What Did I Do Good Today?

Once the dust settled after my husband and I got engaged, married and moved into our new home, we found that we had fallen into a relationship slump. It was about a year into our marriage by this time and we had settled into an unsettling routine.

There were no big fights, yelling or arguments, we had just found that we didn't enjoy each other's company as much as we had. We pretty much stayed in different rooms whenever we were home at the same time and our conversations were reduced to discussing what was for dinner or if the mail had came. In a weird way, we had drifted apart. We were newlyweds, this wasn't suppose to happen.

One day it just hit me how awful things had gotten so I talked with him about it. He was feeling the same way, not really even enjoying my company either. So, we decided to work together to improve our relationship.

One thing that I invented during this time was the game "What did I do good today?" Right before going to sleep, we had to tell each other one thing that the other person did good during the day that we are thankful for. I attached two rules to the game:

1. What the other person did good had to be something that wasn't so obvious. For him, that meant he couldn't tell me that he enjoyed dinner or that he appreciated me cleaning. It had to be deeper and more thoughtful than the obvious things I had done during the day.
   
2. We also couldn't use the same "good thing" two nights in a row.

Over time, things returned to normal with us, and I attribute a lot of it to this "game" which put us both into a more positive frame of mind. The funny thing is that even now, almost 10 years into our marriage, we continue to have our nightly ritual of "What did I do good today?"

Last night's was that I appreciated that he took the initiative to get the twins ready for bed without me having to shout "It's time for bed!" And for me, he said that he appreciated that I called to say that I was running a few minutes late.

I'm looking forward to starting What Did I Do Good Today with the twins when they get a little older. It's a great way to remember to tell someone every day how much you appreciate him or her.

Is there something special that you and your spouse/family do to let each other know how special he/she/they are?