. (2020, April 6). Redefining Individuality and Togetherness During Quarantine. Retrieved from https://www.gottman.com/blog/redefining-individuality-and-togetherness-during-quarantine/

Gottman, J. M., & Gottman, J. S. (2018). The science of couples and family therapy: behind the scenes at the love lab. New York: W.W Norton & Company.