how do you even find your way back to your husband after the kids happen??

ok first, its not weird at all, that is basically the universal experience of having a 3 year old and a 9 month old at the same time, you are running a small chaotic business together and calling it a marriage lol. the falling asleep at minute 12 thing made me laugh because yeah, movies are a trap right now, too much effort to stay conscious. what actually helped us wasnt some big date night plan, it was dumb tiny stuff, like doing dishes together and just talking about nothing while we did it, or texting him something stupid during the day so he knows im thinking about him not just the kids. lowering the bar helped a ton too, connection doesnt have to be a whole event, it can be 10 minutes on the couch after bedtime where you actually look at each other instead of your phones. it comes back slower than you want but it does come back, this stage just eats everything for a while

not weird at all, that's basically every marriage with a toddler and a baby in the house. here's the thing most guys aren't saying out loud: he probably feels the exact same distance and has no clue what to do about it either. he's not upset, he's just as tapped out as you, and men especially go quiet when we don't know how to fix something. so nobody brings it up and you both just keep tag-teaming. the stuff that actually works is embarrassingly small. texting him something dumb mid-day. a hand on his back walking past in the kitchen. going to bed at the same time even if you just lie there ten minutes before passing out. skip the movie, you don't have the tank for it yet. what rebuilds it isn't one big date night, it's a hundred tiny five-second moments where you choose each other instead of just the logistics. that adds back up faster than you'd think.

not weird at all, it's honestly one of the most common seasons a marriage goes through and it doesn't mean anything is broken. what you're describing isn't distance from lack of love, it's distance from lack of bandwidth, and those are very different problems. try zooming out: right now you're both surviving, and survival mode just doesn't leave room for connection the way you used to have it. that's temporary, not permanent, even though it doesn't feel that way at minute 12 of any movie ever again for the next few years lol. the tiny stuff really does count more than the big date-night stuff right now, a hand on his back while you pass in the hallway, texting him something dumb during the day, ten minutes of actual eye contact instead of screens after they're down. you're not trying to recreate old closeness, you're building a new kind that fits this season. it comes back, slowly, and usually you don't notice it happening until one day you look up and you're just... there again.