I Surprised My Wife With Our First Date Since We Had Our Son. Big Mistake.

Care and Feeding Photo illustration by Slate. Photo by Getty Images Plus. Care and Feeding is Slate’s parenting advice column. Have a question for Care and Feeding? Submit it here. Dear Care and Feeding, My wife, “Cindy,” and I have a 2-year-old son, “Sam.” He’s a pretty good kid, easy going. There’s a high schooler called “Anna” who lives on our street. We’ve known her since she was a kid. She dropped a flier advertising her babysitting services. We haven’t been on a date since he was born, so I decided I’d surprise my wife. I had Anna meet me at the house after daycare pickup. She’d met Sam before, and I knew they got on great. Then I went to pick my wife up at work and surprise her with a dinner date. Well, when I got to her office, she was surprised all right, but not happy about it! She immediately started freaking out about where the baby was (she still calls Sam a baby, which annoys me). I explained I hired Anna to watch him and she freaked out even more! She said a babysitter needed specific certifications, an interview, and training. She made us rush home. When we got there, Anna and Sam were having a blast, but Cindy just asked Anna how much we owed her and sent her home. She told me to never do that again and didn’t talk to me the rest of the night. We have not talked about it since, but I’m really at a loss about why she is so upset. We have known Anna since she was a kid. She’s an honors student. She was totally OK watching our son for a few hours while we got dinner. I didn’t ask her to do bath or bedtime, just play with our son for a little bit. I think my wife really overreacted here. I want to try again with Anna to go on a date, but honestly I’m scared to ask my wife. How long do you think I should wait until I bring it up again? —Doghouse Dad Dear Doghouse Dad, Before you even ask your wife out on any more surprise dates, you have to find out what freaked her out so much. Ask her why she feels uncomfortable with Anna. Is it really about her lack of her properly accredited babysitter’s certification? Or maybe she still thinks of Anna as a kid? Or something else? Be curious. And as much as you may not think Sam is a baby anymore, your wife still does. Expressing your annoyance at how she reacted isn’t gonna get her more excited to join you in a fun-filled night at your local Chili’s anytime soon. Be empathetic! But you asked how long you should wait, and I’ll give you a timetable: I’d say give it a month. Talk to you wife, help her communicate how she’s feeling. Don’t roll your eyes; simply check-in and see what’s wrong. Once you’ve cracked that door with her and she sees you’re coming at this from a good place, you can work on finding a babysitter solution that works for both of you so you can have a stress-free night of eating baby back ribs together until you bust out of your pants. Please keep questions short (<150 words), and don‘t submit the same question to multiple columns. We are unable to edit or remove questions after publication. Use pseudonyms to maintain anonymity. Your submission may be used in other Slate advice columns and may be edited for publication. Dear Care and Feeding, My wife “Andrea” and I have a 17-month-old son, “Luke,” and she is absolutely losing her shit over a mistake my 19-year-old brother, “Brett,” made while he was over the other day. They were all in the kitchen, Luke in in his high chair, when Andrea had to step out of the room for a minute and asked Brett to keep an eye on Luke. Brett says he was eating some grapes, and Luke pointed to the grapes, so he put some on his highchair tray for him. When Andrea got back and saw the grapes in front of our son, she snatched them away and began screaming at Brett for giving them to him without cutting them in half. He apologized and said he’d never heard of doing that, but it wasn’t enough. She slapped him in the face and threw him out. Now she says she doesn’t want my brother around our son again because he “nearly killed him.” Brett is the youngest in my entire family—the youngest of my siblings, and the youngest between us and all our cousins. He doesn’t have any experience with really little kids and honestly wasn’t aware about grapes being a choking hazard for very young children. He’s tried apologizing to Andrea, but she refuses to speak to him. What can I do to get my wife to understand Brett truly meant no harm and to come to her senses? —Banished Brother Dear Banished Brother, I absolutely understand your wife’s insanity when it comes to this grape thing. When my kids were that age I would jump across a table Matrix-style from the opposite side of the room if I spotted any of my kids sticking any food smaller than a cupcake in their mouth. Grapes were a bad one for me—but so were hot dogs. We cut them in half, but I would have preferred mushing them into a paste and spread on a bun until my kids were driving age. We had a babysitter who never cut grapes and would send us pictures of our then 1-year-old with a plate full of what appeared to be 18 slippery giant green grapes. I’d worry about him every time he went over there. Like, what else is she feeding him? Thumb tacks? Rusty bolts from an old lawnmower? Lye? The mind reels! It seems like the difference between me and your wife is that I absolutely know I was being overprotective and paranoid about it. But your wife slapping the shit out of your brother and then banning him for life over what is a fairly common oversight for any person without kids, especially a clueless but well-meaning 19-year-old, is uncalled for. Tell her to apologize, and nudge her towards reconciliation with your brother, though I get the sense he’s not going to want to come back until your son is 12-years-old. And, honestly, who can blame him? But tell her to fix this. —A.J. More Parenting Advice From Slate My husband and I have two kids, ages 14 months and 2 years old. Ever since the second was born, I’ve been kind of uncomfortable with the fact that my husband is NEVER alone with both of them, outside of me going to the bathroom or taking a shower. Anytime I have somewhere to be, he has at least one of his parents come over or he goes to their house or his sister’s house with the kids. Never miss new Slate Advice columns Get the latest from Prudie and our columnists in your inbox each weekday, plus special bonus letters on Saturdays. Advice Family Kids