The "Spouse Temptation"

My goal this week was to avoid sweets. I actually was doing pretty good yesterday. I didn't get a candy bar at the gas station (I got some nuts instead). I got my daughter a treat without getting one for myself and even resisted finishing it when she decided she didn't like it anymore. Then, after dinner my husband declared "I'm going to get ice cream, you want anything?"

Well. Geez. How can you say no to that? Someone is offering to hand deliver ice cream to your hand. I can quite literally sit on my butt without exerting a single muscle and get ice cream.

I thought about my promise on this blog and my goal and some how managed to reply, "I'm trying to give up sweets, so I think I'll pass." Yeah. Mental high five!

My husband responded, "Oh come on. You can start tomorrow. We'll start together. What do you want?"

That was the point my already shaky resolve crumbled. I got ice cream and felt quite guilty eating it. Okay. I felt a little bit guilty. Mostly I was thinking "Mmmm this is good ice cream."

The "spouse temptation" is part of the reason I'm where I am. We took our bad habits and shared them with each other. I like to eat out and have carbs. He likes sweets. Now we eat out eating carbs and sweets. It's a recipe for disaster.

Early in our marriage we didn't share the same physical activities we did individually. I ran, but he never joined me and eventually I gave up running to spend time with him. He would play sports with friends, but soon he spent those weekends with me. We did play raquetball as a couple for a while, but that fell away as well.

Now we have both realized that we need a change, but that means we have to change what we do as a couple. Instead of movie night, we need to go on a family walk. Instead of coloring with our daughter, we play tag or hide-in-seek. Okay. There is still a very healthy amount of coloring going on for those of you that are concerned about her artistic talents.

It's been difficult to change what we do as couple because we have always done this. We adapted our hobbies to include each other, but we didn't bring the healthy active hobbies with us. I suppose it was way more fun to watch movies with a new love interest than go for a jog with each other. But that's been years and years ago, so it's time for a change. And who doesn't like new ideas for dates? Weight room anybody?