Wherever there is something in their relationship that a couple, or even one partner, feels to be out of control, there is a chance that a timetable will help to solve the problem. It is not necessarily the whole answer, and it may not have to be used for long before things settle down and it can be discontinued. What the timetable essentially does is to treat both partners’ needs as legitimate, and simply say that there should be a fair division of the time that they spend together or separately, into time that is rewarding for Partner A and time that is rewarding for Partner B.
Timetables may therefore be seen as a fair way of rearranging a couple’s time together, to start to address each of their relationship problems in turn and making it rewarding for the partner who is giving something up by providing an alternative way of spending the time. They may be used in more serious conflict situations, such as a partner who is excessively jealous, a partner who desires sex more frequently than the other partner or a couple who are having intractable arguments and fights.
Exercise: My Relationship Advice For Setting up a Timetable
You need to establish what the activities are that need to be timetabled
Get together, if necessary using a time-limited discussion with no distractions such as TV, music or radio, and the telephone on ‘answer’
The partner who is feeling uncomfortable about the activity should say what the problem is and what they would like to be done
The other partner should then make an offer for a timetable
You should then agree on how long the activity should go on for, and how often
Then you need to plan when it should happen, how long for and how often (for example a visit to Partner A’s relatives on a weekend once a month for four hours)
For some activities there should be more specification (for example Partner A to sit at the computer for a maximum of three hours on Monday, Wednesday and Friday)
You might like to think of a mutual timetable, for example watching sports on TV for two hours twice a week and soap operas for half an hour daily